Patriarchal Research Articles

Dr. Anandibai Joshi: An Indian Medical Pioneer.

Dr. Anandibai Joshi was the first Indian female physician to complete her studies in Western medicine at the Women's Medical College of Pennsylvania. A pioneer in medicine, she was a trailblazing Indian woman, who had faced many hurdles during her quest for education. In her short span of life, she faced a lot of emotional, mental, physical, and social turbulence and had to prove herself at every step to the orthodox patriarchal Indian society the need to study medicine. Studying medicine in India was impossible for females during the 19th century. During those days, the females in India were uneducated due to gender differences prevalent in society, so the only option was to pursue medicine in a foreign land. Her life was full of hardships and challenges; she got married at the age of nine and, at the young age of 14, delivered a baby boy who could not survive beyond 10 days due to lack of medical care. This was the turning point in her life, and she was determined to become a physician so that the other women would not suffer the way she had. Thus began her educational journey, to pursue a career in Western medicine. Before Anandibai went to the United States, she gave a motivating speech in a public gathering, expressing the need for female doctors in India and her keenness to pursue medicine in the United States. She challenged all the social norms in those days, whether it was fighting to break gender stereotypes or convincing the male-dominated society to study medicine in the United States. This article is a reflection of Anandibai's accomplishments in her life and medical career and her dedication, determination, and strong commitment to improving the lives of Indian women. Her short life is a reflection of hope, perseverance, determination, and success and an inspiration to many Indian women to pursue education and medicine.

New perspectives on fighting violence against women.

Gender-based violence (GBV) and, more specifically, violence against women (VAW) are commonly considered a consequence of a patriarchal structure-a social system granting the senior male absolute authority over the family and the community as a whole. Anthropologists have documented that human male dominance is rooted in evolution, with male violent behavior observed among the great apes. Given that evolution is a continuous process, human progress over millennia has modified pre-existing behavior, demonstrating that humans can move beyond ancestral ways of life over time. Precisely because of the imperative to change and improve, at the global international level as well as in individual countries, strong movements are in action to eliminate GBV/VAW. FIGO has been and continues to be at the forefront of the battle for equality, with initiatives that cover many aspects of this, including the imperative to involve men, who-in the majority of cases-are the perpetrators. Since men are often the root of the problem, they must also be at the forefront of the battle to eradicate it. GBV/VAW comprises many facets, including selective female abortion, infanticide, femicide, honor killing, female genital mutilation, and child marriage. These deeply rooted forms of violence continue to perpetuate gender inequalities, remain major obstacles to health and societal progress, and violate the most basic human rights.

The Change and Development of Female Images of Different Social Periods Reflected

Before the emergence of deconstructivism, the idea of gender binary opposition occupied the mainstream of social thought. Female was regarded as second gender, attached to male who occupied social resources, and female’s subject consciousness was also weak. The proposal of deconstructivism broke this gender binary opposition, which belongs to the product of patriarchal society, female’s self-consciousness also gradually awakened. With the development of society through different eras, the changes of women’s status and thoughts in the real world are also accurately reflected in the literary works at that time. This paper takes the female images in three classic literary works in different social periods as the key point, including Tom Jones in classicism, Jane Eyre in Romanticism and O Pioneers! in Modernism. By analyzing the surface changes of these female images and the deep social reasons that promote such changes, this paper reflects the changes in social power structure and social resource distribution caused by the development of time and people’s ideological liberation, criticizes the imprisonment and oppression of women in the old society, and witnesses the gradual awakening of female consciousness and the birth of a relatively just society.

The Institutionalized Oppression of Reproductive Responsibility: A Dystopian Interpretation of the Maternal Role in The Handmaid’s Tale

This paper examines the institutionalized oppression of women through the manipulation of reproductive responsibility in Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale. It explores how the dystopian regime of Gilead weaponizes the maternal role by reducing women to their reproductive capacities, employing surveillance, commodification, and religious manipulation to control their bodies and identities. The analysis delves into the mechanisms by which the state sustains its patriarchal power, such as ritualized sexual violence, forced surrogacy, and the distortion of Biblical narratives, to justify its exploitation of women. The paper investigates acts of resistance and reclamation of autonomy by the female characters, revealing how small acts of defiance and solidarity challenge Gilead’s oppressive structures. Atwood’s narrative is argued to be a critique not only of the fictional society but also of contemporary real-world issues surrounding reproductive rights, gender inequality, and bodily autonomy. Ultimately, the novel serves as both a warning against the erosion of rights and a call to resist patriarchal systems that seek to control and commodify women’s bodies.

