Women in Culture: A Womens Studies Anthology

This anthology collects key texts on women in culture and offers an ideal introduction, for students in women s studies and feminism, to the cultural dimensions of women s experience today. The materials are drawn from a wide range of sources, including popular newspapers, women s and fashion magazines, academic journals, and textbooks. Together they reveal how the mass media, music, and pornography industries portray women, how advertising promotes unattainable standards of beauty for women, and how, for example, cultural expectations can promote date rape and sexual harassment. Women s contributions to culture are also explored.

Divided into three parts The Cultural Construction of Gender, Cultural Institutions Defining Women; Opportunities for Women in Culture the anthology offers ten chapters and a total of thirty–one readings, supported by detailed introductions, questions, suggested activities and bibliographies of key works (including films and videos) for further study.

The readings selected are by: Maya Angelou, Ellen Bass, John Berger, Carl Bohmer, Kim Chernin, Farai Chideya, Johnnetta B. Cole, Patricia Hill Collins, Terry Kay Diggs, Marilyn Friedman, Marilyn Frye, Gay and Lesbian Speakers Bureau, Miranda Van Gelder, Shirley Glubka, bell hooks, Indiana University Empowerment Workshop, Douglas Kellner, Jean Kilbourne, Ynestra King, Audre Lorde, Martha Mahoney, Papusa Molina, Sherry B. Ortner, Andrea Parrot, Elayne Rapping, Linda M. Scott, Susan Sherwin, Carroll Smith–Rosenberg, Starhawk, Shari L. Thurer, Sojourner Truth, and Naomi Wolf.

Preface x

Acknowledgements xii

Introduction 1

Part I The Cultural Construction of Gender 13

1 Women in Culture 15

Introduction 15

Is Female to Male as Nature is to Culture 23
Sherry B. Ortner

Oppression 45
Marilyn Frye

Suggested Activities 50

Bibliography 52

2 Commonalities and Differences among Women 55

Introduction 55

Commonalities and Differences (excerpt) 63
Johnnetta B. Cole

Age, Race, Class, and Sex: Women Redefining Difference 69
Audre Lorde

And A n t I a Woman? 77
Sojourner Truth

When you Meet a Lesbian: Hints for the Heterosexual Woman 80

Indiana University Empowerment Workshop

Heterosexuality Questionnaire 81

Gay and Lesbian Speaker s Bureau

Suggested Activities 82

Bibliography 85

3 Cultural Representations of Women 91

Introduction 91

Ways of Seeing (excerpt) 97
John Berger

Beyond caring: the De–moralization of Gender 105
Marilyn Friedman

Suggested Activities 112

Bibliography 114

Part II Cultural Institutions Defining Women 117

4 Women and Popular Culture I: Advertising, Print Media, and Pornography 119

Introduction 119

Beauty and the Beast of Advertising 127
Jean Kilbourne

Fresh Lipstick: Rethinking Images of Women in Advertising 131
Linda M. Scott

Suggested Activities 141

Bibliography 145

5 Women and Popular Culture II: Television and Film 149

Introduction 149

Solace in Soapland 153
Elayne Rapping

No Way to Treat a Lawyer 160
Terry Kay Diggs

Suggested Activities 165

Bibliography 167

6 Fashion, Beauty, and Women s Health 171

Introduction 171

The Beauty Myth (excerpt) 179
Naomi Wolf

Madonna, Fashion, and Identity (excerpt) 187
Douglas Kellner

Obsession: the Tyranny of Slenderness 201
Kim Chernin

Suggested Activities 216

Bibliography 219

7 Motherhood and Families 223

Introduction 223

Shifting the Center: Race, Class, and Feminist Theorizing about Motherhood (excerpt) 231
Patricia Hill Collins

Fall from Grace: Twentieth–century Mom (excerpt) 244
Shari L. Thurer

Out of the Stream: an Essay on Unconventional Motherhood 251
Shirley Glubka

Abortion through a Feminist Ethics Lens (excerpt) 261
Susan Sherwin

Suggested Activities 272

Bibliography 275

8 Sex, Sexism, Sexual Harassment, and Sexual Abuse 283

Introduction  283

High School Lowdown 301
Miranda J. Van Gelder

Scope of the Problem 304
Carol Bohmer and Andrea Parrot

Legal Images of Battered Women (excerpt) 323
Martha R. Mahoney

In the Truth Itself, There is Healing (excerpt) 338
Ellen Bass

Suggested Activities 349

Bibliography 356

Part III Opportunities for Women in Culture 363

9 Women Creating Culture 365

Introduction 365

The Female World of Love and Ritual: Relations between Woman in Nineteenth–Century America (excerpt) 372
Carroll Smith–Rosenberg

Revolution, Girl Style 391
Farai Chideya, with Melissa Rossi and Dogen Hannah

Witchcraft as Goddess Religion 394
Starhawk

Suggested Activities 401

Bibliography 404

10 Feminism and the Future 409

Introduction 409

Feminism: a Transformational Politic 418
bell hooks

Recognizing, Accepting, and Celebrating our Differences 427
Papusa Molina

Healing the Wounds: Feminism, Ecology, and the Nature/Culture Dualism (excerpt) 433
Ynestra King

Still I Rise 440
Maya Angelou

Suggested Activities 441

Bibliography 444

Index 449

The editor teaches in the Department of Philosophy and Religion at the American University, Washington, D.C. She is editor (with Bob Leming) of the Resource Guide to Law–Related Education and editor of two volumes in the We The People series published by the American Bar Association: A Handbook on Community Forums on the Constitution, to which she is also a contriutor, and Program Planning Guide for Community Forums on the Constitution.

"Helpful, editorial summaries of the field, a diverse selection of ′readings′." Journal of American Studies