Portal:Feminism

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The Feminism Portal

Feminism is a range of socio-political movements and ideologies that aim to define and establish the political, economic, personal, and social equality of the sexes. Feminism holds the position that modern societies are patriarchal—they prioritize the male point of view—and that women are treated unjustly in these societies. Efforts to change this include fighting against gender stereotypes and improving educational, professional, and interpersonal opportunities and outcomes for women.

Originating in late 18th-century Europe, feminist movements have campaigned and continue to campaign for women's rights, including the right to vote, run for public office, work, earn equal pay, own property, receive education, enter into contracts, have equal rights within marriage, and maternity leave. Feminists have also worked to ensure access to contraception, legal abortions, and social integration; and to protect women and girls from sexual assault, sexual harassment, and domestic violence. Changes in female dress standards and acceptable physical activities for women have also been part of feminist movements.

Many scholars consider feminist campaigns to be a main force behind major historical societal changes for women's rights, particularly in the West, where they are near-universally credited with achieving women's suffrage, gender-neutral language, reproductive rights for women (including access to contraceptives and abortion), and the right to enter into contracts and own property. Although feminist advocacy is, and has been, mainly focused on women's rights, some argue for the inclusion of men's liberation within its aims, because they believe that men are also harmed by traditional gender roles. Feminist theory, which emerged from feminist movements, aims to understand the nature of gender inequality by examining women's social roles and lived experiences. Feminist theorists have developed theories in a variety of disciplines in order to respond to issues concerning gender.

Numerous feminist movements and ideologies have developed over the years, representing different viewpoints and political aims. Traditionally, since the 19th century, first-wave liberal feminism, which sought political and legal equality through reforms within a liberal democratic framework, was contrasted with labour-based proletarian women's movements that over time developed into socialist and Marxist feminism based on class struggle theory. Since the 1960s, both of these traditions are also contrasted with the radical feminism that arose from the radical wing of second-wave feminism and that calls for a radical reordering of society to eliminate patriarchy. Liberal, socialist, and radical feminism are sometimes referred to as the "Big Three" schools of feminist thought.

Since the late 20th century, many newer forms of feminism have emerged. Some forms, such as white feminism and gender-critical feminism, have been criticized as taking into account only white, middle class, college-educated, heterosexual, or cisgender perspectives. These criticisms have led to the creation of ethnically specific or multicultural forms of feminism, such as black feminism and intersectional feminism. Some have argued that feminism often promotes misandry and the elevation of women's interests above men's, and criticize radical feminist positions as harmful to both men and women. (Full article...)

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Proserpine by Dante Gabriel Rosetti (1874)

Proserpine is a verse drama written for children by the Romantic writers Mary Shelley and Percy Bysshe Shelley. Mary wrote the blank verse drama and Percy contributed two lyric poems. Composed in 1820 while the Shelleys were living in Italy, it is often considered a partner to the Shelleys' play Midas. Proserpine was first published in the London periodical The Winter's Wreath in 1832. Whether the drama was ever intended to be staged is a point of debate among scholars. The drama is based on Ovid's tale of the abduction of Proserpine by Pluto, which itself was based on the Greek myth of Demeter and Persephone. Mary Shelley's version focuses on the female characters. In a largely feminist retelling from Ceres's point of view, Shelley emphasises the separation of mother and daughter and the strength offered by a community of women. Ceres represents life and love, and Pluto represents death and violence. The genres of the text also reflect gender debates of the time. Percy contributed in the lyric verse form traditionally dominated by men; Mary created a drama with elements common to early nineteenth-century women's writing: details of everyday life and empathetic dialogue. Proserpine is part of a female literary tradition which, as feminist literary critic Susan Gubar describes it, has used the story of Ceres and Proserpine to "re-define, to re-affirm and to celebrate female consciousness itself". However, the play has been both neglected and marginalised by critics.

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Credit: Paul-Jacques-Aimé Baudry

Charlotte Corday was a poor French aristocrat who supported the Girondists during the French Revolution. She single-handedly assassinated Jean-Paul Marat, a Jacobin journalist, with a knife in 1793. Although she was beheaded four days afterwards and the Reign of Terror continued for another year, she was later seen as a heroine who gave her life to rid her country of a monster. The assassination is depicted in this 1860 painting.