Gender socialization and adolescent pregnancies in Togo.

The aim of this article is to understand the significance of the gender socialisation of adolescents and its impact on sexuality. This socio-anthropological study is based on qualitative surveys conducted as part of two action-research programmes implemented between 2018 and 2022 in Togo. The empirical data comes from individual semi-directed interviews, group interviews and life stories relating to the themes of sexuality, early pregnancy and gender-based violence. The results show that in these patriarchal societies, the socialisation of adolescents is structured around gender relations. The social construction of masculinity is based on a position of decision-making power for young boys, while that of femininity inculcates submissive behaviour in young girls. In these contexts, many young girls, even if they do attend school, find it difficult to express their opinions on matters of love and sex.

Ömer Seyfettin’s Short Story “The Rainbow”: A Precursor of Transgender Narratives

Ömer Seyfettin, the founder of the modern Turkish short story and a widely read literary figure, published “The Rainbow” (“Eleğimsağma”) in 1917 in a magazine. The story revolves around a ten-year-old girl, Ayşe, and her gender transformation as part of a struggle against masculine hegemony and suppression. Although this transformation takes place through the protagonist’s dream, Seyfettin successfully showcases how gender roles and stereotypes become central in building respectful, acceptable, and powerful personas in society. The story also helps to question the so-called domestic roles of women by juxtaposing the responsibilities of the two genders based on existing cultural norms. To this end, this study aims to investigate how established gender roles in a patriarchal society are called into question and how gender fluidity defies stereotypical understanding of gender representation in a male-dominated society. The analysis of this gender transformation in the story will be made through the concept of performativity which has been introduced by Judith Butler. Though biologically female, Ayşe enjoys activities such as riding, wrestling, shooting, and playing in the streets, which are almost always associated with the male gender. Furthermore, she is subjugated to societal and religious pressure to act like a girl and cover her body. In this respect, Ömer Seyfettin’s “The Rainbow” can be hailed as a leading narration that puts gender performativity in the limelight at the beginning of twentieth-century Turkish literature.

Consanguineous Marriages and Domestic Violence against Women: Evidence from Pakistan

The high prevalence of cousin marriages in the patriarchal Pakistani society presents a unique setting to study the impact of consanguinity on domestic violence. Our study investigates the relationship between consanguineous marriages and domestic violence against women, using econometric models and the Pakistan Demographic and Health Surveys (2012 and 2017–2018). The findings reveal a grim picture of domestic violence, with 6.5% of women experiencing severe physical violence in 2017–2018. We find that consanguineous marriages serve as a protective cushion against domestic violence, while being married to a maternal cousin as compared to a paternal cousin interestingly reduces domestic violence.

DEPICTION OF WOMEN IN CARTER’S THE BLOODY CHAMBER AND ELLIS’S AMERICAN PSYCHO

Women have always been an important part of literature, no matter how were they presented. They are key characters in the development of the plots in works of all literary periods and literary movements. They are presented as victims, villains, weak, strong, intelligent, and sacrificing. This paper will bring a comparative outlook how women are presented in Bloody Chamber and American Psycho. Both Carter in Bloody Chamber and Ellis in American Psycho have women as main protagonists, and no matter these works belong to the postmodernist period, the images of women have a lot of traces from the earliest times. It means, we see women as victims of patriarchal society and families, we see them as sexually submissive and undervalued gender. They try to point out if these women are able to do something to change the way their actions and behavior are judged and how the society views them. This paper gives a comparative outline of these famous literary works, presenting a part of English and American Literature. This is what is presented in this paper, hoping that it will give a glimpse of not only women, their role and position in the society, but the whole society as well, presented in British and American literature.

Transforming harmful representations, investigating violence and empowering care practises in masculinities.

