Chapter 8 "Contradictions of the Pure Relationship":
"Pure relationship" as defined by Giddens is "a relationship of sexual and emotional equality" (p. 2, he goes more into details on p. 58). In this chapter, Giddens focuses on aspects of the pure relationship in same-sex encounters, specifically lesbian women (134). In this chapter, I believe Giddens is saying that a homosexual relationship, especially a lesbian relationship can provide us with a new model to follow since the heterosexual model has been impacted by too many societal restrictions. Giddens goes on to say that it is the gay community who becomes pioneers in changing and challenging long-term relationships and marriages (135). I do believe that because so much attention has been focused on heterosexual relationships (and unfortunately, so much benefits have been given to heterosexual couples) that maybe our hope for a new model of relationship would be to look at homosexual relationships. According to Giddens, homosexual relationships can give us that pure relationship we're looking for because women have a higher level of communication with each other as opposed to heterosexual relationships (142). I think Giddens sums up this chapter pretty well on page 154 when he says "if orthodox marriage is not yet widely seen as just one life-style among others, as in fact it has become, this is partly the result of institutional lag and partly the result of the complicated mixture of attraction and repulsion which the psychic development of each sex creates with regard to the other".
I personally have seen and experienced a lot of problems with heterosexual relationships in terms of communication and expectations from the other sex. The earlier chapter on codependence spoke to me on personal levels. I believe there are a lot to learn from other relationships, such as homosexual relationships, and once we can look at the relationship instead of the two individuals involved, than maybe we can start to see what works and what doesn't. I can speak for myself that I've started to noticed my personal relationship have become more of what Giddens called "confluent love". So as third wave feminists, I wonder if this "confluent love" is what we all should be striving for?
Chapter 9 "Sexuality, Repression, Civilisation":
I found this chapter harder to understand. But in here, Gibbens criticizes "sexual radicals", Wilhelm Reich and Herbert Marcuse, for "believing that modern societies depend upon a high level of sexual repression" and because they did not include much information on gender or changes on love in the modern social order (168 & 169). I guess one thing that I didn't really understand was when Gibbens mentions that according to Reich "freedom and sexual health are the same thing" (163). I believe Gibbens is saying that he doesn't agree with Reich and Marcuse in have a non-repressive society because we are not ready for it and by having it be a non-repressive society, we put all of our other relationships at stake (182).
I would have to say that I agree with Gibbens on this issue. I find it disturbing to think of kids having sex with each other. Yes, this is how my culture, my society has raised me up to think but like we mentioned earlier, should we consider everything socially constructed as something bad?
Chapter 10: "Intimacy as Democracy":
First, Gibbens goes on to talk about 'the meaning of democracy'. He mentions David Held four approaches to political democracy (185). Gibbens states "the structural source of this promise is the emergence of the pure relationship, not only in the area of sexuality but also in those of parent-child relations, and other forms of kinship and friendship". What he is proposing here is again his model of "confluent love" (188). I believe Gibbens is saying that he doesn't believe parents should encourage their children to be sexually active but he believes parents should have democratic relationships with their children.
"The model of confluent love suggests an ethical framework for the fostering of non-destructive emotion in the conduct of individual and communal life" (202).
Thursday, April 24, 2008
Wednesday, April 16, 2008
Against Love: a polemic (Ch. 1&2)
"Please fasten your seatbelts: we are about to encounter contradictions. The subject is love, and things may get bumpy" (3). Indeed, the first two chapters have been nothing else but pages after pages of a polemist arguing against something that as a society, we have learned to not question. Laura Kipnis questions our quest for lasting love and looks at the meanings and cultural significance of fidelity and betrayal.
