B: Definition, Theory, Signficance Flashcards
Gender Reform/Resistance/Rebellion (28 cards)
Affirmative Action (Reform)
Definition: Policy that aims to increase the representation of marginalized groups (like women) in education and employment through proactive hiring/admissions.
Connected Theory: Gender Reform Feminism
Significance: Pushes for fairness and equal opportunity through legal reform and institutional policy.
Contrasting Approach: Radical Feminism sees it as a band-aid that doesn’t dismantle patriarchal power structures.
Comparable Worth (Reform)
Definition: The idea that different jobs requiring similar levels of skill and responsibility should be paid equally, even if they’re in gendered sectors.
Connected Theory: Gender Reform Feminism
Significance: Tackles economic inequality in a reformist way, advocating wage equity via policy.
Contrasting Approach: Marxist/Socialist Feminism argues this doesn’t fix the capitalist exploitation of gendered labour.
Glass Ceiling
Definition: Invisible barrier preventing women from rising to top-level positions despite qualifications.
Connected Theory: Gender Reform Feminism
Significance: Illustrates how gender bias operates within formal systems and motivates reformist solutions like mentorship or diversity hiring.
Contrasting Approach: Intersectional Feminism argues this mainly reflects privileged women’s experiences (e.g., white, middle-class) and overlooks deeper systemic exclusions.
Sticky Floor
Definition: The tendency for women, especially racialized or working-class, to remain stuck in low-wage, low-mobility jobs.
Connected Theory: Gender Reform Feminism
Significance: Drives the need for educational access, labour protections, and policy reform.
Contrasting Approach: Intersectional Feminism emphasizes how race, immigration status, and class worsen this problem in ways reformist feminism alone can’t address.
De-Gendering
Definition: Removing gender-specific classifications or expectations in institutions, roles, and language.
Connected Theory: Gender Reform Feminism
Significance: Seeks equality by erasing gender bias in structures like policy, forms, or job roles.
Contrasting Approach: Gender Rebellion/Postmodern Feminism pushes further by rejecting gender categories altogether, not just neutralizing them.
Gender Mainstreaming
Definition: Systematically integrating gender equality into all levels of policy-making and institutional practice.
Connected Theory: Gender Reform Feminism
Significance: Recognizes that policy decisions impact genders differently — reformists push for equal inclusion at all stages.
Contrasting Approach: Radical Feminism might critique this as superficial inclusion in still-patriarchal systems.
Gender Gap
efinition: Measurable differences between men and women in areas like wages, voting patterns, or education.
Connected Theory: Gender Reform Feminism
Significance: Quantifies inequality; motivates data-driven policy reform.
Contrasting Approach: Marxist Feminism would critique focus on numbers without addressing structural labour exploitation.
Gender Consciousness
Definition: Awareness of gender-based inequality and the social structures that sustain it.
Connected Theory: Gender Reform Feminism
Significance: Helps build political will for reform, especially within democratic and educational institutions.
Contrasting Approach: Intersectional Feminism argues this must include racial/class/sexual consciousness too.
First-Wave Feminism
Definition: Early feminist movement focused on legal equality, especially voting rights and property laws (19th–early 20th century).
Connected Theory: Gender Reform Feminism
Significance: Laid the foundation for modern liberal feminist reforms.
Contrasting Approach: Second-Wave/Radical Feminism criticized it for focusing only on legal reforms and excluding race and class concerns.
Sex/Gender Systems
Definition: The social and institutional ways we assign roles, rights, and norms based on biological sex.
Connected Theory: Gender Reform Feminism
Significance: Reformists seek to make these systems more equal (e.g., remove gendered laws, roles).
Contrasting Approach: Social Constructionism/Postmodern Feminism argues these systems need to be deconstructed, not just made fair.
Gender Resistance Feminisms
Definition: Feminist perspective that challenges dominant patriarchal systems and emphasizes how power structures oppress women.
Connected Theory: Gender Resistance Feminism (aka Radical Feminism)
Significance: Believes reform isn’t enough — systems like patriarchy, marriage, or media must be dismantled.
Contrast: Gender Reform Feminism believes in working within systems (e.g., passing better laws), not tearing them down.
Gender Essentialism
Definition: The idea that women and men have inherent, natural differences.
