 believed to be commonly experienced by all women, much contemporary feminist writing emphasizes the diversity of women's relationship not only to the male social order but also to each other. It is more accurate, therefore, to talk of feminisms than feminism. Sebestyen (1978) charted over ten political tendencies within feminism, ranging from a liberal, equal rights position to a female supremacist strand. Palmer (1989) listed the following tendencies – academic feminism, cultural feminism, lesbian feminism, liberal feminism, psychoanalytic feminism, political lesbianism, radical feminism and socialist feminism. Furthermore, black feminism has been concerned with the implicit and explicit racism within feminist thought and has stressed the particular issues concerning the lives of black women (Lorde, 1979). The original four demands of the ‘second wave’ – equal pay now, equal education and opportunities, free contraception, abortion on demand and free 24-hour nurseries – have been identified as the primary concerns of white, Western women. Access to food, fuel and water are the primary needs of many THIRD WORLD women. Feminism has been identified with white women's culture, and many black women favour the term ‘womanist’ (Walker, 1983). Ecofeminism suggests that an end to the oppression of women is bound up with ecological values, and that women should be centrally concerned with ending the exploitation of the ecosystem (Collard, 1988). Ecofeminism has been particularly strong within radical feminism and within the GREEN MOVEMENT.
Case (1988) has followed the convention of distinguishing between two major theoretical divisions within feminism, namely, radical feminism and materialist (socialist) feminism. The former is characterized by the belief that PATRIARCHY is the major and universal cause of women's oppression, and that the power invested in men is the root problem. Radical feminism, the predominant form of feminism in the US, has fostered the notion of an exclusively women's culture, together with a belief in the need to organize separately from men. Materialist (socialist) feminism is critical of the essentialism implicit in radical feminism and the ahistorical approach to patriarchy. Materialist feminism has its roots in MARXISM and prioritizes SOCIAL CLASS as the factor determining the situation of women within CAPITALISM. This approach is therefore concerned with the interaction between the dialectic of class and GENDER. Not without theoretical problems, Hartmann (1979) has characterized the ‘marriage’ between Marxism and feminism as an unhappy one. The division between radical feminists, who wish to organize separately from men, and materialist feminists who seek solidarity with 'S upportive’ men, continues unresolved.
Academic feminism has made an impact on the teaching and research carried out in many academic institutions. WOMEN'S STUDIES courses have been concerned with revising and challenging a wide variety of academic disciplines including sociology, history and English literature. Academic feminism has been concerned to criticize the ‘sex-blind’ nature of academic knowledge. Within sociology there has been a growing literature on the position of women in society and the development of a specifically feminist research methodology (Stanley and Wise, 1983).
Whilst there is no single ideological position uniting all feminists, most would accept that the subordination of women to men is the result of socioeconomic factors and not the effect of biological determinism. Hence, there is a commonly held belief that major social change culminating in women's liberation is possible. At present, feminism remains a vital and visible social movement, particularly successful in the area of cultural creativity Despite media references to the Post-Feminist Era, the continuing social inequality of women and its eradication remains at the core of feminism in all its forms. See also MATRIARCHY.
a women’s movement to obtain equal rights with men within bourgeois society. It arose in the 18th century, first in North Americ