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We've Only Just Begun:
By: Amy Schriefer |
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After graduating from college in 1999 with a degree in Women's and Gender Studies, I was looking forward to beginning my new job as an abortion counselor at the local Planned Parenthood clinic. I envisioned working in a strong feminist community committed to a women's right to control her reproduction. On my first day I was ordered to prepare the doctor's scrubs and get his coffee while I observed him chastise women during the procedure for not using birth control. I was angry for having to accept and accommodate this man because he was the only doctor we could get to perform abortions (and according to Roe v. Wade, as I learned, abortions could only be done by doctors). I had studied reproductive rights and was excited and inspired by my Second Wave feminist professors' praises of Roe v. Wade and women's health clinics, but my present reality was not living up to their romantic historical vision. I had also studied Second Wave feminist theories of power, economics, and sexuality and it was this knowledge that allowed me to understand that my so-called glamorous feminist work at Planned Parenthood was not, in fact, expressing feminist principles. I cultivated a desire to use these personal experiences break the silence in the feminist community about these discrepancies and challenge the impervious reputation of Roe v. Wade and abortion providers. I sought to involve myself in organizations working to allow midwives to perform abortions, which would give women more options when it came to choosing a provider. That was also when I came to understand and be a part of third wave feminism. Feminism's first wave is usually seen as having begun with the Seneca Falls Convention of 1948 and ending with securing the right to vote in 1920 and the second wave categorizes the resurgence of women's activism beginning in the late 1960s and ending (or at least ebbing) with the defeat of the Equal Rights Amendment and the Reagan-Bush era. Third wave feminism purports to encompass the young women born in the 1960s and 70s who feel their personal experience of their history set them apart from older women. Barbara Findlen in the introduction to Listen Up: Voices from the Next Generation of Feminism states, "I strongly believe that the experiences that led me to identify as a feminist were significantly different from those that inspired the previous generation" (xi). Women who came of age in the 1980s were influenced by issues such as AIDS, high divorce rates, and gay and lesbian rights and radicalized by social injustices such as the Clarence Thomas confirmation hearings, anti-abortion legislation and violence, and the Rodney King beating. We were also the first generation to grow up with feminism as part of our cultural and political wallpaper, and in striving to form our own feminist identity, naming and navigating feminism's contradictions has become a primary theme of the third wave (Orr 1997). The third wave texts position
themselves as criticisms of second wave feminisms, defining itself against
as well as through it (Drake 1997). In the introduction to her anthology,
To Be Real: Telling the Truth and Changing the Face of Feminism, Rebecca
Walker argues that young women struggle with the feminist label not
because of a lack of historical knowledge or negative media stereotypes,
but because feminism's rigid definitions of a "good feminist"
entrap women just as much as sexist definitions of women. She concludes:
This perceived either/or is difficult for those who grew up bisexual, interracial, transgender, and influenced by postmodernism and multiculturalism and precipitates the need to create our own identities that acknowledge these ambiguities and multiple positions: "including more than excluding, exploring more than defining, searching more than arriving" (Walker xxxiii). Third wavers believe that the negotiation and contradiction of our differences is the main concept of modern feminism, requiring us to rethink what our movements and activism look like as well as our meanings of identity and community. This celebration of difference welcomes the influence of feminists of color and queer feminists who feel that their voices previously left out (Drake 1997). The writers in Findlen's Listen Up face these negotiations and contradictions through sharing their personal stories of defining themselves as young feminists. Some of the essays discuss how easily the sense of entitlement to equality that growing up with feminism brings is broken with the first taste of sexism. Sharon Lennon, for example, describes how she only saw feminism on television and had a difficult time translating it into her reality. Ellen Neuborne argues that this generation has to focus their fight on ensuring that anti-discrimination policies are enforced and practiced in real life, not just on paper. Many of the essays struggle with how to reconcile white Western feminism with their home culture. Bhargavi Mandva shares how she first used feminism to break away from her strict Indian upbringing, but eventually came to create her own feminism that drew upon her heritage, history, and