Sartre and Beauvoir on Women's Psychological Oppression. Issue 1 (1st June 2021)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Edwards, Mary
• Is Part Of: Sartre studies international. Volume 27:Issue 1(2021)
• Page Start: 46
• Page End: 75
• Publication Date: 2021-06-01
• Subjects: bad faith -- Beauvoir (de) -- imagination -- psychological oppression -- Sartre -- situation; Philosophy, French -- 20th century -- Periodicals; French literature -- 20th century -- Periodicals; Criticism and interpretation -- Periodicals; 194
• DOI: 10.3167/ssi.2021.270104
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 1357-1559

Abstract

Abstract: This paper aims to show that Sartre's later work represents a valuable resource for feminist scholarship that remains relatively untapped. It analyses Sartre's discussions of women's attitude towards their situation from the 1940s, 1960s, and 1970s, alongside Beauvoir's account of women's situation in The Second Sex, to trace the development of Sartre's thought on the structure of gendered experience. It argues that Sartre transitions from reducing psychological oppression to self-deception in Being and Nothingness to construing women as 'survivors' of it in The Family Idiot . Then, it underlines the potential for Sartre's mature existentialism to contribute to current debates in feminist philosophy by illuminating the role of the imagination in women's psychological oppression.