Stemming from a critical perspective of feminist studies on masculinities, this article proposes to explore how dominant and hegemonic masculinities are being reimagined, renegotiated and reconstructed, by understanding new patterns of violence amongst boys, on the one hand; and how care, as the opposite of violence, and a concept in construction from a feminist perspective, can be adopted, put in practise and understood. From a feminist standpoint masculinities studies need to go through a renewed problematisation of the social constructions of masculinities in a space-time context that intersects the economic crisis, health crisis and, on the other hand, implementation of legislation and initiatives for gender equality and citizenship, and is marked by social challenges that are related to the increase of gender inequality, violence indicators and extremism but also the emergence of caring masculinities that need closer attention. This feminist approach to masculinities allows us to critically challenge hegemonic models of boyhood/manhood, specifically by developing a FEMINIST THEORY OF CARING MASCULINITIES. Through a critical understanding of the new patterns and ways in which patriarchal masculinities are perpetuated in society, and placing CARE as the centrepiece and pro-active practise that opposes violence sustained models of masculinities, feminist masculinities studies can challenge dominant forms of masculinity by taking action in diverse social contexts and emphasising empathy, emotional expression, and cooperative relationships.

Staging a dialogue between Autonomist Marxists and Post-Marxists: The case of the alt-right multitude

Albeit in different ways, both Autonomist Marxists and Post-Marxists have proposed radical democratic theories. To Autonomist Marxists, the latest advances in capitalism would pave the way for global democracy. To Post-Marxists, the plurality of social movements would push society towards a radical model of democracy. Despite their contributions, both Autonomist Marxism and Post-Marxism have left underdeveloped the possibility that digital, affective capitalism could push society towards the opposite direction of global and radical democracy. This article explores the hypothesis that contemporary capitalism may have given birth to a multitude that aims at consolidating White, Western, and masculine supremacy. It argues that fantasies that have, for centuries, sustained the racist, xenophobic, and sexist ideological dimensions of capitalism have brought together multiple groups and individuals that have engaged in the collaborative production of conspiracy theories conveying the common belief that an idealised White/Western identity is under attack: the alt-right multitude. By merging part of the key features of the multitude proposed by Autonomist Marxists with what is known as a ‘Žižekian-Lacanian-Post-Marxist theory’, this article stages a dialogue between both schools of thought, opening new directions for research on how capitalism intersects with issues of race, ethnicity, and gender.

Examining stress and coping levels of patriarchal men with autistic children who receive special sports training in Türkiye

Our study aims to explore the factors affecting the stress levels and coping mechanisms of parents with children on the autism spectrum in patriarchal societies. The study group consisted of fathers (n = 183; x̅=44.6) of children diagnosed with autism between the ages of 18–55 living in Izmir province. As a data collection tool; ‘Personal Information Form’ prepared by the researcher to determine the socio-demographic characteristics of Turkish fathers; ‘Stress Self-Assessment Checklist (SSAC)’, ‘Ways of Coping Questionnaire (WCQ)’ was used. It is crucial for partners of children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) to support each other, a principle that holds true for fathers within patriarchal structures as well. Simply put, when parents of autistic individuals support each other, stress levels are reduced. Additionally, increased enrollment of the child in specialized education, especially those incorporating physical activities, serves as a stress-reducing factor. Another significant factor in reducing stress is the employment status of the mother. According to this finding, in patriarchal societies (such as ours), mothers are not obligated to stay at home and care for the child; they can pursue employment. Indeed, a noteworthy outcome of our study is the decrease in paternal stress when the mother is employed.

Beauty, nobility, and desire: Ideals of gentlemanliness and the male body in Confucius and Plato

ABSTRACT Both Plato and Confucius were deeply concerned with moral cultivation and political leadership, topics that were inherently gendered in ancient patriarchal societies. I show that both thinkers focused their discussions on concepts that were associated with male aristocratic ideals of gentlemanliness. Yet while Confucian texts emphasize moral behavior and ritual to beautify the male body (shen 身), Plato focuses on the cultivation of a non-physical soul, which women also possess. Various theories have been proposed to explain this difference in their understandings of the self, but when we bear the gendered nature of their inquiry in mind, an important difference takes center stage: for Socrates, the male body is an object of sexual desire. This paper highlights the influence of homoerotic desire in Plato’s unique approach to gentlemanliness, offering a new perspective for comparing these philosophers' views on gender, cultivation, and leadership.

