And what do the answers to that question tell us about women themselves, about society, and about men?
This collection of readings raises questions central to the woman’s movement and feminist debate. Each of the eight sections explores the material and ideological basis of sexual inequality, in the family, the labour market, politics, education, the media, literature and popular culture. Drawing on historical and cross-cultural perspectives as well as on contemporary writings, the sections illustrate the ways in which social processes and structures elaborate and legitimize the differences between men and women, while challenging the assumption that such differences are an innate and invariable condition of social life.
The book includes extracts from Mary Wollstonecraft, Sheila Rowbotham, Simone de Beauvoir, Adrienne Rich, Tillie Olsen, Barbara Taylor, Mary McIntosh and many others.