fDiana has 12 post(s)

In her essay, “Do Muslim Women Really Need Saving,” Lila Abu-Lughod points out that have been many arguments about to rescue oppressed Muslim women for their culture and religion. Even now in the 21st century discourses on humanitarianism and human rights establish the image of an Afghan woman who needs to be rescued. Muslims women have been exposed as victims of the veil (or burqa), violent abuse, forced to marry, and deprived of their rights. Also, the burqa is commonly seen as a sign of their oppression and we seem surprise when many women continue wearing their burqas after been “liberated”. Lughod also explains that the burqa is a form of “cover” that represents the separation of men’s and women’s spheres. According to the anthropologist Hanna Papanek many women saw the veil as a liberating invention because it allows them to move out of segregated spaces and still being protected of unrelated men. Lughod makes a point of equally when she explains that poverty and political instability affect not only the attendance of girls to school, but also of boys.

I think that the “vocation of saving others” is because we have a different culture and a different lifestyle than the Muslim women’s. We expect a better world for all women. We have a different point of view about how should be the world, how women should dress or what role should they play in society. That is why we see Muslim women as victims. Lughod explains that we focus more in see other’s problems and we forget our own situation and ignore our own oppressions. Trying to “save others” is just a distraction to forget that our own policies and actions are responsible for making the conditions in which others live at a distance. A better option is to ask ourselves what can we do to create better condition for better place for everyone to live.

In her essay Amalia Cabezas explains several problems related to with the usual conception of sex work in Cuba and the Dominican Republic. She considers that the term “sex work” is more than the simple practice of sex in exchange for money. Cabezas also point out that the increased tourism has caused an increase of sex work, which in turn has contributed in the creation of different types of relationship between tourist and hosts. In countries as Cuba and Dominican Republic, solitary women, lesbian and other sexual minorities are target for moral panic and harassment by police. Also in these countries, women who have sex with more than a person is cataloged as bad sexual subjects, while male who have several sexual partners are considered “supermen” because this is considered as a natural behavior of men sexuality.

Also, in her essay Cabezas explains the highlighted difference on how is considered the sex work among male and female, because while male sex workers are considered as national idols, female sex workers are considered deviants and a social evil. I think that Cabezas uses the term “sexual citizenship” to refer to the acceptance in the public life of the different sexualities, outside the masculine heterosexual domain, particularly those women outside heteronormativity. Many concepts of female sexual agency keeps absent from the conceptualizations and laws of human rights, but when we implement the idea of sexual rights we can cover minorities instead of categorize or to frame people by their sexuality and at the same time we open the way in situations where labor rights can not be applied. Finally, according to the author, tourism has opened a door where labor practices and romantic relationships are mixed. In countries where the economic index is very low is difficult to separate love, money, and business. They see tourism as a way to scape of their reality.

In his book Aberrations in Black Toward a Queer of Color Critique”, Ferguson reveals how African American are placed outside heteronormative patriarchal norms and how racial segregation is a way in which capitalism keep gender and sexuality norms. Ferguson also suggests that there is a relationship between property, capital and prostitution. Property relations within tribal communities are heterosexual and patriarchal arrangements. It is interesting the relationship between capitalism and prostitution because the symbol of prostitution was used by Marx to represent the man’s dehumanization (Ferguson p.7). Prostitution was the representation of man’s feminization. Wage labor did not allow a man to be independent by himself and that need forced him to become prostitute and sell himself to his work to get capital and survive. In nineteen century the prostitute was a racial metaphor for the gender and sexual confusion created by capital, which related the figure of prostitute to sexual savagery of black women and to establish nonwhite sexuality as the alliance for other kinds of womanhood. While the industrial capital was developing working-class white women with a limited income, but the prostitute became the racialized figure that represented demonstrations against those changes.

On the other hand, the transition from an industrial economy to a post-industrial economy created a slope in manufacturing jobs, but at the same time occurred an increase in service jobs, in the private sector and government jobs as well. This improved the development of different social classes among African Americans. Ferguson also explains this relationship between capital, property and prostitution is related to “queer of color” because capital produces different kinds of social creations as the intersections of race, gender, sexuality and class that surpass the limits of what is considered the rationalized gender and the sexual ideas of the different individuals and the same time the queer of color represents the malformations of modern society.

