Review: Japanese Women and the Transnational Feminist Movement Before World War II by Taeko Shibahara

2015 ◽  
Vol 84 (4) ◽  
pp. 549-551
Author(s):  
Barbara Molony
2015 ◽  
Vol 18 ◽  
pp. 125-138 ◽  
Author(s):  
Shiko Maruyama ◽  
Sayaka Nakamura

Author(s):  
Hillary Maxson

In the aftermath of World War II, many Japanese women felt impelled to exorcise “martial motherhood,” a stoic, tearless, child-sacrificing gender ideal constructed by the state throughout the early twentieth century. At the Mothers’ Congress of 1955, mothers from across the country gathered to reclaim motherhood from the state and began to redefine motherhood for themselves in the postwar era. This chapter argues that the Mothers’ Congress represented a moment of transition from the wartime concept of “motherhood in the interest of the state” to the postwar idea of motherhood in the interest of mothers. Furthermore, the influential power of the organizers of Japan’s Mothers’ Congress was fundamental in the creation of the 1955 World Congress of Mothers. This was the first instance in which Japanese women became international feminist leaders, and they did so through the language of matricentric feminism.


Author(s):  
Emzar Makaradze

The study of women's issues, the feminist movement, as an academic discipline, and the first curriculum were established in the University of San Diego in 1970. The women’s problems have been mainly studied in the framework of traditional social and humani-tarian disciplines, mostly in literature, philosophy and psychology.The active dissemination of feminist ideas in Turkey after World War II, espe-cially in the late 1970s, and the creation of various feminist societies and journals provided a solid foundation for the establishment of research centers in universities, that study women's issues.There are two directions in the study of women's issues in Turkish universities and academic circles. The first one includes research centers that bring together rep-resentatives of various disciplines and fields of science. They deal with gender, the economic and social status of women, education and health. The second approach combines all those trends that are associated with the social faculty.The level of female activity in Turkey is much lower than in Europe. The status of a woman here is also characterized by its specific development.In the 1980s and 1990s, the feminist movement in Turkey became more and more active. New women's communities, magazines, newspapers, libraries were creat-ed, and women's conferences with an active participation of Turkish women were held both in Turkey and all around the world.It can be concluded that the women's movement in the higher and academic sys-tem of Turkey after World War II led to a new political process that raised the issue of gender equality. The struggle of women for emancipation played an important role in the formation of Turkish society.Despite some achievements regarding women's issues, there is still gender ine-quality, violation of women's rights in Turkish society, what indicates the fact that the women’s problems are still relevant in republican Turkey.


1995 ◽  
Vol 20 (04) ◽  
pp. 941-1001 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rebecca M. Ryan

How did the American legal elite come to reject the husband's privilege to rape his wife. What is the significance of that rejection. This essay traces theories justifying the marital rape exemption from the 17th century, focusing on the period following World War II. The history illustrates how the postwar legal elite's limited progressivism created inconsistent arguments that left the exemption open for attack, an attack that came from within the 1970s feminist movement. Radical feminist rhetoric about sexuality, rape, and marriage pulled away the last layer of theoretical support for the exemption and denounced the sex right it left exposed underneath. Connections in the 1970s, both literal and conceptual, between radical feminists and the legal elite allowed the feminist movement to discredit the exemption within that elite. To interpret the significance of that rejection, I consider how legal language affects people's senses of self. I argue that legal words like “rape,” “marriage,” and “husband” validate and inform people's, specifically husbands', identities in marriage. By changing the meanings of those legal words, legal reform can eventually change human behavior.


Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document