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In this month

2 November 1938 – First woman awarded the Hero of the Soviet Union, Marina Raskova (pictured) was a Soviet aviator known as the "Russian Amelia Earhart" who helped found three female air regiments for World War II
2 November 2004 – Theo van Gogh murdered by Mohammed Bouyeri over the movie Submission, written by the feminist Ayaan Hirsi Ali, which attacked Koranic verses allowing the abuse of Muslim women.
3 November 1793 – Guillotining of Olympe de Gouge, playwright and journalist who demanded equal rights for women during the French Revolution in her Declaration of the Rights of Woman and of the Female Citizen
18 November 1872 – Susan B. Anthony was arrested and fined for voting in a presidential election—a fine she refused to pay for the rest of her life
28 November 1893 – Women voted for the first time in New Zealand

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To me, a feminist belongs in the same category as a humanist or an advocate for human rights. I don't see why someone who's a feminist should be thought of differently.

— Suzanne Vega

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Bette Davis was a two-time Academy Award-winning American actress of film, television and theatre. Noted for her willingness to play unsympathetic characters, she was highly regarded for her performances in a range of film genres, from contemporary crime melodramas to historical and period films and occasional comedies, though her greatest successes were romantic dramas. Until the late 1940s, she was one of American cinema's most celebrated leading actresses, known for her forceful and intense style. Her forthright manner, clipped vocal style and ubiquitous cigarette contributed to a public persona which has often been imitated and satirized. Davis was the co-founder of the Hollywood Canteen, and was the first female president of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. Her career went through several periods of decline, and she admitted that her success had often been at the expense of her personal relationships. Married four times, she was once widowed and thrice divorced, and raised her children as a single parent. Her final years were marred by a long period of ill health, however she continued acting until shortly before her death from breast cancer, with more than a hundred film, television and theater roles to her credit. In 1999, Davis was placed second, behind Katharine Hepburn, on the American Film Institute's list of the greatest female stars of all time.

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Did you know (auto-generated) - load new batch

... that Margareth Rago seeks to establish a methodology for what she calls "feminist science"?
... that after dying in her daughter's arms in an asylum in 1897, Maria Trubnikova was remembered as the "heart and soul" of feminist activism in Russia?

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...that Enriqueta Favez (pictured), a Swiss woman, studied medicine and served as an army surgeon in the Napoleonic Wars disguised as a man, went to Cuba in the 1820s and married a local woman?
...that Captain Rosemary Bryant Mariner was the first military woman to command an operational naval aviation squadron?
...that the four main influential figures to Filipino women writers are Gabriela Silang, Leonor Rivera, Imelda Marcos and Corazon Aquino?

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The following are images from various feminism-related articles on Wikipedia.

