Key Terms: Feminism

Patriarchal - describes a society or culture dominated by men. Other - denotes "different from" and not as important as the privileged term of a binary. I.e. women, the colonized. Sexual Politics - posits that economic inequality and ideological indoctrination have been the chief causes of women's oppression. Also denotes distinctions between sex and gender. Gynocriticism - defines the process of constructing "a female framework for the analysis of women's literature to develop new models [of interpretation] based on the study of female experience, rather than to adapt to male models and theories." Misogyny - the hatred or distrust of women. écriture féminine - literally, "women's writing." Modern feminist critics speculate that a style of writing peculiar to women exists and that this écriture féminine is fundamentally different from the way men write and obtain meaning through the writing process. Cultural Feminism - asserts that personality and biological differences exist between men and women. Its main tenet is that women are inherently and biologically kinder and gentler than men. (Cf. "essentialism") Ecofeminism - posits a commonality between the domination of women and the domination of the land. Women and nature share the status of the unprivileged terms and through this commonality, we can trace similiarities in language, treatment, and attitudes