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Feminism and the Writing and Teaching of History

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Feminism and the Writing and Teaching of History Atlantis Vol. 7 No. 2 Spring! Printemps 1982 37-46 Feminism and the Writing and Teaching of History Ruth Pierson Alison Prentice Ontario Institute for Studies in Education No one would deny that the contemporary how a feminist perspective affects the women's movement has had an important im• historian's task, first as a writer and, briefly, as pact on the writing and teaching of history. It a teacher of history. has produced, above all, the vital subfield now known as women's history. But almost from Feminism, in our view, is both a movement the beginning, historians in this field have been and an ideology. Insofar as some of its fol• critical of their own enterprise. As many early lowers have engaged in extended philosophical 3 proponents of women's studies now prefer to analysis it has also given rise to theory. Intrin• think of their project as feminist studies, sic to feminism is women's sense of grievance, historians concerned about the place of women arising out of an awareness that "women suffer in the past increasingly look to the develop• from systematic social injustice because of their 4 ment of a feminist history, a history which will sex." This awareness of injustice depends, in have an impact beyond the study of the history turn, on a belief in and commitment to the of one half of the human race. ideal of equality. In a world where there ex• isted no concept of equality, we would argue, 5 What does a feminist perspective mean in there could be no feminism. As an ideology, the practise of history? It seems to us impossi• feminism is premised on the belief that women ble to answer this question without first putting suffer from oppresive inequalities in a number forward a definition of feminism itself, admit• of areas and puts forward the ideal of a world tedly not an easy task. We recognize, first of in which the sexes would be equal. As a move• all, that there are many feminisms2 and that it ment, it strives to make the achievement of is unlikely that our brief discussion can encom• justice, perceived as the attainment of wo• pass all of them. Risky as it may be, we never• men's equality with men, a political and eco• theless argue that no discussion of feminism nomic reality. While we recognize that in• and the writing and teaching of history makes equality is not necessarily synonymous with sense without an attempt to sort out what the oppression, we believe that systematic inequal• word feminism actually means to us. From ities lead to abuses of power and therefore to definition, we will move to a consideration of oppression. Feminists, by definition, are par- ticularly concerned with systematic inequal• and anonymous productions. Although noth• ities based on sex. ing in the language logically assigns art to men or craft to women, the fact is that few women The critical task of feminism, therefore, is to have made it into the domain of high art,7 as examine the structures of women's inequality. this has been defined historically, while many When and where has systematic subordination have devoted themselves to the creation of of women existed? What have been the social, works to humanize the domestic environment. economic and political mechanisms of wo• Contemporary feminists have sought to open men's oppression? Because an exclusive preoc• our eyes to the excellence of design and execu• cupation with these mechanisms could lead to a tion in such objects as hooked rugs and pat• distorting and purely negative picture of chwork quilts, indeed to abolish the distinction women as victims, it is equally a task of between craft and art altogether.8 This aim is feminism to reclaim, elucidate and reevaluate part of the larger feminist insistence that all the positive aspects of women's experience in matters of interest to women including, for ex• the present and in the past. In fact, one of the ample, childbirth, childbearing, family rela• basic oppressions that women suffer is the si• tions and domestic labour, deserve more lencing of their whole experience, both nega• serious and intelligent attention than they cur• tive and positive. A basic injustice that rently receive. feminists wish to redress, therefore, is inequali• ty in terms of visibility. What feminists de• Invisibility because of the traditional usages mand is the right to know and understand the of language or marginality because of a lower experience of women and to have it analyzed, value implied in words attached to women's taken into account, recorded and valued, activities is perceived by feminists as based in equally with the experience of men. patriarchal social structures. A major focus of feminist research is thus the examination of the Women's invisibility is rooted in the lan• origins and perpetuation of such structural in• guage itself, for often imbedded in conven• equalities. In such analysis the modern sever- tional language are usages that marginalize the ence between the public and the private experience of women or leave them out of the spheres is seen as serving to reinforce patriar• picture altogether. The most frequently cited chal power by circumscribing women within case in the English language, and one fre• the domestic realm, or, insofar as they are quently encountered in historical writing is, of drawn into the public domain, relegating them course, the use of male pronouns or prefixes to menial and low status positions within it. when both sexes are intended or when "man• This emphasis on the public/private is central kind" is used to refer to the entire human to feminist analysis for, insistent as feminists 6 race. Another subtler form of devaluing are that the domestic sphere is important, we women and their experience, which current also recognize that we ignore at our peril the language usage reflects, involves assigning larger world outside the home, the realms for from a pair of related terms the exalted one to instance, of the state and its military, of in• an activity usually performed by men and the stitutionalized religion and education, or of lowly one to a similar activity performed by space science, computer technology and the women. A case in point is the historical multi-national corporation. emergence of a distinction between "art," seen as the creative act of "men of genius," Crucial decisions affecting the lives of all and "craft," which has been reserved for human beings are made in the public realm. smaller, less significant and often collective And, insofar as decisions made there impinge on private and domestic life, it cannot be said ference are established by a male-dominated that the two spheres are equal in power. It is "science" and used to set limits to women's 10 this recognition of the interconnectedness of expression and development. the public and private spheres and the subor• A crucial example of the different but equal dination of the latter in modern western society dilemma concerns birthing. If women demand that has driven and continues to drive feminists control of the birth process, is this because they to demand that women move into the public have a superior claim on the grounds of world. And here the concern of feminism with biological role or inherited or socialized traits personhood comes into play. For, so long as not shared by men? Or should women de• women do not participate or represent them• mand, rather, an equal share in the govern• selves directly in the public realm, we are not ment of childbirth—with fathers, doctors, persons in our own right. Systematic inequal• hospital authorities and the like—on the ity of representation or participation in any grounds of an equal right to govern a process field of endeavour is, in the present order of that affects all of us intimately? As feminists we things, diminishing to women. In order to be should like at the moment to live with this as an at least as autonomous and self-determining as open question. Our fear is that the answer will men, whether it be in respect to marriage laws, be preempted by a male-oriented socio-biology the price of bread or the possibility of nuclear with theories of genetic determination or war, women need to be able to participate in mother-infant bonding, for example,11 or by public power equally with men. male judges issuing injunctions against abor• tions in the name of fathers or foetuses.12 Feminist goals are not without their atten• dant problems. It has been suggested, especial• We recognize that all too often women's ly by those who fear feminism, that by seeking choices have been circumscribed by rigid an autonomous selfhood for women, equal to categories and dichotomies, positing unrecon- men's, feminism promotes a further atomizing cilable conflict between two solutions, two in• of society. A society of selfish individuals living terpretations, or even two supposedly opposite alone, unencumbered by intimate ties to or re• types of feminism that force women into one sponsibilities for other human beings is hardly camp or another. It has been pointed out time a feminist goal; rather, feminists insist that and time again that "feminist theorists do not women and men have equal needs for affection agree on whether their long-term goal is to and emotional support and that for satisfaction maximize female identity or to reject gender as of these needs one sex should not have to make a primary category.13 We believe that it is a greater sacrifice of autonomy than the other.9 possible and desirable to pursue both goals at once, despite their apparent contradition.14 Another major tension arises out of the co• We think that having to make choices of that existence of the demand for equality with the nature is analagous to the traditional choice acceptance or celebration of difference.
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