her mother's experiences. Instead of choosing between the Bahamian culture in which she was born and raised and the U.S. feminist culture in which she is educated and employed, Lisa Bowleg concludes that we can somehow merge our families of origin with our chosen families, taking the best aspects of the other. The writers in Walker's anthology further attempt to reject the "either/or" dichotomy as they theorize their experiences and identities. Naomi Wolf longs for a "brideland" where she can wear a lacy, corseted wedding dress and celebrate a "ritual that respect, even worships, female sexuality and reproductive potential" in "an age where female sexuality is held incredibly cheap" (1995, 39) while Veena Catrero-Su, who is out to kick a little ass, challenges a feminism in which "a woman's response to violence with violence is not viewed as one of the many expressions of resistance, not as a natural, human response to daily humiliation, but as a sociopolitical faux pas" (1995, 45). The hip-hop community, often labeled as misogynist by feminists, is where Eisa Davis claims to find a space that celebrates her Black feminism/womanism. Jennifer and David Allyson write about struggling to create a non-patriarchal name for their new identity as a married couple and Veronica Webb attempts to prove that a supermodel can "do feminism" by using her influence and money to create jobs for other Black women and raise public awareness of different issues affecting the Black community (1995, 212). The writers, like those in Listen Up, are from a wide range of backgrounds and feminisms, offering more proof that what unites the third wave is not a singular feminist identity, but the negotiation of contradiction, rejection of dogma, and need to say "both/and" (Drake 1997). With the advent of computers, e-mail, the Internet, third wave feminists have adamantly used this technology to create and disseminate ideas almost instantly, giving credit to and an outlet for alternative forms of theory. Recognizing that though second wave feminists have successfully challenged the content of Western theory, they have not yet done much to challenge its form (Alfonso and Triglio 1997). Third wavers strive to use alternative outlets to make their ideas more accessible to larger amounts of people, particularly those outside of academia. This type of theory production was epitomized by the Riot Grrrl movement of the early to mid-1990s which spoke out through zines, web sites, and song lyrics. Not only is the mode of production different, the theory itself relies on different forms of expression. Examining their lives and experiences, third wave writers strive to demonstrate how feminist ideas function in everyday life, continuing and building on the feminist tradition of allowing the personal to influence our theory. Walker claims, "I prefer personal testimonies…I believe our lives are the best basis for feminist theory" (1995, xxxvii) These books, and the third wave movement itself, have not gone without facing their own criticism from the very same second wavers they implicate. The main problem with the third wave is that they are not rebelling against the reality of feminism, but a false image constructed by the media throughout the second wave and particularly the conservative backlash era of the 1980s. Even though the profess to be aware of this backlash, third wavers, especially those in the above texts, do nothing to acknowledge the media's negative influence or contradict the media's statements and set the record straight (Bailey 1997, Shah 1996). Most of the issues these writers discuss are not new to feminists and they "end up fighting ghosts that could be exorcised (or rendered more complex) by looking at history" (Orr 1997). This blinded vision of the past disappoints some second wave feminists, such as Angela Davis, who argues in her Afterword to Walker's book that if the third wave had "the same kind of nuanced vision of the past that they did of the present" they would see that the previous generation of feminists did, in fact, deal with issues of difference and personal identity (1995, 281). The way in which third wave writers use their personal experiences to shape their theory has also been a long time staple of feminist thought. Second wave feminists engaged in consciousness raising groups where women would share personal experiences that formed the theoretical foundations of feminism and the political foundations as well. The third wave marks a return to personal consciousness raising, but it has been rendered different due to postmodern and multicultural ideas of multiplicity and difference (Siegel 54). The goal of second wave consciousness raising was to create a shared space and experience to use as a uniting force for all women (Siegel 69), but the third wave is more interested in the differences among people and their how that difference shapes their personal and political issues. They encourage everyone to identify their own issues based on their experiences, find your feminism (redefine it if you have to), and get to work (Higgenbotham 2000). This year, a new book builds upon Walker and Findlen's collections to demonstrate how third wave theories of difference can and have been