Critical Review of Radical Feminism: Libertarian and Cultural Perspectives and Womanism and Black Feminism

TITLE:
A CRITICAL REVIEW OF “RADICAL FEMINISM: LIBERTARIAN AND CULTURAL PERSPECTIVES” AND “WOMANISM AND BLACK FEMINISM”

WOMANISM AND BLACK FEMINISM
Introduced by Alice Walker in her book “In Search of Our Mother’s Gardens”, the term “womanism” was initially taken from a black Southern expression. Used to describe black female children who behaved serious, responsible and too grown-up for their good, their mothers would tell them that they were “acting womanish”. This was in deep contrast from being “girlish” where a female was expected to be irresponsible and playful, which was characterized as the nature of white females.
Walker’s had several different meanings for “womanism” which highlight reasons why an abundant amount of African American preferred to align themselves with womanism instead of black feminism. In terms of Black Nationalism, black women accepted “womanism” if they felt that blacks and whites could not cohesively and equally function within the same space therefore whites could never understand their plights. In terms of Pluralism, black women felt that maintaining black individuality and honor would bring about an improved version of racial integration in a group setting.
Some black women however accepted the term “black feminism” through their approval that “feminism” promoted the belief that women were full human beings who were proficient enough to take on leadership roles and responsibilities. Four major areas that the feminist agenda focused on were the economic status of women, their political rights, their marital and family issues on a global scale and issues concerning their health in terms of sexually transmitted diseases and reproduction situations.

RADICAL FEMINISM: LIBERTARIAN AND CULTURAL PERSPECTIVES
Hailed as “radical feminists”, this group was comprised of women who had a desire to improve women’s conditions and participated in radical social movements like the Civil Rights movement and the anti-Vietnam War movement. This was unlike reformist feminists who joined primarily conventional women’s rights groups such as women’s educational and professional groups. These revolutionary feminists initially started the practice of conscious-raising where women could meet in small groups and share their personal experiences with each other. Usually talking about situations pertaining to their experiences “as women”, the female participants in these meetings realized that their individual stories had widespread recognition and familiarity with others.
Radical feminists strongly felt that women’s oppression “as women” was stronger than any other form of human oppression. This claim was justifiable to this group due to the reality that men seemed to have too much control over women, whether it was in women’s reproductive and sexual lives or men’s effect on the self-esteem and self-identity of women. However, while radical feminists agreed in principle that sexism was an extensive form of human oppression, some could not agree on how they could completely manage and remove it. Thus, radical feminists were divided into two groups where members usually had different views about the most effective way to stop sexism. These were the Radical-Libertarian Feminists and the Radical-Cultural Feminists. Radical-Libertarian feminists believed that women’s capacity to contribute to their society was limited by their femininity and gender identity, so they encouraged women to appear androgynous by adopting acceptable masculine and acceptable feminine characteristics. However, the view of Radical-Cultural Feminists was significantly different from the other group because they believed that feminine traits should be celebrated, not substituted for masculine behaviours.
Radical-Cultural and Radical-Libertarian feminists have very different point of views on gender and sexuality. On the subject of Gender, a radical-libertarian feminist named Kate Millett stated that in order for women to be truly liberated, male control over them must be eradicated. This could only be fulfilled through the elimination of gender attributes since they were formulated under the patriarchal rule. However, a radical-cultural feminist named Marilyn French felt that female values should be re-introduced into the masculine society which was previously created by a patriarchal philosophy. On the topic of Sexuality, Radical-Libertarian feminists felt that women should regain control over their female sexuality by having the freedom to practice whatever gave them pleasure and fulfillment. This meant that certain sexual desires would no longer be repressed in order to placate long-standing norms. In contrast, since heterosexual sexual relations typically had sexual objectification ideologies, Radical-Cultural feminists expressed that any sexual practices that reinforced male sexual violence should be unacceptable.