Western Feminism

Modernity coupled with the Industrial Revolution and rising secularism paved way for a new ensemble of social unity. Individualism that penetrated the core of modern society brought many changes to the application of many pre-modern values like justice, equality and liberty. From such passage from pre-modern to the modern world, we witness the birth of one of the most influential movements in the modern world on the level of social dynamics; Feminism. Started in the strictly political sense, Feminism, soon gathered enough momentum to produce its literature in most social divisions. The struggle for political equality soon translated into social equality and from there it became the concept of individual freedom. In the West, it penetrated almost all social dimensions in critical approach and revolutionary endeavours. From movement to perspective, Feminism served as the leading momentum of modern world’s value system. When Feminism reached enough maturity it left its Western compilation to become a global struggle and at the same time, we witness the birth of Islamic Feminism. Although the global theory itself operated in Islamic societies under the banner of secular Feminism but it soon died out and a more intellectual approach took its place; Islamic Feminism. It confined itself within Islam and from there it attempted to tackle the problem of women in Islamic societies and Islamic sacred Text. This dissertation would present a thorough examination of Islamic Feminism. First, this thesis would estimate the impact of global Feminism on the locality of Islamic Feminism. Then it would examine the originality and authenticity of Islamic Feminism. Finally, it would provide a critique to make possible a structural rethinking of Islamic Feminism.

This research takes a point in departure in critically examining Mona Eltahawy's article 'Why Do They Hate Us? The Real War On Women Is In The Middle East, through a postcolonial feminist framework. This research paper discusses women's freedom and rights through the case of Female Genital Cutting, within an Egyptian framework. Chandra Mohanty's Intersectionality, Edward Said's Orientalism, as well as Euben's Comparative Political and Hermeneutic method are the theoretical considerations that lay the foundation for our investigation. This approach makes it possible to accept divergent understandings of the variety of cultures, as well as to question the presupposition and universality of Western 'freedom' and 'rights'.

This article investigates and analyses the main characteristics and issues involving Western hegemonic feminisms, especially so-called 'radical feminism', on the topic of sex work and trafficking in persons/migration, to understand how these discussions have influenced the main conventions, regulations and legislation on this global subject. In particular, it enables understanding of how these regulations invisibilize and, sometimes, criminalize trans* and gender-diverse people in migratory contexts. The contributions to decolonial feminism and transfeminism made by decolonial trans writers are essential to analyse and critique some of the conceptions espoused by Western hegemonic and especially trans-exclusionary feminisms that have influenced the international anti-trafficking and anti-prostitution discourse today. These discourses often affect the voluntary migration of trans* and gender-diverse sex workers, mainly from the Global South, such as in the Brazilian case. This piece aims to bring a decolonial and Brazilian transfeminist critique to bear on the Western hegemonic discourse presented in many radical feminist debates, and in the leading international and national conventions and legislation on human trafficking, migration and sex work. The history of colonialism and slavery, the imposition of binary, white, heteropatriarchal and cissexist norms, and consequently the global economic model of capitalist hegemony, is essential to comprehend how these structural systems have generated enormous inequalities between and within several countries, as is the

It is clear that since the 1970s, feminism has become a political and ideological apparatus in the hands of Western liberal capitalism. Liberalism and capitalism gladly use women regardless of their identity for socioeconomic and political gain. Since 1970s, especially African-American women claim that Western liberal feminism failed to recognize their identity. It is a fact that most women of color, while being a free woman in a sense of feminism, prefer to abide by their values and traditions such as unity of family between a man and woman. On the contrary, Western liberal feminism incorporated with capitalist ideology aims at destruction of family life and the unity between man and woman.

This paper critically examines the fictional world of Anita Desai, a prominent Indian woman writer to understand her outlook and standpoint on the socio-cultural issues of female freedom and empowerment. The study finds that Desai while depicting psychological plight of female characters in her novels makes clear that Indian feminism is quite different from the western one. Besides, this paper shows how authentically the writer represents the deplorable status of women in Indian patriarchal society.

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This article investigates and analyses the main characteristics and issues involving Western hegemonic feminisms, especially so-called ‘radical feminism’, on the topic of sex work and trafficking in persons/migration, to understand how these discussions have influenced the main conventions, regulations and legislation on this global subject. In particular, it enables understanding of how these regulations invisibilize and, sometimes, criminalize trans* and gender-diverse people in migratory contexts. The contributions to decolonial feminism and transfeminism made by decolonial trans writers are essential to analyse and critique some of the conceptions espoused by Western hegemonic and especially trans-exclusionary feminisms that have influenced the international anti-trafficking and anti-prostitution discourse today. These discourses often affect the voluntary migration of trans* and gender-diverse sex workers, mainly from the Global South, such as in the Brazilian case.

The Me Too movement, started by Black feminist Tarana Burke in 2006, went viral as a hashtag eleven years later after a tweet by white actor Alyssa Milano. Mainstream movements like #MeToo have often built on and co-opted the work of women of colour, while refusing to learn from them or centre their concerns. Far too often, the message is not 'Me, Too' but 'Me, Not You'. Alison Phipps argues that this is not just a lack of solidarity. Privileged white women also sacrifice more marginalised people to achieve their aims, or even define them as enemies when they get in the way. Me, not you argues that the mainstream movement against sexual violence expresses a political whiteness that both reflects its demographics and limits its revolutionary potential. Privileged white women use their traumatic experiences to create media outrage, while relying on state power and bureaucracy to purge 'bad men' from elite institutions with little concern for where they might ap...