Image 1Cover of WSPU's The Suffragette, April 25, 1913 (after Delacroix's Liberty Leading the People, 1830) (from History of feminism)
Image 2Christine de Pizan presents her book to Queen Isabeau of Bavaria. (from History of feminism)
Image 3Female soldiers from Peru, Egypt, India and other countries celebrate International Women's Day. (from International Women's Day)
Image 4First edition print of A Vindication of the Rights of Woman (from History of feminism)
Image 5Clara Zetkin (left) and Rosa Luxemburg (right) in January 1910 (from International Women's Day)
Image 6A veil-burning ceremony in Andijan on International Women's Day in 1927. (from International Women's Day)
Image 7Elizabeth Cady Stanton (seated) and Susan B. Anthony (from History of feminism)
Image 8Suffrage parade in New York, May 6, 1912 (from History of feminism)
Image 9Sylvia Pankhurst (from History of feminism)
Image 10Frances Cobbe (from History of feminism)
Image 11Female members of the Australian Builders Labourers Federation march on International Women's Day 1975 in Sydney (from International Women's Day)
Image 12Wealthy Chinese women with bound feet (Beijing, 1900). Foot binding was a symbol of women's oppression during the reform movements in the 19th and 20th centuries. (from History of feminism)
Image 13Germaine Greer in June 1972 (from History of feminism)
Image 14Simone de Beauvoir (from History of feminism)
Image 15Marie Stopes (from History of feminism)
Image 16An Antimonumenta, installed in Mexico City on International Women's Day 2019, as photographed the day after. The circle part says "In Mexico 9 women are murdered daily" and the cross part says "Not one more!" On the opposite side, the Antimonumenta reads "We demand a national gender alert", and in the central part "No + Femicides". (from International Women's Day)
Image 17Author and scholar Helen Kendrick Johnson opposed women's suffrage. (from History of feminism)
Image 18Betty Friedan 1960 (from History of feminism)
Image 19Matilda Joslyn Gage (from History of feminism)
Image 20Margaret Sanger (from History of feminism)
Image 21John Neal (from History of feminism)
Image 22The vandalized Concepción Feminist Mural in Spain, which was vandalized on International Women's Day 2021. (from International Women's Day)
Image 23Emily Davison (from History of feminism)
Image 24The Nineteenth Amendment (from History of feminism)
Image 25Camilla Collett (from History of feminism)
Image 26Women on the street celebrating International Women's Day in Cameroon (from International Women's Day)
Image 278M 2020 in Spain (from International Women's Day)
Image 28Catharine MacKinnon (from History of feminism)
Image 29Ida B. Wells (from History of feminism)
Image 30María Elena Oddone holding a banner, on International Women's Day in 1984 in Argentina. The banner says "No to motherhood, yes to pleasure". (from International Women's Day)
Image 31Irena Krzywicka (from History of feminism)
Image 328M 2018 in Pamplona (from International Women's Day)
Image 33bell hooks (from History of feminism)
Image 34
  Official holiday
  Holiday for women
  Non-official holiday
(from International Women's Day)
Image 35Women's Liberation march in Washington, D.C., 1970 (from History of feminism)
Image 36Bessie Rayner Parkes (from History of feminism)
Image 37Florence Nightingale (from History of feminism)
Image 38Yellow mimosa is the symbol of IWD in Italy as well as in Russia, Ukraine and many other ex-Soviet Union republics (from International Women's Day)
Image 39Nellie McClung (from History of feminism)
Image 40Huda Shaarawi, founder of the Egyptian Feminist Union (from History of feminism)
Image 41Gloria Steinem at news conference, Women's Action Alliance, January 12, 1972 (from History of feminism)
Image 42Female soldiers from Peru, Egypt, India and other countries celebrate International Women's Day. (from International Women's Day)
Image 43Lucy Stone (from History of feminism)
Image 44Board of directors of "Jam'iat e nesvan e vatan-khah", a women's rights association in Tehran (1923–1933) (from History of feminism)

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This is a list of recognized content, updated weekly by JL-Bot (talk · contribs) (typically on Saturdays). There is no need to edit the list yourself. If an article is missing from the list, make sure it is tagged (e.g. {{WikiProject Feminism}}) or categorized correctly and wait for the next update. See WP:RECOG for configuration options.

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Alice Manfield - Guide Alice, Mt Buffalo, c1900-30, SLV
Alice Park - Records of the National Woman's Party
Alice Paul (1915) by Harris & Ewing
Angela Davis in a half-length portrait by Bernard Gotfryd - crop
Anne Dallas Dudley LOC
Avril de Sainte-Croix - Restored, cropped
Bertha Lutz 1925
Cabinet Card of Sojourner Truth - Collection of the National Museum of African American History and Culture
Convicts Lunatics and Women! Have No Vote for Parliament, ca. 1907-1918
Dr. Caroline Spencer 275029v
Ethel Smyth
Frances Benjamin Johnston, Self-Portrait (as "New Woman"), 1896
Fredrikke Mørck
George Charles Beresford - Virginia Woolf in 1902 - Restoration
Henrietta Rodman from the George Grantham Bain Collection
Henry Mayer, The Awakening, 1915 Cornell CUL PJM 1176 01 - Restoration
Hester Jeffrey
Hubertine Auclert 1910
Iris Calderhead
Joy Young Rogers outside the White House
Lucretia Mott, signed photo, by F. Gutekunst
Mabel Vernon, c. 1917, by Edmonston, Washington, D.C.
Marguerite Durand 1910 - Restoration
Marie Stopes in her laboratory, 1904 - Restoration
Mary Garrity - Ida B. Wells-Barnett - Google Art Project - restoration crop
Millicent Fawcett
Mrs. Crystal Eastman Benedict by Edmonston, Washington, D.C.
Mrs. Lillian Ascough, chairman of the Connecticut branch of the Woman's Party
Mrs. Pauline Adams 147002v
Portrett av Gina Krog (6276081582) - Restoration
Poster by Anna Soós Korànyi for the Seventh Conference of the International Woman Suffrage Alliance
Ray Strachey restored
Sojourner Truth, 1870 (cropped, restored)
Victoria Claflin Woodhull by Mathew Brady - Oval Portrait
Voltairine de Cleyre (Age 35)
We Can Do It! NARA 535413 - Restoration 2