1. Feminism An introduction for ICUDS By Ed Middleton Dec ‘12

2. Contents What? and Why? The Feminist Movement Employment Objectification Gender Roles Intersectionality

3. Introduction • GENDER IS A SOCIAL CONSTRUCT • Both genders are equal • “Different but equal” • Identical • Differences: • Biological • Socialised

4. The Feminist Movement • First wave: • De jure/mandated inequalities • Second wave: • De facto/non-official inequalities • Third wave: • Post-structural • Deconstruction of gender

5. Employment – What? • Pay gap • Vertical segregation • Positions of management • Horizontal segregation • Types of career • Perception of colleagues

6. Employment – Why? Maternity (genuine costs + excuse) Lack of role models ‘Old boys club’ Similarity bias Gender roles Socialised behaviour

7. Employment - Solutions • Quotas for boards • Incentives to work • Tax breaks • Subsidies in education • State sponsored childcare • Educational focus

8. Objectification – What? • instrumentality: the treatment of a person as a tool for the objectifier's purposes; • denial of autonomy: the treatment of a person as lacking in autonomy and self-determination; • inertness: the treatment of a person as lacking in agency, and perhaps also in activity; • fungibility: the treatment of a person as interchangeable with other objects; • violability: the treatment of a person as lacking in boundary-integrity; • ownership: the treatment of a person as something that is owned by another (can be bought or sold); • denial of subjectivity: the treatment of a person as something whose experiences and feelings (if any) need not be taken into account. • reduction to body: the treatment of a person as identified with their body, or body parts; • reduction to appearance: the treatment of a person primarily in terms of how they look, or how they appear to the senses; • silencing: the treatment of a person as if they are silent, lacking the capacity to speak.

9. Objectification – What? Pornography Advertising Individual interactions Sexualisation of girls and women Narratives about women

10. Objectification – Why? • Harms of pornography: • Coercive • Violent • Deprecating • Rape culture • Paedophilia and abusive relationships • Value of women • By men and women

11. Gender Roles – What? • Personality • Career • Parenting • Component of: • Employment problems • Objectification • Basically everything

12. Gender Roles – Why? • Self-actualisation • Benefits to society • Family division of labour • Harmful effects of above • Other groups affected by defined genders: • Men • Transgender people • LGBTQIA

13. Gender Roles – Solution? Education Up-bringing Positive Discrimination Education

14. Intersectionality • Interactions with other minority identities: • Sexuality • Ethnicity • Class • Religion

15. BUT IT AFFECTS MEN TOO… …Who cares?