å February 2017

According to Silvia Frederici in her article “The Caliban and the Witch,” women had been discounted as part of the capitalist’s investment. In the Middle ages, feudalism was deeply rooted into European society for a very long time. Until the shift between workers and masters occurred, nothing was sufficient enough to demolish the old concept and hierarchies. Frederici brings up Marx’s idea of which connects the feudal reconstruction to the development of capitalism. According to that, European working class set up the foundation of capitalist system. However, in Marx’s introduction of “transition to capitalism,” he does not mention the social position of women and how it was shifted due to social and economic changes. According to Frederici, women were only treated as a working machine. In other words, they were merely the reproduction of work force. The accumulation of wealth was eventually made by exploited workers, but the more important thing is that there was also a division within the working class and people suffered much more due to race and gender. Therefore it supports Frederici’s idea that capitalism is committed to both sexism and racism. The capitalist class in Europe had policies that shaped the proletariat. One of the policies was cutting wages of women. There also was a hierarchy between indigenous, African and European women. These were happened to discipline and reproduce the capitalist class. The means of self sufficiency brought wealth of people in some sense, but it excluded certain class from the hierarchy, which does not fit the general capitalist idea. As a result, capitalism brought different forms of enslavement. The exploitation was not just about physical abuse and labor, but was intensified in terms of ideology. Also, derived from this idea the clear division of gender and race was created. The whole process of degradation came into place. Eventually it became the foundation of capitalist accumulations that shaped a big part of the society.

When the land started to become privatized and work was changed into a free wage labor market, almost all women lost their production jobs such as working on the field. Instead, they were degraded to the point where almost anything they did was seen as housekeeping or helping the man. This started happening because women lost their land, or a common area, where they could talk to other women and share ideas without the influence of males. It was also harder for women to work production jobs and travel since they had to take care of children or would get pregnant which meant it was harder for them to do the job even if they were available. This caused many women to riot which eventually lead to them being arrested and further degraded.

When women did any work it was seen as housekeeping work no matter what it was and that they were working for the men. If there was women working in production, it was only cause they were seen as there to help their husbands. In France, women were expected to register their pregnancies and weren’t allowed to terminate them. Contraception was also made illegal,  These laws were of course made by men. There was a huge emphasis on women keeping their babies because more children meant that in the future, there would be more people working in production if they were male. Women being pregnant and giving birth was also eventually credited to the men who were doctors in society instead of the women. The men were said to be giving life even though it was the women who had the baby in her womb and gave birth. This system was seen as profitable since both men and especially women were getting paid less than how much the products they made would be sold for, which meant more money for the state.

In Silvia Federici’s reading, she described the degradation of women’s social status in the period of Capitalism. The article had mention that in 14th century, the women can got half the pay of man, but in the mid-16th, they only earn one-third of man’s wages. This fact states the degradation of women’s social status. During 16th century, women’s power was being crushed, they were forcing to worked on the jobs that were unpaid or low paid. They were excluded from many wages occupation, even they had the same job with males, they still earn less compared with males.
In 19th century, there were more women that became full time housewife, in relation with men. The rate of more women were dependence on men was increasing, because there has no access to earn wages for unmarry women, they were under the condition of poverty, economic dependence. The only thing they can do were to rely on men.
During the transition of Feudalism to Capitalism, there was a time period called Patriarchy. In that time, women were lived as a ‘Wages-slavery’: The man was receiving his wife’s wages, the woman didn’t get the money even she worked so hard. In this way, women was impossible to have their own money.
In conclude, women’s social status was being degraded. Their wages get low, and the chance of work opportunities were limited for them, the way for women to survive was rely on men. They were also being insult and assault by men with inequality treatment. Their social status has became more inferior to men.

Federici describes the degradation of women as a relation to the changes in the social-economic system in Europe and the New World. As the economy of Europe changed from Feudalism to Capitalism, women’s roles changed along with it. Federici says, “the ‘transition to capitalism’ is a test case for feminist theory, as the redefinition of productive and reproductive tasks and male-female relations that we find in this period” (14). Where a woman’s role in the household was once valued because she was able to knit her family’s clothing and help her husband till their farm, once economic life became commercialized, women were forced to buy their clothing and buy their produce. They could no longer function as imperative forces in their homes. Furthermore, the term “housewife” meant that a woman was working full-time in her home (raising children, cooking, cleaning), as an unrecognized, unpaid laborer. Women were degraded in this way and became dependent on their husbands.