Connected Theory: Radical-Cultural Feminism (a form of Gender Resistance)
Significance: Sometimes used strategically — i.e., arguing that women’s empathy, care, or cooperation are strengths.
Contrast: Social Constructionism/Postmodernism rejects essentialism entirely, saying gender is a socially created role, not natural.
Radical-Cultural Feminism
Definition: A branch of radical feminism that emphasizes the positive value of women’s culture and experiences.
Connected Theory: Gender Resistance Feminism
Significance: Promotes spaces that celebrate women’s distinctiveness, away from male-dominated culture (e.g., women’s festivals, communities).
Contrast: Intersectional Feminism critiques it for being overly white, middle-class, and universalizing womanhood
Frames / Framing
Definition: The way issues are structured and presented to the public.
Connected Theory: Gender Resistance Feminism
Significance: Critiques how dominant institutions (media, law, politics) frame women’s issues in patriarchal ways.
Contrast: Reform feminists may try to reframe issues within mainstream media or policy spaces rather than questioning the system of framing itself
Sex
Definition: The biological classification of male or female.
Connected Theory: Gender Resistance Feminism challenges the assumption that sex is purely biological and linked to roles.
Significance: Resistance feminists argue that even “biological” sex is politicized, especially in areas like reproduction or bodily autonomy.
Contrast: Essentialist feminisms often take sex as fixed, while Postmodern feminists argue it’s just as socially constructed as gender.
Patriarchy
Definition: A systemic structure of male dominance over women in society.
Connected Theory: Gender Resistance Feminism
Significance: Central to radical feminist critique — patriarchy is not just one issue, it’s the underlying system across all institutions.
Contrast: Liberal feminists may recognize patriarchy, but often believe laws and policies can reform its effects.
Gender Stereotyping
Definition: Oversimplified and rigid ideas about how men and women “should” behave.
Connected Theory: Gender Resistance Feminism
Significance: Seen as a tool of patriarchy that limits freedom and upholds male superiority.
Contrast: Gender Reform Feminism also opposes stereotypes, but may focus more on breaking them in careers or media rather than deeper cultural change.
Social Constructionism
Definition: The belief that gender, sex, and sexuality are socially constructed through culture, not biology.
Connected Theory: Gender Resistance Feminism
Significance: Undermines naturalized ideas about gender — a powerful tool for dismantling patriarchal norms.
Contrast: Gender Essentialism, often associated with some strands of Radical-Cultural Feminism.
Heteronormativity
Definition: The assumption that heterosexuality is the default or “normal” sexuality.
Connected Theory: Gender Resistance / Queer Feminism
Significance: Challenges the way society enforces compulsory heterosexuality, especially through media, law, and family structures.
Contrast: Gender Reform Feminism often overlooks sexuality as a feminist issue unless explicitly discussed.
Intersectionality
Definition: A framework that examines how race, gender, class, sexuality, etc. overlap to create unique experiences of oppression.
Connected Theory: Intersectional Feminism
Significance: Challenges the idea that “woman” is a universal category; centers experiences of marginalized women.
Contrast: Gender Reform Feminism often treats all women’s experiences as the same — a “one-size-fits-all” model.
Global Care Chain
Definition: A system where women (often from the Global South) migrate to do care work (like nannies, nurses) in wealthier countries, often leaving behind families.
Connected Theory: Intersectional Feminism
Significance: Exposes how race, gender, class, and global inequality intersect in feminized labour.
Contrast: Liberal feminism may focus only on economic empowerment, missing the global + racial dynamics.
Feminization of Labour
Definition: The growing presence of women in low-paid, insecure, and flexible work, often devalued by society.
Connected Theory: Intersectional Feminism
Significance: Critiques how this shift disproportionately impacts racialized and immigrant women, not just women in general.
Contrast: Marxist feminism may emphasize class alone and ignore racialized dimensions.
Unwaged Labour
Definition: Unpaid domestic and reproductive labour (e.g., caregiving, cleaning, cooking) usually performed by women.
Connected Theory: Intersectional Feminism
Significance: Highlights how race, immigration status, and class shape who is expected to perform this work.
Contrast: Radical feminism might critique patriarchy here but overlook how it’s racialized or globalized.