GENDER STEREOTYPES AND ITS PSYCOLOGICAL IMPACT PORTRAYED IN MULAN 1998 MOVIE

Gender stereotypes are beliefs about individuals’ traits and behaviors based on gender. These preconceptions of gender stereotypes influenced society and shaped individual beliefs, attitudes, and experiences. This study examines the psychological impact of gender stereotypes towards Mulan as reflected in the Mulan (1998) movie. More specifically, this study aims to determine the psychological impact of negative stereotypes on women that are embedded in the beliefs of a patriarchal society. This research applies Erik Erikson’s developmental psychology theory to examine the psychological impact of gender stereotypes on Mulan as an adolescent girl. This study analyzed the data consisting of words, sentences, and dialogues using a qualitative approach. The data was collected through several steps, such as watching and reading the movie script, identifying, and classifying. Based on the findings of this study, Mulan’s psychological development is impacted by gender stereotypes in several aspects, including low self-esteem, future career, and social roles.

“A strong diewei” – A critical investigation of gendered neological metaphors on Weibo

Contributing to the growing literature on discursive strategies against male-dominated gender discourse in the Chinese digital space (e.g., Chen and Gong, 2023), this study investigates a popular neological metaphor – diewei (“爹味” − literally, a smell of father, figuratively, a sense of fatherhood) coined by Chinese microblogging users on Weibo. Similar to mansplaining in English, diewei was originally adopted to describe men’s patronizing, condescending, and overconfident speech style (Bridges, 2017). Drawing on the cultural reference to Chinese fatherhood, diewei represents irony against the authoritative role of the father privileged by patrilineal Chinese family ethics, employed to evaluate others’ overbearing speech styles, attitudes, and behaviors. From a dataset of 198 Weibo posts, we identified three strategic adoptions of diewei based on linguistic and communicative functions. These include (1) markers of masculine essence, (2) metapragmatic commentaries, and (3) personal labels. We then adopt critical discourse analysis (CDA) to explore how gender relationships are discursively produced, represented, and resisted in the diewei discourse through the above adoptions. Our findings suggest that diewei instantiates the pragmatic expansion of gendered metaphors at the expense of dominant masculinity, constituting feminist irony against the authoritative fatherhood in China’s digital space.

Research on the Current Situation of Gender Inequality in China-From a Female Perspective

The rise of feminism has prompted more and more people in the world to pay attention to the issue of gender equality. In China, which has a large population, this issue has also become very prominent. This paper studies the current situation of inequality in China from women‘s perspective, and analyzes the current situation and reasons of inequality mainly from three aspects: workplace, education and family. The causes are analyzed from three perspectives: history, social welfare policies and family. The influence of Confucianism and patriarchal society on women, the neglect and lack of implementation of some bills of rights for women and the influence of family on women are the main causes. Corresponding solutions are proposed to address the existing phenomena. The government needs to improve women‘s employment and maternity leave policies and strengthen the family subsidies for women, innovate the pension insurance system and marital property system, and raise the social awareness of affirmative action. Equality between men and women was essential for the advancement of women and the development of society.

Standards of Femininity in Traditional and Contemporary China: Stereotypes and Beliefs on Women’s Appearance, Roles and their Cultural Influences

Technological advancements have advanced patriarchal society. Modern society is bombarded with media, which introduces new styles and trends daily. These new fashion standards often have negative effects and reinforce social norms and stereotypes. Female roles and fashion trends are stereotyped worldwide, but they are rarely rigid. However, many in Eastern Asia, especially China, are concerned about this issue because cultural and media influences shape many stereotypes and perceptions about women’s physical appearances and social roles. People used to embrace their own beauty standards. However, modern society has adopted a standardised ideal, leading many to undergo extensive plastic surgery procedures like nose bridge enhancement, V-shaped face, skin lightening, and double eyelids. It seems like everyone is identical and can be easily replicated. Without inner beauty and values, outer beauty is just a decorative vase. Beauty, like anything else, is harmful in excess. Self-improvement and personal values should be prioritised before cosmetic enhancement. Through impact of social media, Chinese people set beauty standards and keep them for female generations .

