♂
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The Second Sex (1949)
By
Simone de Beauvoir
(1908 – 1986)
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• L’invitée (1943; She Came to Stay, 1949)
• Le Sang des autres (1944; The Blood of Others, 1948)
• Le deuxième sexe (1949; The Second Sex, 1953)
• Les Mandarins (1954; The Mandarins, 1956)
• Mémoires d’une jeune fille rangée (1958; Memoirs of a Dutiful
Daughter, 1959)
• La vieillesse (1970; The Coming of Age, 1973)
• Tout compte fait (1972; All Said and Done, 1974)
Dibo
• La cérémonie des adieux (1981; A.Adieux:
A Farewell to Sartre, 19844
“Enough ink has been spilled in the quarreling
over feminism… It is still talked about,
however, for the voluminous nonsense uttered
during the last century seems to have done
little to illuminate the problem.”
(p.2)
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Problem / Conflict
Woman has always been man’s dependant, if not
his slave.
The two sexes have never shared the world in
equality.
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The Second Sex
Not:
• judgmental of individual men
• Personal reaction of an oppressed
woman
Is:
• A genuine search and analysis of
woman’s identity in relation to the other
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The Second Sex
 Pertinent:
 Timely:
• Philosophical analysis
• Post-W.W. vision of
society  Full
membership
• Interpretation of the
relation between Men &
Women
• Liberation movements
• The Universal Declaration
of Human Rights (1948)
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Universal Declaration of Human
Rights (1948)
 Article 1.
“All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and
rights. They are endowed with reason and conscience and
should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood.”
 Article 2.
Everyone is entitled to all the rights and freedoms set forth
in this Declaration, without distinction of any kind, such as
race, colour, sex, language, religion, political or other
opinion, national or social origin, property, birth or other
status…
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“…the fortunes of the individual as
defined not in terms of happiness but
in terms of liberty.” (p.10)
 Essential Value:
• liberty of acting
• becoming what they want to be
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“A person is not born a woman,
but becomes one.”
SS. Vol. II, Ch.I
Eternal Feminine (anatomy)
Female Function (physiology)
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What is a Woman?
“A product elaborated by civilization”
(p.16)
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Woman
Aristotle
 Female  intrinsic
natural defectiveness
St. Thomas Aquinas
 An imperfect being
Julien Benda
 Can’t think of herself
without man
 Created as a 2nd & a
helper
The Bible
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• Otherness  fundamental category of human
thought
• Fundamental hostility towards every other
consciousness
• No Reciprocity
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♂He
♀She
The One
The Other
Master
Slave
Subject / Absolute Object / Incidental
Essential
Inessential
Positive / Right
Negative / Wrong
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The basic trait of woman:
“She is the other in a totality of
which the two components are
necessary to one another” (p.4)
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 Failure to utilize:
 Instead of facilitating
liberation:
1. Men’s sexual
dependence
 Become sex objects
2. Women’s financial
independence
 Unequal wages
 No recognition of their
work’s value
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Why didn’t they dispute Man’s
sovereignty?
?
Critiquing Women’s attitude:
Failure to bring about the change
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Women accepted
representations
of themselves
as dictated by men
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Women manifest complicity with the oppressor.
They don’t give up the deal with him
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• Women lack the means of
organizing themselves
• No awareness of common
cause
• No solidarity
• Individualistic solutions
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Pleased with their role as
“others”
?
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• Awareness & Consciousness of “BEING”
 our responsibility
• We are the sum total of our acts & choices
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Immanence vs. Transcendence
 Woman no longer seeks to drag Man
into immanence
 She strives to emerge herself in the
light of transcendence
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Transcendent Woman VS. Transcendent Man
 Confrontation
 No mutual recognition
 Desire to dominate the other
“…the war profits neither”
(p.13)
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Beauvoir’s approach to a solution:
•
•
•
•
•
Discard quarrelling
Impartiality
Clarity & Understanding
Education
Reciprocity / Equality
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“A world where men and women
would be equal is easy to visualize”
(p.16)
Characteristics of the solution:
• Does not exclude the “OTHER”
• Does not ignore the distinctive sexual
differences
• Allows both (Women/Men) to live out in their
several fashions the strange ambiguity of the
flesh
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Basic Assumption
≫peculiarities
•
Being Human
•
The same essential need for one another
•
Can gain from their liberty the same glory

⇒ Fraternity is possible
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Utopia?