According to Collins in her essay “Learning from the Outsider Within: The Sociological Significance of Black Feminist Thought,” Black women have decrease White power by working in the households of White families as domestic workers. Black women have made an ingenious use of their “marginality” by using their outsider within status to formulate their own standpoint. Collins points out three key points: Black women’s self-definition and self-valuation, the interlocking nature of oppression, and importance of African American culture.

Black feminist thought describes and explains different observations and understanding about Afro-American womanhood. Black women’s image is associated with many stereotypes, usually negative, which form part of their self-definition and self-evaluation work to replace that stereotypical image with authentic Black female images. Self-definition and self-valuation is very important for Black women can value their own standpoint and to break down the psychological oppression imposed by white people.

Black women suffer a double oppression: for being women and for being Black. Sojourner Truth explains that even when Black men get their freedom and their rights does not mean that Black women can enjoy the same privileges because they will be still oppressed by Black men. It is this oppression that makes their standpoint essential in creating Black Feminist theory and understanding their reality. Collins also speaks the sexist and racist ideologies that predominate in treating dominated groups (the “others”), when they compare or see Black women as obstinate mules, which make the harder work and get beat for their masters, and white women as obedient dogs, which are closer to the master and he let them stay in the house. Finally, studying Afro-American women’s culture result very interesting because there is a kind of sisterhood between them that reinforces their unit as a group that have suffered discriminations, abuses and oppression for a long time.

Peterson and Parisi in their article “Are Women Human? It’s Not an Academic Question”, explain that some feminist researches stipulate that the universal references of what is considered a human are of androcentric character, considering men as standard. They define Heterosexism as the institutionalization of heterosexuality as only natural way in which people express their sexual and social conducts. Heterosexism was institutionalized by the states, which protect but at the same time violate individual rights within public and private sphere.

Historically, women have been dominated and deprived of their freedom and autonomy and a gender hierarchy have been imposed. Heterosexism promotes binary gender identities and the subordination of women to men’s interests. It also promotes heterosexual relation and the inclusion of women in-group projects, but at the same time, it is oppressive, it privileges men’s interest upon of women’s interests and rejects any other sexual orientation or gender identification. They also explain that when children born they must be bred in an appropriate way, which includes a cultural transmission and socialization of group members. In those process is created a gender/race division remarking the inequality among women and men.

With the transition to western civilization was marked a centralization of political authority, which created new laws and a hierarchical division of labor by gender, age and class. As we take modern state making as our pattern to start, that sketch suggested that women were not included into the definition of individual according to discourse of human rights, also women were not considered as person in their own rights to make decision, but according to heterosexist principles of group reproduction, women are tied to the reproductive role. Any action that moves away from what the heterosexism stands for is considered not normal, even for women to be taken into account should seem as possible to the men who are established status.

In her essay Adrienne Rich explains that there is an assumption of most of women are born heterosexual and that the existence of lesbian has been omitted in the writings and history texts. She also explains that through the time men have imposed their sexuality forcing women to give up their own. Women have been submitted to many humiliations, mistreatments, sexual abuse, prostitution, among other things and all of it is allowed by a society that prefers a cruel heterosexuality rather than sexuality between women.

In one hand, men power was manifested in the control that they had over women consciousness, which they used to convince them that the best life option was heterosexual marriage, even if this is not what women really wanted or even when they felt repressive and unhappy. In another hand, society has contributed in this disproportionate relation between men and women. Even though they perform the same job, women have lower paying than men. Men have the economic power forcing women to depend on them or give in to their pressures and sexual harassment to get a job. There is not place for lesbians in the market place, to keep their jobs they are forced to play the role of heterosexual women.

Heterosexuality empowers men over women. For society, homosexuality is not a natural instincts in humans, but for Rich, heterosexuality is an institution imposed by society to subordinate women. Rich also sees lesbianism as part of feminism. Lesbian existence breaks the men’s right of access to women and the rule of a obligatory heterosexuality. Many women have married because they need men to survive economically or because society expects that women have children or because they are afraid of a society that punishes those who dare to feel different or because heterosexual marriages have been imposed as a rule to fulfill women’s role. The truth is that lack of choice causes women to remain in relationships where they are inhibited from expressing their own sexuality.

Hi professor.

Can I include the definition of the terms in my handwriting notes?