One review from the back of her book states, "[this book] raises a thousand questions most of us lack the courage to ask". We're afraid to ask because we're afraid we might find answers that might oppose our essential need to love and be loved. In the prologue, Kipnis argues that adultery is an "experiment" to keep us feeling "alive". She gives the analogy of "adultery is to love-by-the-rules what the test tube is to science: a container for experiments" (9). Agree or disagree? I think that there is adultery because marriage life has been portrayed by the media as something so negative--that after a couple years of marriage, there will be less sex, less attraction, more arguments, etc. The media already gives couples a sense of what to expect from marriage without having even been married. So I wonder, how much does the media and the society play into our expectations of marriage? When we do find ourselves having less sex, feeling less attractive, and arguing more, are these our signs of a fail marriage or have we been socially constructed to feel that way when we encounter these signs? And with over 50,000 couple therapists in this nation, how can we not expect to think marriage is set for failure?
Kipnis goes on to her first chapter of "Love's Labor" and argues that we cannot separate how we love from how we work (22). It's important to keep in mind that our approach to "achieve what is most essentially human" is " a recent cultural dictate" (25). In this chapter, Kipnis helps me to see this whole notion of "working on your relationship" in a new light. Just like how we're dissatisfied with our work and want to look for something else, we're also expecting the same from our relationship when we ask, "isn't there supposed to be more?" (42). And her solution so far is adultery. I don't believe adultery is the way to go once a relationship becomes monotonous, but I'm not sure how else to go about it. This makes me question, is it apart of human nature to always want more, or is it our society that promises us we can have more....and it'll be better? I think what Kipnis really wants us to get out of this chapter is that our notion of love is shaped by our society and adultery is an outlet to what we have been restricted to.
In chapter 2, Kipnis goes on to discuss about "Domestic Gulags". Here Kipnis disagrees with our modern idea of "mature love" in which she describes "maturity" as "a depressing badge of early senescence and impending decrepitude". Instead of viewing "maturity" this way, we tend to think of it as "a sterling achievement, a sign of your worth as a person and your qualifications to love and be loved". By trying to live up to this "mature love", any sort of change means personal failure and therefore we are constrain to continuously strive for this "enviable state" (58). Here, she also goes into details about "Couple Linguistics 101", listing all the things you cannot do in a relationship (84-92). These eight pages of cannots made me feel overwhelmed by what we restrict and demand from our relationships. Maybe it's because I find myself saying a lot of these to my boyfriend but my gosh, reading them here makes me question why I'm so demanding! And by demanding so much, is it a sign of a failure or is failure our only expectation?
Kipnis brings two good points on page 94:
"why has modern love developed in such a way as to maximize submission and minimize freedom, with so little argument about it?"
"Isn't it a little depressing to think we're somehow incapable of inventing forms of emotional life based on anything other than subjugation?"
Overall, Kipnis has really helped me to ask those questions that I've been afraid to ask. I'm excited to here what others think of her.
One review from the back of her book states, "[this book] raises a thousand questions most of us lack the courage to ask". We're afraid to ask because we're afraid we might find answers that might oppose our essential need to love and be loved. In the prologue, Kipnis argues that adultery is an "experiment" to keep us feeling "alive". She gives the analogy of "adultery is to love-by-the-rules what the test tube is to science: a container for experiments" (9). Agree or disagree? I think that there is adultery because marriage life has been portrayed by the media as something so negative--that after a couple years of marriage, there will be less sex, less attraction, more arguments, etc. The media already gives couples a sense of what to expect from marriage without having even been married. So I wonder, how much does the media and the society play into our expectations of marriage? When we do find ourselves having less sex, feeling less attractive, and arguing more, are these our signs of a fail marriage or have we been socially constructed to feel that way when we encounter these signs? And with over 50,000 couple therapists in this nation, how can we not expect to think marriage is set for failure?
