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Simone de Beauvoir

Simone de Beauvoir. (1908-1986). Background . upper class family conservative Catholic materialistic women expected to be subservient hostesses supervise servants stay at home not have careers. Rebellion against upbringing. at age 15 stopped believing in God

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Simone de Beauvoir

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  1. Simone de Beauvoir (1908-1986)

  2. Background • upper class family • conservative Catholic • materialistic • women expected to be subservient • hostesses • supervise servants • stay at home • not have careers

  3. Rebellion against upbringing • at age 15 stopped believing in God • pursued a higher education in philosophy • got Aggrégation in philosophy • met Sartre in graduate school • became a socialist • refused to marry Sartre, though was his life-long companion • refused the traditional role of women

  4. Relationship with Sartre • shared many ideas (hard to separate) • both Existentialists • both committed to social change • against privileges of upper class • against racism and sexism • part of Resistance movement • refuted materialism (possessions)

  5. Writings • very prolific writer • autobiography in 5 volumes • numerous novels, essays • literary prize • The Second Sex considered a manifesto for feminism (1949) • particularly known for her portrayal of women in her novels

  6. The Second Sex • historically the role of women • inaccuracies of Freudian psychology • penis envy • biological role of women • myths that women are inferior • economic subjugation of women • fulfillment through transcendence

  7. The Second Sex • Beauvoir explains female subordination from: • myth • cultural practices • biological facts, and • gender stereotypes that cast women as weak, alienated objects of masculine ideals and desires.

  8. women • According to Beauvoir, women are relegated to a secondary existence of dependency and passivity because they are defined in relation to men rather than as autonomous subjects themselves.

  9. Outspoken feminist • Advocate of equal rights at a time when women were expected to be housewives and stay at home with their children. • She argues why women ought not be subordinated into the position as the Other. • She provides a philosophical argument about why sexism is wrong.

  10. . If people are defined through their relationships with others and the world, as she argues in The Ethics of Ambiguity, then women, the Other, find themselves in an inferior situation.

  11. Beauvoir’s existentialism • In The Ethics of Ambiguity, published in 1947, she defines existentialism as a philosophy of ambiguity, one emphasizing the tension between living in the present and acting with an eye to one's mortality; she also attempts to answer critics who accused existentialists of wallowing in absurdity and despair.

  12. Existentialism • living in the “now” • freedom to choose • we are who we choose to be • need to take responsibility for our actions • see ourselves as others see us • pitfalls of “bad faith” (self deception)

  13. Situation of man in the universe • ACTIONS define us • only the present moment counts • intentions, motives are irrelevant • not taking action is a choice • action presupposes a choice • always a choice • existence is a constant exercise of liberty

  14. Post WWII France • return to the status quo after liberation • people who had money and power were often conservative, materialistic • taste rather unrefined • class conscious • family name • wealth & property

  15. Intellectuals of the period(Camus, Sartre, Beauvoir) • committed to Marxism • committed to environmental protection • anti-Gaullist ( anti status quo) • for Algerian independence • anti-Apartheid

  16. France in 1968 • Conservatives in power in the government (Charles de Gaulle was president) • Women’s rights were not really respected • Strong Catholic influence

  17. The Woman Destroyed (1968) • study of three women in three different styles • all three are deceiving themselves • OPNION OF SELF • SET OPINIONS OF OTHERS • BELIEF SYSTEM SHATTERED

  18. making the OTHER an OBJECT • tendency to have a fixed image of what another person is like • reluctance to accept anything that conflicts with that image • our self image formed by reactions of others to us • self image is threatened when others see us differently than we see ourselves

  19. self deception Why is the narrator threatened by her son’s wife? Why does she consider his new job as “a betrayal”? Why is she angry at her husband? How has her self-assessment changed ?why? How is her mother-in-law different?

  20. “The Age of Discretion” • woman in her sixties, married with an adult son • committed to left wing liberal politics • has written a book which she considers very innovative • sees her husband as aging, but not herself

  21. retired professor liberal left wife who really knows her husband well innovative writer mother of an intellectual son husband aging, (but she isn’t) resigned to her body Self image of narrator“Age of Discretion”

  22. Bad Faith • Excuses used to avoid action. “I didn’t have time” “I intended to do it later.” • Failure to take responsibility for actions “ I was only following orders.” “__________ wanted me to do it.” • Guilt, regret, blame for past actions “ I should never have done that.” “It’s ____________’s fault.”

  23. Bad Faith (self deception) • Expecting things to stay the same • Seeing her husband as aging but not herself • Expecting husband to take her side 100% • Thinking her book is innovative, new • Assuming she is “morally superior” • Total withdrawal when she doesn’t agree

  24. The Woman Destroyed • separate studies of three women, each of whom is living in bad faith in one form or another. As each encounters a crisis in her familial relationships, she engages in a flight from her responsibility and freedom. • This collection expands upon themes found in her ethics and feminism of the often denied complicity in one's own undoing.

  25. Judgments of others • André is giving up; old man p.33 • « nothing that we do not know about each other » • Irène is pretentious, materialistic, shallow p. 38 • Philippe is only doing what his wife wants • Martine is allowing herself to be eaten alive by her profession and home. p. 21

  26. Desire for control

  27. time Time has not moved by at all. The future stretches out to infinity. p. 12 As she watches André disappear from her sight he «exists with the most overwhelming clarity » • The world is in «an everlasting present » • p. 12

  28. memories • keeps Philippe’s room as it was because she does not want to believe that he stopped belonging to her • Milly not as she remembers it • distance not as great; market place changed; towers of château are just stones piled up.

  29. slanted memory • memory is a tool that allows one to remember things • things often disfigured in memory, so as to make them more the way one wants them to be • memories of the same event vary greatly between individuals • people may choose a fixed image of someone in memory and not want to change it.

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