In Thinking Sex: Notes For a Radical Theory of the Politics of Sexuality, Gayle Rubin explains that in The United States many people see sexuality as immorality, corrupted and as a negative behavior. People were afraid of sex, which contributed to create many taboos and negative attitudes against sex. The sexual behavior is defined within the religious framework and social, all behavior out of it is considered as immoral or sinful. It is normal that at a young age we feel curiosity about our body and begin to know and explore it, but government categorized sex as dangerous and damaging, especially for youth, creating in the parents the idea that this measure would protect their children.

Another assumption is based on the Christian traditions. Sex is pardoned only between married couples and as long as it is done with love and with the intention of procreating. Enjoy this act is prohibited and it is considered a sin. Obviously homosexuality, fornication and premarital sex were prohibited. Having sexual attraction, masturbate or explore their body or sexuality was considered as a sinful behavior. There was a “radical theory of sex” where government created several laws in order to control people’s sexuality in every way.

Rubin used diagrams to illustrate some of her arguments. These diagrams explain the concrete divisions between what is allowed and what is condemned within sexual practice. As a result of this continuing sex negativity, groups that fall outside “the normal group” of sexuality are the most persecuted in society. I agree with Rubin when she points out that sex between two consenting individuals should be no concern of the government. There are many things that should be changed and it is important do not confuse the concepts of sex, gender, and sexuality. We have to be confortable with our sexuality and change some standards of what is good or wrong.

In the Caliban and the Witch, Silvia Federichi explains that the sexual division of labor was used as a capitalist tool for accumulating wealth and preserving power among white men. Being women was a disadvantage for this time because gender became a decisive factor of class relations. The mere fact of being a woman gave the right to their bosses to pay them less money than the men for their work. Prostitution, servitude and housewives became the exclusive labors for women. For example, women were not able to become soldiers for pay; instead some joined armies as cooks and other positions related to their gender.

With the development of capitalism the reproductive labor was devaluated at a point that women need men to survive. Women had a very hard time getting monetary resources, therefor having commodities, such as food, almost impossible to obtain leaving them with no options but to get undervalue goods. Economy growth helped out the nations wealthiest, but leaving the poor in a more critical state than what they already had. Small business like food supplier had their goods bought by the rich with no problem but women had no other options but to beg on streets or in storefronts. Women had no means of getting any benefit from this economy boom that was happening. Riots erupted as one could imagine and crime went up especially in the steal factor because woman often used to steal crops from their neighbors. The poor where so infuriated that they started burning property’s that belonged to the rich.

The persecutions of “witches” affected woman’s main role of reproduction and how they behave. Women had to be more careful of their actions if not they could be judged wrongly. Women reproductive function declined creating a crisis since with no reproduction no new generations were being born this lead to the creation of punishment toward woman that did not perform their role of reproduction.

In her essay “The Medical Construction of Gender”, Suzanne Kessler explains that an intersexed infant is a baby who is born with undefined genitals. In the late 20^th century scientists could determine the infant’s gender through out a chromosomal and hormonal test, which is normally taken to be the real, natural, biological sex of the infant. Kessler interviewed six different specialists and all of them agreed that the management of the intersexuality cases is based on the theory proposed by John Money. According to this theory, it is crucial that the gender of an infant is assigned immediately, color is use to determines a infant’s sex (pink for female, blue for male), genitals must be made to match the assigned gender, and if an infant needs a correction it should be done as soon as possible, otherwise, the infant could have traumatic memories.

The gender assignment is very important for specialists, parents and infants, because this will determine the kind of interaction that the community, including parents, will have with the child as it grows into adulthood. Another factor that is even more important than the chromosomes is the penis sizes. Scientists consider that a good size of penis is enough to determine that an infant could be defined as male. According to society’s standards, masculinity includes an average penis size in the male case if the child penis is smaller than the norm, or for some reason it cant function as a regular penis, then that child’s genitals re-constructed to look and function like a vagina, a vagina is suppose to have enough space for a regular size penis which ultimately will define the sex in the female case. Social factors are very important because after the physician assign the infant’s gender, parents are encouraged to create the credibility of that gender in their community. The option of a third gender is unacceptable to society, and therefore all children born neither male nor female are considered abnormal and deformed. Kessler points out that hermaphrodites are a third gender category.