Курсовая теория на тему Феминизм, Англия и СССР в период Второй Мировой войны

Содержание:

INTRODUCTION 3

1. The origins of «second wave» feminism and its manifestations in England 5

2. Feminism in the USSR during the Second World War 8

CONCLUSION 12

REFERENCES 13

Введение:

In the modern world, culture and public space in general are increasingly filled with a feminist agenda, and the topic of “women’s rights” is increasingly becoming the subject of propaganda manipulation. In recent decades, despite the blurring and diversity of trends, the ideas of feminism have become increasingly popular, especially among young women. Therefore, let’s try to look at the history and evolution of the feminist movement, analyze how the idea of equal suffrage was transformed into eccentric accusations of the majority of men in the “oppression” of women.

The formation and development of feminism can be formally divided into three waves – a kind of outbursts of the feminist movement, which chronologically spread over several decades. Usually, there are three such waves, but some researchers of feminism claim the existence of a fourth, generated by the spread of the internet and the emergence of so-called “cyber activism”. This wave is still at the stage of formation, so now we will consider the previous three, which are known for no less shocking. The three waves differ significantly both in value and in ways to achieve the goal, but all share the desire of women to achieve changes in their social status (both constructive and frankly insane). The feminism we study in this paper during the Second World War is associated with the second wave of feminism.

The purpose of this work is a comparative analysis of second-wave feminism in the USSR and England. Accordingly, the objectives of the study are:

— identify the main features of second-wave feminism in the USSR;

— identify the main features of second-wave feminism in the England;

— outline the main conclusions.

The issue of women’s participation in social and political life was raised in the XVIII century. This was due both to the spread of the democratic system in Europe and America. At the same time, an organized women’s movement appears already in the XIX century. Women’s activism was associated with various aspects of social existence: the struggle for the abolition of slavery, the movement for sobriety, various charities (caring for the infirm, organizing shelters for orphans, etc.) and, as a result, the struggle for the right to vote. Women who demanded the right to vote were called suffrages. The first state where the victory of feminism became state policy was the Soviet Union, where men and women were officially equal. However, almost always their initiatives only harmed women. Together with the right to vote (which meant little in the Soviet Union), women had a unique opportunity to experience equality with men in the field, in the factory, and later in the army and mine. Then women were finally able to get rid of the shackles of “slave” homework for caring for children and caring for their husband and fully feel the total equality of responsibilities.

The first wave was characterized by bringing the issue of women’s rights into the public space, women’s suffrage, and crazy experiments with the status of women under the influence of communism. Subsequent events are considered by us in the context of this work.

 

Заключение:

The second wave of feminism was a delayed reaction to the return of women to the role of housewife after World War II, during an unprecedented economic growth and baby boom. During these years, women did not try to look for work, considering domestic duties as their role, which corresponded to public opinion; however, they found themselves isolated in their home, alienated from politics, economics and lawmaking. The mass media of that time clearly show this. Also, some events laid the foundation for the emergence of second-wave feminism. One of them was the publication by the French writer de Beauvoir of the results of her research of the 1940s: she came to the conclusion that in a patriarchal society women are perceived as «different».

In 2022, we are still living in the grip of the myth of equality in the Soviet Union, and our historical «peculiarities» directly affect women in the 21st century — we see this in politics, business, and society. In recent years, official rhetoric has become increasingly conservative: in it, a woman is primarily a mother, the word «gender» is associated with «the destruction of the traditional way of family life,» and gender research centers are declared foreign agents. At the same time, the wage gap, according to the Ministry of Labor, is 27.9%. The Law on Gender Equality — «On state guarantees of equal rights and freedoms and equal opportunities for men and women in the Russian Federation» — has not been adopted for 18 years after the introduction of the draft.

Women make up about a third of the owners of small and medium—sized businesses (in small, according to the Federal Tax Service, there are more of them — 40.2%), and many forums, clubs, associations and other platforms work for the development of women’s entrepreneurship, including with the support of the state. But even there, the themes of motherhood and caring for older relatives, combining work with housekeeping, sound like a constant refrain. And the woman still has a double burden, which makes her voice the issue of gender equality over and over again.

Фрагмент текста работы:

1. The origins of «second wave» feminism and its manifestations in England

As time passed, new living conditions and new trends in philosophy and politics emerged. At the events of World War II, the specter of communism in Europe and America changed somewhat in its form and scope. The rise of neo-Marxism (cultural Marxism) in universities, culture and art gave rise to global social changes that manifested themselves in the deconstruction of traditional institutions and values [6]. Religion and the family suffered the greatest attacks.

Feminists were concerned about the social and cultural aspects of women’s lives. In the mid-twentieth century, in most states that were subject to the Western system of values, women had the same legal rights as men. However, this did not mean that the two sexes became interchangeable in society, and the representation of women in politics or science was not equal to that of men. The vast majority of women in the West saw their vocation and their own sphere of responsibility in the family, caring for children, caring for their husband, and a significant percentage of them remained housewives and did not want to change their field of activity.

A person with a right-wing worldview, who is aware of the natural state of affairs, can explain this situation very simply: most women and men have different needs and different ways of realization. Although there are unique cases in life that do not fit into the usual system of areas of vocation, however, these are exceptions, not the rule.

Instead, the feminists of the time had a completely different explanation. According to their interpretation, women do not want to take equal positions with men in the professional and social spheres in general, because patriarchy reigns in society, which puts pressure on them and restricts women. Even when the latter themselves do not want to have a status identical with men in society, feminists blame patriarchal principles. They attributed this state of affairs to “a deep-rooted patriarchal culture that prevents women from reaching their potential.”

Second-wave feminism focuses its struggle primarily on the ideological impact and cultural changes in the status and image of women, and only then it comes to legislation [3, p. 420-423]. Legal changes in the women’s issue of the second half of the twentieth century arose from radical changes in society and culture. The hippie movement, the actualization of the visibility of national and racial minorities, combined with the frenzied popularity of socialist and even communist models of Building Society among young people, prompted the most active deployment of the second wave of feminism in the United States and some European countries.

Radical feminism was most actively spread, which is a kind of business card of the second wave. The word “radical” in this case does not mean so much the methods of struggle (although they were indeed radical and often came to violence), but the interpretation of women’s rights. This term is used in its original meaning – root, which focuses on the essence and root cause of problems. This root cause was called patriarchy. This term meant the traditional system of building a society, where the role of leader is assigned to a man. At the same time, the concept of “sexism” as discrimination on the basis of gender also appears.

Feminists saw patriarchy everywhere: in the family, in politics, in culture, in history, in religion, and so on. For several decades, all these areas have been subjected to the destructive influence of feminism and the deformation of healthy functioning as a result of methodical struggle with the natural state of affairs.

The organized women’s movement in Britain took shape and developed during a period marked in national history as the era of the highest imperial power of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland. This fact has had a decisive impact on the nature of the women’s movement, its ideology, rhetoric and political practices. With the same confidence, we can say that women’s attempts to enter the sphere of politics have become the most important determinant in the construction of contemporaries’ ideas about British democracy and the British nation. And if we take into account that state-building was understood by the British as the construction and strengthening of the empire, then, as many researchers note today, it is almost impossible to consider the women’s movement in Britain outside the imperial context.