Feminist Theory of Psychoanalysis

Feminist Theories of psychoanalysis have emerged as early as 1792 (-1920s) in such publication namely “The changing women”, “Ain’t I a Woman”, “Speech after Arrest for Illegal Voting” and so on. Feminist theory is the expansion of feminism into hypothetical, or theoretical discourse, the aim is to understand the nature of gender inequality. It examines about women's social roles and lived experience, and feminist politics in a variety of fields, such as anthropology and sociology, communication, psychoanalysis, economics, literary criticism, and philosophy. While generally providing a review of social relations, much of feminist theory also focuses on examine gender inequality and the endorsement of women's rights, interests, and issues. The themes explored in feminism include art history and contemporary art, aesthetics, discrimination, stereotyping, objectification (especially sexual objectification), domination, and patriarchy (social system in which men dominate).

Nancy Cott makes a division between modern feminism and its part history, especially the right to vote. In US she places the turning point in the decades before and after women attain the vote in 1920 (1910-1930).Susan Kingsley Kent says that Freudian patriarchy was responsible for diminished profile of feminism in the interwar (relating to period between World War I and II) years. Elaine Showalter explains the improvement of Feminist theory of Psychoanalysis as having a number of phases.

The first she calls "feminist critique" - where the feminist reader examines the principles behind literary phenomena. The second Showalter calls "Gynocritics" - where the "woman is producer of textual meaning" including "the psychodynamics of female creativity; linguistics and the problem of a female language; the path of the individual or collective female literary career and literary history". The last phase she calls "gender theory" - where the "ideological inscription and the literary effects of the sex/gender system" are explored."

Psychoanalysis

Psychoanalytic feminism is based on Freud and his Feminist theory of psychoanalysis. It maintains that gender is not organic, but is based on the psycho-sexual development of the individual. Psychoanalytical feminists believe that gender inequality comes from early childhood experiences, which lead men to believe them to be masculine, and women to believe them feminine. It is further maintained that gender leads to a public system that is dominated by masculine, which in turn influences the individual psycho-sexual development. As a result it was suggested to avoid the society structured of gender-specific by male-female coeducation. In the last 30 years, the modern-day French psychoanalytical theories concerning the feminine, that refer to sexual difference rather than to gender, with psychoanalysts like Julia Kristeva, Maud Mannoni, Luce Irigaray , and Bracha Ettinger has largely influenced not only feminist theory but also the understanding of the subject in philosophy and the general field of psychoanalysis itself.

Questions:

• When Feminist theory of Psychoanalysis emerged and in what kind of publications?
• What is Psychoanalysis based on?