Federici explains that once mercantilism started to grow, there was a dire need for population growth to accommodate such a work force. The wealth of a nation was therefore dependent on its number of citizens. This population crisis put a huge amount of pressure on women. A woman’s role was now to reproduce. Women lost control of their own bodies. They were marginalized if they were taking any form of birth control, if they had complications during pregnancy, or if they were barren. Federici argues that witch hunts came about because of this crisis — men needed someone to blame for the lack of reproduction. Women were deemed witches if they were unable or unwilling to reproduce. Even midwives were blamed if there was a complication during birth. Many midwives were persecuted or lost their jobs. The result was an massive increase in male doctors.

Women saw many forms of discrimination during these economic changes. There came about a new sexual division of labor and sexual hierarchy in a political society. Federici claims, “discrimination that women have suffered in the wage work-force has been directly rooted in their function as unpaid laborers in the home” (94-95). She believes the degradation of women — racism and sexism in labor roles — stemmed from capitalist development and ideologies which marginalized women’s work life in their homes and outside the home as well.

Before reading this piece, I did believe that capitalism directly caused sexism and worked to harm women each day. Women were unable to have equal rights in the workforce, were placed in unfair unsafe working conditions, and are not given the same wages to this day. In this piece, women are described as having their work being valued as less than that of a man’s. Because of the fact that they are women, the bosses are able to pay them less and treat them more poorly, which is seen as normal by the white male population. Women were increasingly seen as housewives, which were expected to stay at home and work from there, relying on the wages of the man. Women who worked outside of the home still had little access to resources because of their low wages; for example, if a woman worked in a wheat factory it would still be very likely that she could not afford bread on her own. This system caused women to have to rely on men, staying with them and being unhappy just to make a living. Separation was impossible for economic reasons as well as societal reasons, so women were forced to stay in unhappy or abusive marriages because it would be impossible for them to live otherwise. Many women were politically involved during this time, protesting food shortages and unfair working conditions. Women rose up against their unfair treatment, and fought for their rights as seen in the years previous to this. To me this shows the persistence and strength of women, as they are always continuously faced with disadvantages that they fight against. The rebellion and efforts of women are extremely important to the history of women, as it demonstrates the effectiveness of women coming together to fight against patriarchal rule and unfair conditions.

In your responses to Kessler, many of you point to a moment she describes in her work: when doctors encountering intersexuality are managing all that this situation can mean and become. The relevance of this moment, when intersexuality is treated as a condition that must be resolved through the successful identification of the body’s characteristics defined either as male or female, is powerful one. Kessler returns our attention to the ideas expressed by Grewal and Kaplan, and their argument that we tend to treat science as “value neutral” (2005). We might also compare this moment to the one that Londa Schiebinger describes, when human skeletons began to be understood in terms of the messages anatomists were thought to be decoding, about the worlds the female body was built to inhabit (1986).

In the cases Kessler refers to, the supposed objectivity of scientific knowledge is clearly overridden by doctors who cannot see beyond a two-gendered system. Grewal and Kaplan explain that one of the hallmarks of western science is its division between the natural and cultural world. “Nature” is defined as that which is untouched and unchanging while “culture” refers to the interpretations and ways of life that human beings have adopted in the different times and spaces (2005:1). In line with the questions Grewal and Kaplan raise, about what counts as difference, we have in Kessler’s article instances where doctors cannot see past a difference based on male and female to consider the kinds of bodily differences presented to them.

Pivotal to Kessler work as well as for the article(s) from Ann Fausto-Sterling on “The Five Sexes,” are ideas about the connection of the sex of the body (presumed as natural) to gender (which Kessler describes as a performance). But there are some presumptions that both Kessler and Fausto-Sterling make about “identity” that are worth examining. Both seem to suggest that identity is something that most people desire to be aligned with once and for all. But is “identity” something that we aspire towards? In Maggie Nelson’s book The Argonauts (2015), she stresses that identity, and gendered selfconsciousness in particular, is not something people have an immediate awareness of. Moreover, she argues that a lack of selfconsciousness about identity (and gendered identity in particular) is, for many people, something that is desirable and refreshing. I want to underline this point as it bears an important affinity to the way subjectivity is often configured in relationship to difference, as a project of assimilation.