Reading-While-Walking: Books and Material Culture in Jane Eyre (1847) and Milkman (2018)

As with many Victorian novels, Charlotte Brontë’s Jane Eyre (1847) reflects and thematises society’s obsession with material culture. This article investigates the contrasting ways in which books are appraised in Jane Eyre, arguing that patriarchal authority and its imposed vigilance over female bodies appear to be connected to the ways in which its characters engage with books. To unpack this argument, I propose a close reading of the novel’s opening scene, in which John Reed confiscates Thomas Bewick’s A History of British Birds (1797–1804) from Jane Eyre and reclaims it as his own. Further, I propose an analysis of the intertextual relationship between Jane Eyre and Anna Burns’s Milkman (2018), a contemporary novel that posits the book as a contested object in the public space. In both novels, the protagonist/narrator finds in storytelling a way to circumvent the barriers placed over their access to books in early life.

Female Malady: A Psychoanalytic Exploration of Woman’s Madness in Shirley Jackson’s “The Daemon Lover” and “The Tooth

يقدم هذا البحث دراسةَ نفسيةَ لجنون المرأة في قصص مختارة لشيرلي جاكسون. من خلال المنظور التحليلي لمفهوم إلين شوولتر حول "المرض النسوي"، تتعمق هذه الدراسة في الطبقات المتداخلة للعقد النفسية التي تعيشها بطلتي قصتي "الحبيب الشيطان"، التي تعرض هوس البطلة الجنوني بحبيبها، و"الضرس"، التي تدرس القلق، والهوية الأنثوية والضغوط الاجتماعية. تهدف هذه الدراسة النوعية إلى الإجابة على ما إذا كان جنون الإناث صفة موروثة في عقل النساء أم إنها اكتسبت بسبب الضغوطات الاجتماعية المفروضة عليهن. يُطبق البحث النظرية النفسية لتوضيح كيف يمكن أن تثير الأحداث التافهة ظاهريًا اضطرابًا نفسيًا عميقًا. ويكشف هذا التحليل عن الطرق التي يتقاطع بها النظام الذكوري، والقوانين الاجتماعية المفروضة على النساء لتشكيل هذه السردية لجنون المرأة. يتم تحليل تجارب الشخصيات من خلال منظور الرغبات المكبوتة وتوقعات المجتمع واضطرابات الشخصية ضمن سياقات محددة.

Factors Influencing Women’s Entrepreneurial Success in a Patriarchal Society: Empirical Evidence from Morocco

The purpose of the current study is to identify factors associated with women’s entrepreneurial success. By embracing social feminism theory, this study provides a well-rounded analysis of the individual, social, institutional, and economic factors that shape successful women’s business development in a patriarchal society within a Muslim and Arab country. Following the conceptual model development, data were obtained from 212 Moroccan women business owners using a web-based questionnaire. The results, based on structural equation modeling, revealed the positive and direct influence of individual factors on women entrepreneurs’ success, including the need for achievement, and risk-taking. Additionally, external factors, particularly government support, social support, and access to finance, were found to be an important determinant of the entrepreneurial success of Moroccan women. This study enriches the existing knowledge on the determinants of the entrepreneurial success of women in developing countries. It offers offer useful managerial implications for policymakers who should implement appropriate actions to promote gender equality, as well as foster an environment conducive to enabling Moroccan women to launch and develop their own businesses.

Abusive relationships and their repercussions from the perspective of undergraduate healthcare students

in several dimensions. Abusive relationships reflect patriarchal society, and perpetuate abuse of power and gender inequality. Existing literature focuses on marital relationships, pointing out a need for further investigation into violence in dating relationships and among young people. The goal was to analyze the perspective of health students on abusive relationships and their repercussions. This is a qualitative study, carried out in a private Higher Education Institution (IES), in 2023, with female students, over 18 years old. Data were collected through semi-structured interviews, and analyzed and interpreted through Minayo content analysis. The research was approved by the IES ethics committee. The interviewees highlighted violence and possessiveness in abusive relationships, highlighting impacts on victims' mental health and the importance of information and positive representation of women in the media for prevention. The study emphasizes the urgency of understanding abusive relationships and disseminating information to promote more equitable and safe relationships.