“…our lack of imagination always depopulates
the future.” (p. 18)
“New relations of flesh and sentiment of which
we have no conception will arise between the
sexes; already, indeed, there have appeared
between men and women friendships,
rivalries, complicities, comradeships - chaste
or sensual - which past centuries could not
have conceived.” (p.18)
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Feminism
The doctrine and the struggle for
women’s social and political rights
equal to those of men
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Other approaches to feminism:
$
¥
€
I. Marxist Feminism
• Economic & material
exploitation
• Division of labor
• Inequality within the
workplace
$
£
£
₤
₣
 Equality
conceived in
material &
economic terms
₤
¥
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₣
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Other approaches to feminism:
II. Liberal Feminism
• Laws
• Customs
 Change Laws
 New Legislations
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Other approaches to feminism:
III. Radical Feminism
• Patriarchal Society
 Female forms
of culture
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Other approaches to feminism:
IV. Analytic Feminism
• Anatomy is Destiny
 Woman not
only Biological
Functions
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Other approaches to feminism:
V. Socialist Feminism
UN
UN
UN
UN
UN
• Assigned Roles
• Stereotypes
 Gender Concept
UN
Analysis
UN
UN
UN
UN
UN
UN
UN
UN
UN
UN
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Other approaches to feminism:
VI. Existential Feminism
• Domination:
One / Other
 Choose in
Freedom to be
a SELF
 Rights to full
partnership
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Other approaches to feminism:
VII. Post-modern Feminism
?
?
?
?
?
?
To be an “OTHER”
is
an
Advantage
?
?
?
?
?
?
?
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Other approaches to feminism:
VIII. Islamic Feminism
• Male Domination
Qur’an & Sharïa
protect women
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Today:
What is being done to improve Women’s
situation?
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World Conferences On Women:
• 1st  Mexico City  1975
• 2nd  Copenhagen  1980
• 3rd  Nairobi  1985
• 4th  Beijing  1995
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Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination
against Women (CEDAW 1979)
&
Fourth World Conference on Women
Beijing, China - September 1995
Action for Equality, Development and Peace
•Action to end discrimination
• Ensure women's equal access to, and equal opportunities in:
 Political and public life incl. right to vote + to stand for election
 Education
 Health
 Employment.
• Reproductive rights of women
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In the Arab World:
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May Ziadeh:
 One of the 1st Lebanese
female writers
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Laure Moghaizel:
 Legislation
 Co-founder of the Lebanese Association for Human
Rights
 Member of the International Commission for Human
Rights (U.N.) – Geneva
 Awards: Holder of the Order of the Cedar, rank of
Commander.
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Nawal El Saadawi:
 Founder and President, Arab Women's Solidarity
Association (AWSA)
 Co–Founder, Arab Association for Human Rights
 Founder Vice-President, African Association for Women on Research
Development, Dakar, Senegal
 President and Organizer, International Conference on the Challenges Facing
Arab Women, Cairo, September, 1986
 Founder, Egyptian Women Writer's Association, 1971
 On 8 December 2004 she presented herself as a candidate for the
presidential elections in Egypt
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Hanan Ashrawi:
 Joined the Intifada Political Committee, serving on its Diplomatic Committee
 Founder and Commissioner General of the Preparatory Committee of the
Palestinian Independent Commission for Citizens' Rights in Jerusalem
 Minister of Higher Education and Research.
 Founder & secretary general of the Palestinian Initiative for the Promotion of
Global Dialogue and Democracy (MIFTAH)
 An elected member of the Palestinian Legislative Council, Jerusalem District.
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Fatimah Mernissi:
Contemporary Moroccan feminist writer & sociologist
Concerned with Islam and women's roles in it
Analyzes historical development of Islamic thought
and its modern manifestation
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A lot remains to be done:
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Stats: From UN Human Development Report, 2006
Arab world:
Women constitute > 67% of illiterate
adults
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Crimes of Honor:
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Repudiation:
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Divorce Laws:
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Excision
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Domestic Violence:
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Harassment:
Lap top computer
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The right for Lebanese women
married to a foreigner to give
their children their Lebanese
nationality
A. Dibo (April 2012)
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Thank you!
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