Kipnis goes on to her first chapter of "Love's Labor" and argues that we cannot separate how we love from how we work (22). It's important to keep in mind that our approach to "achieve what is most essentially human" is " a recent cultural dictate" (25). In this chapter, Kipnis helps me to see this whole notion of "working on your relationship" in a new light. Just like how we're dissatisfied with our work and want to look for something else, we're also expecting the same from our relationship when we ask, "isn't there supposed to be more?" (42). And her solution so far is adultery. I don't believe adultery is the way to go once a relationship becomes monotonous, but I'm not sure how else to go about it. This makes me question, is it apart of human nature to always want more, or is it our society that promises us we can have more....and it'll be better? I think what Kipnis really wants us to get out of this chapter is that our notion of love is shaped by our society and adultery is an outlet to what we have been restricted to.
In chapter 2, Kipnis goes on to discuss about "Domestic Gulags". Here Kipnis disagrees with our modern idea of "mature love" in which she describes "maturity" as "a depressing badge of early senescence and impending decrepitude". Instead of viewing "maturity" this way, we tend to think of it as "a sterling achievement, a sign of your worth as a person and your qualifications to love and be loved". By trying to live up to this "mature love", any sort of change means personal failure and therefore we are constrain to continuously strive for this "enviable state" (58). Here, she also goes into details about "Couple Linguistics 101", listing all the things you cannot do in a relationship (84-92). These eight pages of cannots made me feel overwhelmed by what we restrict and demand from our relationships. Maybe it's because I find myself saying a lot of these to my boyfriend but my gosh, reading them here makes me question why I'm so demanding! And by demanding so much, is it a sign of a failure or is failure our only expectation?
Kipnis brings two good points on page 94:
"why has modern love developed in such a way as to maximize submission and minimize freedom, with so little argument about it?"
"Isn't it a little depressing to think we're somehow incapable of inventing forms of emotional life based on anything other than subjugation?"
Overall, Kipnis has really helped me to ask those questions that I've been afraid to ask. I'm excited to here what others think of her.
Sunday, April 6, 2008
Masculinities Chapters 1-3
[I have the 1995 version so the page numbers might be different from yours.]
Chapter 1 "The Science of Masculinity": From a sociological perspective, Connell discusses in details about how early works of psychology has contributed to shaping the West's ideas of masculinity (and femininity) . He starts out by stating how scientific claims has a "definite hegemony in our education system and media"(6). Therefore, whenever speaking of sex differences, we tend to use biological findings to validate our answers without thinking of masculinity and femininity as being "culturally constructed" (5). He gives an example from a local newspaper in Sydney about why women are more likely than men to ask for directions. The psychologist quoted in the article stated "simply because the sexes think differently...for this reason that men tended not to ask a stranger for directions, because it was admitting that they were in some way inferior" (4).
Here Connell acknowledges how scientific findings can help to clarify types of knowledge about gender questions but at the same time, he questions how "scientificity was enough to establish a right to criticize common-sense knowledge [but] common sense did not criticize science" (6). He goes on to say that natural science in the West has a "gendered character", therefore "what can be expected from a science of masculinity, being a form of knowledge created by the very power it claims to study?" (7). I think Connell makes very valid points here in the first couple of pages about how willingly we accept scientific findings without questions. I do see the importance of scientific findings, but I wonder, how can we bring in the more theoretical perspectives into the education system and the media so that there will be perspectives presented rather than only that of science?
Connell continues on to discuss about psychoanalysts (Freud, Jung, Alfred Adler) who have contributed to the discourse of masculinity and what I found very interesting, this idea of "sex-role". It wasn't until the mid-century that the term "sex-role" came about through sex difference research. Expectations are set to one sex, either masculinity or femininity (man or woman). "Masculinity and femininity are quite easily interpreted as internalized sex roles, the products of social learning" (22). But sex role is not connected to the idea of sex differences but these two terms have been used interchangeably since the forties. Connell is saying here that sex role has been created to put both men and women in their places--"linked to the structure defined by biological difference, the dichotomy of male and female--not to a structure defined by social relations" (26).
Two good questions that Connell brought up in this chapter are: "is it actually masculinity that is a problem in gender politics? or is it rather the institutional arrangements that produce inequality, and thus generate the tensions that have brought 'masculinity' under scrutiny?" (42).
