女权主义

 起源：18 世纪末的法国
 定义：泛指女性争取与男性同等社会权利的各种主张
 发展阶段：三个阶段
1　第一次女权主义浪潮：18 世纪末至 19 世纪中期兴起的女权主义运动浪潮，被称为
“自由女权主义”。核心主张是追求两性平等，即女性应该具有同男性同等的自由和平等
的权利。代表人物及著作有玛丽·沃斯通克拉夫特《女权辩护》、约翰·斯图亚特·穆勒《妇女的
屈从地位》和西蒙·德·波伏瓦《第二性》等。
2　第二次女权主义浪潮：20 世纪六七十年代，被称为“激进女权主义”。主要是追求
两性平权，强调两性间分工的自然性并消除男女同工不同酬的现象。凯特·米利特《性政治》
和伊娃·菲格斯《父权制看法：社会中的女人》等。
3　第三次女权主义浪潮：20 世纪 90 年代以后，被称为“后现代女权主义”。仍然强
调男女平等问题，但是反对单纯追求男女平等，而是主张在相对的“平等”和绝对的“差
异”中追求妇女解放。

早期英国社会女性地位
两大叙事：
 一种叙事认为英国女性地位提高，由于文艺复兴和宗教改革的影响， 16、17 世纪的英
国女性在教育和精神上的地位都有所提高。
 另一种叙事认为英国女性地位下降，资本主义的生长和工业革命给女性的经济地位造
成了破坏性的后果。

Jacqueline Eales, Women In Early England

Despite that the social and economic status of women had not improved much from the late
middle ages to the modern period, women had played an active role in many different capacities.
They (royal family & the aristocratic women) had the ability to inherit property in the failure of
male heirs; women can intervene in court and local politics in order to protect their family
interests; The elite women could also obtain offices, grants and favours from the monarch, and
lower-class women could also represent their family in various ways such as participating in the
food riot and acting as the arbiter of neighbourly behaviour in their communities; besides,
women were given the opportunities to become involved in religious debates.

Following the political destabilization of the English Civil Wars in the mid-seventeenth century, a
small number of female writers began to challenge these traditional assumptions. Margaret
Cavendish, Duchess of Newcastle, and Mary Astell have been described as amongst the first
English feminists because their works not only display an awareness of the social construction of
gender, but are also a critique of its failings from a feminine point of view (Smith 1982). They
argued that the inferiority of their sex was not innate and was perpetuated by a lack of
education. They believed that, given the same intellectual training, women would be as rational
and as capable of exercising political or intellectual judgement as men. Yet their influence was
isolated and it might be better to term these writers protofeminists, for no wider women’s or
feminist movement grew up until the mid-nineteenth century when the sustained demand for
female suffrage prompted the organization of pressure groups with a programme for change.