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")