be translated into action. Manifesta: Young Women, Feminism, and the Future, written by Jennifer Baumgarder and Amy Richards (both former editors at Ms. Magazine), addresses the previous critiques (proof that third wave feminism is listening to and engaging with the previous generation to improve a movement still in its infancy) by including a rich history of the feminist movement. The book set forth four main goals: to define feminism and make it accessible to everyone, to outline and stress the importance of the feminist movement's history and impact on today, to explore the problems, specifically intergenerational tension, within the movement, and offer solutions for strengthening and mobilizing the third wave activism. The authors stress that third wave activism can begin by refusing to be silenced by the negative stereotypes of feminism or the guilt of criticizing the movement itself and speaking out to share our experiences and opinions with each other while acknowledging how these personal experiences shaped our personal activist goals. We will find that "feminism is something individual to each feminist," (Straus interview with Baumgardner and Richards 2000) as well as the issues themselves, but this must not stop us from using our talents to affect feminist change. As an example, Baumgardner and Richards write a chapter on a dinner party they hosted for fellow young feminists to discuss the pertinent issues facing them in their lives. Every topic came back to a personal experience they felt had shaped the way they approach the issue in practice. On the particular issue of abortion, Baumgardner shared how complicated it was for her sister to abort her unplanned pregnancy when she was a teenager because of parental consent laws. Baumgardner now supports Voters for Choice, a group that strives to ensure the election of pro-choice candidates who will protect abortion rights and access for all women. Elizabeth Wurtzel, a third wave writer, recounted the story of her recent abortion and the horror she felt about her "lack of privacy" in the "factory" like atmosphere (Baumgardner and Richards 2000, 25). She now feels stronger about the right of women to choose a medical abortion in the comfort of their own home. Inga Muscio in Listen Up adds her own voice to the subject by also relating her negative abortion clinic experience, which caused her to realize that women need to reclaim abortion and use the alternative, more natural remedies women have been using for centuries. On a third wave web site, Alana Wingfoot criticizes second wavers for ignoring the emotional impact of abortion on women and questions, "Where are the post-abortion support groups?" as she helps her friends through their post-abortion grief. She also claims that instead of abortion rights, she would rather focus on alleviating poverty and creating more social services so women would not feel they had to choose abortion for economic reasons (1998). My own experience related in the introduction has led me to work with the National Abortion Federation to lobby for the legal rights of mid-level practitioners, such as midwives, to perform abortions so we would not have to tap dance for sexist male doctors. Abortion for the third wave is more complex than simply fighting for the legality of the procedure. The third wave, while acknowledging the success the second wave had with securing abortion rights, does not want to merely stop there. Striving for the freedom to choose where and how to have an abortion or the freedom to not choose an abortion are issues that third wavers are addressing in their abortion rights activism. We have different ideas of what is important, what is immediate, and how we should accomplish our goals, whether through government lobbying or grassroots organizing, but could easily form coalitions to unite someday under the umbrella of "abortion rights" if Roe v. Wade was threatened. This action comes out of a third wave theory that allows us to question and build upon the second wave's accomplishments while using our personal history and experience to define our issues and how to act on them. The third wave is young and
we are still learning to negotiate the differences in not just our cultures,
races, sexualities, and classes, but our experiences that were shaped
by these factors. Theorizing and understanding these differences will
help us break down the barriers differences cause so we may work together
without sacrificing our identities. JeeYeun Lee reminds us in Listen
Up that it won't be easy when she says, "This thing called 'feminism'
takes a great deal of hard work and I think this is one of the preliminary
hallmarks of young feminists today: We realize that coming together
and working together are by not means natural or easy" (1995, 211).
But if we continue to be unafraid of contradictions and ambiguities,
the third wave will be successful in offering new questions, theories,
and actions on issues brought to the forefront by the previous generation
of feminists. Bailey, Cathryn Baumgardner, Jennifer and
Amy Richards Drake, Jennifer Finlen, Barbara Higginbotham, Anastasia Orr, Catherine Shah, Sonia Siegel, Deborah L. Straus, Tamara
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