Chapter 2 "Men's Bodies": There's this belief that men cannot change due to their "true masculinities". In this chapter, Connell refutes three conceptions of the body: (1) biological, (2) social, and (3) the combination of these two. He proposes that "we can arrive at a better understanding of the relation between men's bodies and masculinity" (46).
Here, Connell explains how we have come to accept "natural masculinity" as an inheritance from the "masculine" genes. Connell explores sociobiology as "almost entirely fictional" because of its broad assumptions in the character traits and behaviors of women and men (47). He states that the power of this masculine perspective "lies in the metaphor of the body as machine" (48). For example words such as: functions, operates, hardwired, programmed, have been used to described how the "mechanic" body functions.
Connell suggests that as a way of rethinking, we can start by acknowledging that "the body is inescapable" in that "in our culture at least, the physical sense of maleness and femaleness is central to the cultural interpretation of gender" (52) (maybe I'm wrong but isn't this the combination of biology and socialization that he's against? So then what is he new vision?). There's the muscular gender in which we get to feel and then there's the bodily experience in which helps us to understand who we are. In the rest of the chapter, Connell gives examples of "life-history" studies to support his argument.
Chapter 3 "The Social Organization of the Masculinity": Connell starts out by defining what masculinity means. Before he names the four strategies the type that is masculine, he provides two good points of masculinity. First of all, masculinity does not exist except in contrast with femininity. Therefore, different culture have different ideas of what it means to be masculine or feminine (68). Secondly, he states that our concept of masculinity is a recent construct so when we speak of masculinity, we must be mindful that we are "doing gender in a culturally specific way" (68).
Now to his four main strategies:
(1). Essentialist- this definition usually picks a feature that defines the core of the masculine. The weakness of this is that it's arbitrary. Different scholars have claimed different universal basis of masculinity.
(2). Positivist- this approach emphasizes finding the facts and what men actually are. The problems are that there is no standpoint in this, requires categories of "men" and "women", and rules out the "masculine" woman and the "feminine" man.
(3). Normative- "masculinity is what men ought to be". This approach gives no grip on masculinity at the level of personality.
(4). Semiotic- abandon personality and define as "non-femininity". This makes it limiting in talking about gender.
Connell goes on to talk about how gender is a way in which social practice is ordered through a three-fold model of the structure of gender (1) power, (2) production and (3) cathexis (74). Connell acknowledges that in order to understand gender, "we must constantly go beyond gender (class, race)" (76).
Connell continues to talk about how gender, race and class is crucial to recognizing multiple masculinities through hegemony, subordination, complicity, and marginalization. At the end of this chapter, what Connell writes reminds me of what Vincent said "men no more than women are chained to the gender patterns they have inherited" (86).
So far I've enjoyed reading Connell and I'm excited to hear what others think of him.
Chapter 1 "The Science of Masculinity": From a sociological perspective, Connell discusses in details about how early works of psychology has contributed to shaping the West's ideas of masculinity (and femininity) . He starts out by stating how scientific claims has a "definite hegemony in our education system and media"(6). Therefore, whenever speaking of sex differences, we tend to use biological findings to validate our answers without thinking of masculinity and femininity as being "culturally constructed" (5). He gives an example from a local newspaper in Sydney about why women are more likely than men to ask for directions. The psychologist quoted in the article stated "simply because the sexes think differently...for this reason that men tended not to ask a stranger for directions, because it was admitting that they were in some way inferior" (4).
Here Connell acknowledges how scientific findings can help to clarify types of knowledge about gender questions but at the same time, he questions how "scientificity was enough to establish a right to criticize common-sense knowledge [but] common sense did not criticize science" (6). He goes on to say that natural science in the West has a "gendered character", therefore "what can be expected from a science of masculinity, being a form of knowledge created by the very power it claims to study?" (7). I think Connell makes very valid points here in the first couple of pages about how willingly we accept scientific findings without questions. I do see the importance of scientific findings, but I wonder, how can we bring in the more theoretical perspectives into the education system and the media so that there will be perspectives presented rather than only that of science?