Due Monday, February 27th, by midnight. Word count: 300 words. Please make sure everything is in your own words. Absolutely no quotes should be used. If you paraphrase from the text (from Federici’s work or anywhere else), you must be sure to include the proper citation (either MLA or APA).

In The Caliban and the Witch, Silvia Federici argues that as a social-economic system, capitalism is committed to sexism and racism (2004:17). In your own words, describe the degradation of women that Federici describes in chapter one of her work. How is that degradation joined to accumulations of wealth in a capitalist political economy?

In Suzanne Kessler’s essay is about how the society gives a model of intersexuality that provides infants a biological identity about themselves. The physician is the role of the medical pyramid, they are standing on the top and decide which gender and social issues that parents/infant should face. They belief the gender and children are malleable based the theory of Monkey and Ehrhardt’s theory, they give a statement about how intersexuality is a condition of the biological issues. There any many doctors, psychologists and geneticist agree that operative correction is necessary for infants who in the early stages of development. In the top of the society, the physician’s all theory are based on researches and data, but they do not care the nature of child birth and the psychology issues for the infants and their families. In the other hand, the morality and ethic is not allowed people who use some extreme surgery to change person’s identity.

The middle of pyramid is the parent, they have higher expectations about their child’s gender and there are many of them use some technologies to test whether it’s a boy or girl. They put too much confidence to physicians and how they should give a healthy baby. Most of them cannot accept intersexual baby, because the trust of medical construction and, lack of knowledge and how others looks them. “How others talk about?” It’s sounds a common question, but when you asked millions of parent. They will give you many argument and critical issues. The gender identify is determined by chromosome and genes from our parent. They have to know the baby is born in nature; there is nothing wrong with them. The society should accept and understand the issues and support them.

In the bottom of pyramid is the patient/infant; it’s not fair if they cannot decide their own gender identity. The relationship between patient and doctor is becomes negative. We need more help from them not only in how to solve the biological issues, they are also should be a doctor of a child, to thinking about their situation.

The focal point of Kessler’s reading is to discuss the obvious social construct that this society condones when it comes to gender. This lens has influenced doctors to make decisions, or create solutions, when it comes to intersexuality. A child that is deemed intersex is born with undefined genitals, which then results in the decision over if the child should identify as male or female. The issue with intersexuality is the fact that it is seen as a deformity that needs to be dealt with. In order for the child to be raised properly, a sex must be assigned, and it is up to the doctors to do so. However, this decision is not quite simple, as it requires a deeper look into other aspects that take part.

A big contribution to this decision are cultural and environmental factors, which ultimately shape an individual as they come into themselves and identify with their sex. In her essay, Kessler includes that both views are important when assigning a sex. The growth of a child is greatly linked to social norms. It is our environment that forces us to establish ourselves in society and sex is one of the main establishments that one must be aware of in oneself. An example of how they make these decisions is by taking a look at the links between society and the individual. Due to the fact that masculinity is related to penis size, a child would be assigned a female rather than a male if their penis was below the average size. Essentially, the societal lens is what makes the decision after all. These constructs are so heavily pressed on individuals in society that if a sex is not decided for the child then he/she will be deemed underdeveloped and out of place. Another adjustment to this issue is performing surgery so that the child may possess more of a female sex organ or more of a male sex organ, depending on which is more prominent initially. It is an important decision, however, because it will guide them to understand who to identify as in the future. Also, it tells the parents what steps they must take in order to raise their child so that they are established in society. Another important aspect that Kessler stresses is the relationship between the parents and doctors. The healthier the connection between them two, the healthier it will be between the parents and their child. This connection leads to the proper growth and establishment of the child in society as he/she grows. The focus may be on the biology of an individual but the true solution is found elsewhere; upon taming and adjusting to societal norms that can hinder the growth of an individual if decisions are made without every possible factor in mind.