Feminist Theory in Seventeenth-Century America

Abstract

Feminist Theory in Seventeenth-Century America Tamara Harvey (bio) Feminist studies of early American women can involve (1) feminism applied to the study of women wherein the feminism resides mostly on the side of 20th and 21st century scholars or (2) feminism of the early American period. It behooves us to be rigorous in trying to distinguish the first from the second, as much to improve our historical understanding of recent feminisms as to increase our insight into the past. Yet there is still much to be done in teasing out these distinctions, in larger part because the word "feminist" still fits uneasily when applied to the women of this period rather than those who study them. I suggest two ways to clarify and deepen our understanding of early American feminisms: (1) reconceive feminist theory in this period as responding to gynesis more than misogyny and (2) explore connections between current challenges to Western rights discourse and feminist strategies preceding eighteenth-century notions of natural rights. Scholars are increasingly comfortable calling pre-Enlightenment texts, people, and activities "feminist," but that term remains closely tied to nineteenth- and twentieth-century formulations that fit uneasily with earlier feminisms as well as feminisms emerging today. The Oxford English Dictionary defines feminism as "[a]dvocacy of the rights of women (based on the theory of equality of the sexes)" with a first English language citation in 1895. Two aspects of this definition stand out: (1) that theory and advocacy are constitutive elements of feminism and (2) that both arise from notions of equal rights. Even as she argues for feminist theory beginning as early as the writings of Christine de Pisan, Joan Kelly makes a similar point in her highly influential 1982 essay, "Early Feminist Theory and the Querelle des Femmes" in which she contends that while the arguments of the querelle des femmes (medieval and Renaissance debates about women) may be understood as feminist theory and women like Anne Hutchinson [End Page 411] (her one American example) may be seen as "feminists in action," feminism proper does not arise until theory and action are joined together in the nineteenth century (68–69). Scholarly debates about early modern feminism have become more nuanced since Kelly's formulation, but they still tend to be guided by her assumption that feminist theory both investigates and rebuts misogyny. Though one may justifiably argue that all male privilege is sustained by misogyny, this characterization of feminism emphasizes the stark poles of a debate tradition inaugurated by the most extreme rhetorical attacks on women. Responses within the querelle des femmes are by necessity guided by these extremes, yielding arguments that are easily recognized by modern readers but only as pale precursors of later efforts. As Katherine Romack writes, Women's responses to their misogynist counterparts rarely stepped outside the logic of the debate itself to pressure its terms, framing their responses not as systematic attempts to reimagine their status by attacking the political, religious, and cultural institutions grounding their subjection, but rather as "defenses" that, though gradually increasing in sophistication, could not ultimately shatter the terms of the dialectic itself. (220) Thus, by focusing on defenses of women like Anne Bradstreet's "The Prologue" in The Tenth Muse or Anne Hutchinson's retorts to John Winthrop during her civil trial, we employ a lens that focuses on ontology and definition—"I can write/reason/speak, even if you say I cannot"—in response to the most blatant attacks in ways that preclude seeing action even as we demand action for true "feminism." But where can we find "systematic attempts to reimagine their status," to use Romack's phrase? We may better understand feminist theory of this period if we characterize it as responding to "gynesis," Alice Jardine's word for the metaphoric use of femininity and female bodies to constitute male subjectivity (as her words, "the putting into discourse of 'woman' as that process diagnosed … as intrinsic to new and necessary modes of thinking, writing, speaking" [25]). Some of the most exciting work on gender in early American studies, including works by Ivy Schweitzer, Patricia Caldwell, Ann Kibbey, Richard Godbeer, and Elizabeth Maddock Dillon, have focused on...