“The Book of the City of Ladies” embodies the awakening of feminism. In the book, Pizan criticizes the remarks and behaviors of men attacking and slandering women. Although the feminist movement did not happen during Pizan’s time, Pizan’s activism and courage to speak out for women is admirable. After reading this book, I started to think about the reasons that led up to the rise of feminism. In my opinion, the rise of feminism started with the social demand for female laborers. In the 19th century, European and American women began to re-examine their status in society, which was related to the surge in demand for female labor in factories after the industrial revolution. During this period, women’s pursuit of education, social status, and social rights advanced drastically and had many accomplishments. After two centuries, the development stages of feminism have changed from trying to liberating women’s rights to their bodies to fighting for equal labor rights and obtaining property to pursuing the promotion of political and social status.
I think feminism is a ideology. But I think one of the problems with feminism is not well defined. Feminism is all about taking women out of predefined boxes and categories. So, categorize feminism would be against the whole ideology. Feminism does to address inequality, whether it’s against women specifically or just gender inequality. I think what feminism has to say has a positive message to address all type of inequality.
I hear often people will say when you look at the overall achievement of humanity most of that achievement is from men, so taking that into consideration you will notice men contribute more to society than women.