Connell continues on to discuss about psychoanalysts (Freud, Jung, Alfred Adler) who have contributed to the discourse of masculinity and what I found very interesting, this idea of "sex-role". It wasn't until the mid-century that the term "sex-role" came about through sex difference research. Expectations are set to one sex, either masculinity or femininity (man or woman). "Masculinity and femininity are quite easily interpreted as internalized sex roles, the products of social learning" (22). But sex role is not connected to the idea of sex differences but these two terms have been used interchangeably since the forties. Connell is saying here that sex role has been created to put both men and women in their places--"linked to the structure defined by biological difference, the dichotomy of male and female--not to a structure defined by social relations" (26).
Two good questions that Connell brought up in this chapter are: "is it actually masculinity that is a problem in gender politics? or is it rather the institutional arrangements that produce inequality, and thus generate the tensions that have brought 'masculinity' under scrutiny?" (42).
Chapter 2 "Men's Bodies": There's this belief that men cannot change due to their "true masculinities". In this chapter, Connell refutes three conceptions of the body: (1) biological, (2) social, and (3) the combination of these two. He proposes that "we can arrive at a better understanding of the relation between men's bodies and masculinity" (46).
Here, Connell explains how we have come to accept "natural masculinity" as an inheritance from the "masculine" genes. Connell explores sociobiology as "almost entirely fictional" because of its broad assumptions in the character traits and behaviors of women and men (47). He states that the power of this masculine perspective "lies in the metaphor of the body as machine" (48). For example words such as: functions, operates, hardwired, programmed, have been used to described how the "mechanic" body functions.
Connell suggests that as a way of rethinking, we can start by acknowledging that "the body is inescapable" in that "in our culture at least, the physical sense of maleness and femaleness is central to the cultural interpretation of gender" (52) (maybe I'm wrong but isn't this the combination of biology and socialization that he's against? So then what is he new vision?). There's the muscular gender in which we get to feel and then there's the bodily experience in which helps us to understand who we are. In the rest of the chapter, Connell gives examples of "life-history" studies to support his argument.
Chapter 3 "The Social Organization of the Masculinity": Connell starts out by defining what masculinity means. Before he names the four strategies the type that is masculine, he provides two good points of masculinity. First of all, masculinity does not exist except in contrast with femininity. Therefore, different culture have different ideas of what it means to be masculine or feminine (68). Secondly, he states that our concept of masculinity is a recent construct so when we speak of masculinity, we must be mindful that we are "doing gender in a culturally specific way" (68).
Now to his four main strategies:
(1). Essentialist- this definition usually picks a feature that defines the core of the masculine. The weakness of this is that it's arbitrary. Different scholars have claimed different universal basis of masculinity.
(2). Positivist- this approach emphasizes finding the facts and what men actually are. The problems are that there is no standpoint in this, requires categories of "men" and "women", and rules out the "masculine" woman and the "feminine" man.
(3). Normative- "masculinity is what men ought to be". This approach gives no grip on masculinity at the level of personality.
(4). Semiotic- abandon personality and define as "non-femininity". This makes it limiting in talking about gender.
Connell goes on to talk about how gender is a way in which social practice is ordered through a three-fold model of the structure of gender (1) power, (2) production and (3) cathexis (74). Connell acknowledges that in order to understand gender, "we must constantly go beyond gender (class, race)" (76).
Connell continues to talk about how gender, race and class is crucial to recognizing multiple masculinities through hegemony, subordination, complicity, and marginalization. At the end of this chapter, what Connell writes reminds me of what Vincent said "men no more than women are chained to the gender patterns they have inherited" (86).
So far I've enjoyed reading Connell and I'm excited to hear what others think of him.
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