Women study: Womens History, Feminism - Term Paper Example

Although education and employment have been the major concerns in feminism, other areas that feminists focus on are reproductive rights, domestic violence, discrimination, violence, and sexual harassment. Women’s History Women’s history is important because women who know their history are well versed. This gives them power and helps them identify their own heroes. Women’s history has grown because of feminism and feminist consciousness. Historically, women have been subordinate to men, which led to the formation of feminist movement in 1830s.

It was formed in New York at a place called Seneca Falls by Elizabeth Cady and Lucretia Mott. The major issues behind the formation were on social, religious, and civil conditions. Following the various discussions carried out in the conventions, the women won the right to vote in the year 1920. Major theories developed to explain women’s history are compensation history, separist history, contribution history, and women as minority group. Compensation history that is similar to contribution history, uses the approach of finding the missing women and recording or filing their contributions in the society.

Separist history uses the approach of expressing women’s anger over their erasure in the society. Lastly, in women as a minority group, the approach used was that all women shared the same experiences in life. Feminist Concepts and Explanations Feminist concepts and theories are important in the analysis of the conditions that shape the lives of women in the society (Jackson, 1998). The belief that gender inequality is natural has been one of the major concepts behind social inequality. Depending on the approaches used, feminists have categorized the concepts behind social inequality into liberal, cultural, social, diversity and radical feminists.

The liberal feminists state that one of the causes of social inequality is the possession of more authority by men as compared to women in the society. Liberal feminists fight this condition by reducing the differences between men and women. Cultural feminists increase the differences between men and women by stressing the importance of women’s maternal values in the society. According to social feminists, inequality results from oppressive structures caused by the material conditions in the society.

The social feminists emphasize social relations in the community. Male dominance, as stated by radical feminists, has been one of the major causes of social inequality where men are termed as powerful creatures as compared to women. The absence of international programs has also been a cause of social inequality. The diversity feminists try to reduce social inequality by promoting reforms using global programs. Family, Culture and Society The nature of the family, culture, and society that houses an individual usually determines his or her behavior.

Culture represents the values passed from one generation to another that shapes the behavior of an individual. The impact from family, culture, and society usually occurs in three parts. The first part is the nuclear family where a child in the family receives all teaching from the parents. Since the nuclear family is distinct, any teaching from the outside world will not influence the behavior of the child. The parents are influential to their children in terms of character. The second step is the school.

The child by interacting with teachers and other students, usually develop certain habits that can be either positive or negative. The last step is the society usually connects both men and women. Any individual living in the society will have his or her behavior modified by the practices, myths and traditions of community (Sharma, 2007). Gender dynamics of relationships