Feminist (re)visions of anthropology

Abstract

This thesis characterizes feminist anthropology's past, present and future. The early years of feminist anthropology were committed to explication of the relationship between gender and power. Currently feminists are engaging in new post-modern ideas. Post-modern concerns with epistemology and knowledge/truth production resound with feminist observations, but post-modern concepts of power, resistance and deconstruction present problems for feminists. For post-modern anthropologists, traditional ethnography has been replaced by experimental texts. Feminist anthropologists created the textual innovation of "voices." Feminist anthropological texts are now focusing on how women handle the complex and diverse power structures that oppress them, incorporating a focus on media and discourse. Recent feminist anthropology combines textual experimentation with a focus on resistance at its various levels. Future feminist anthropologists will return to the discussion of gender and power begun in the 70s retaining the post-modern textual experimentation and interest in resistance and power.