Gerda Lerner Essay, Research Paper

Gerda Lerner expose

on

The History of Women?s Role of Subordination and Slave

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Lerner believes that only reversing the process by which it was constructed can deconstruct patriarchy. Hence, to abolish patriarchy we must know how and why patriarchy came into being and addresses those underlying issues. Lerner proposed a theory to explain the development of patriarchy and offers many comments about women in history and women in history as represented by men as being from the very beginning subordinate to man to the point of slavery.

However, Lerner also communicates through her writing at the same time, the rise of an antipatriarchal feminist attitude among women from the middle ages to 1870. As a result, Lerner introduces us to many wonderful, powerful, proto-feminist women on the history of women?s subordination and slavery to men historically.

Thus, Lerner first points out that the recorded and interpreted record of the past of the human race is only a partial record. This is because it omits the past of half of humankind, and it is distorted, in that it tells the story from the viewpoint of the male half of humanity only as the dominant and the woman half, totally the subordinate to the male half.

This is due to the factor that no historical data whatsoever has excluded males because of their sex. However, since all historical data being written predominately by man has excluded women based upon their sexual difference. Because of this historically documented negation of women?s equality and importance of role in society, their limitation of importance has caused women to this very day to struggle against their historically projected sexually subordinate status. Unfortunately, this historical sexual subordinate status of women mandated by man still largely exists to this very day. This is clearly exhibited in the workplace?s unfair differences of positions and salaries between men and women in the job market. Whereas, men still unfairly obtain far higher salaries and positions than women. While women, just as intelligent or more must still accept subordinate job positions and salaries to men.

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Many times, even if woman has the very same job position as their male equals, the woman working the very same job will still earn far less money than her male counterpart also working the very same job position, as she will. This clearly relates to Lerner?s expose on historical women subordination and slavery. Only now in the 21st century it has become female economic subordination thus, still sexual slaves to men.

However, Lerner defines the historical basis of women originally being portrayed as subordinate and slaves to men in posing the question – if men are exchanged between tribes, what would assure loyalty to new tribe? Men would be capable of violence against members of the strange tribe; with their experience in hunting and long distance travel they might easily escape and then return as warriors to seek vengeance. Women, on the other hand, would be more easily coerced, most likely by rape.

Therefore, once married or mothers of children, they would give their loyalty to their children and to their children’s relatives and would thus make a potentially strong bond with the tribe of affiliation. This was, in fact, the way slavery developed historically.

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Or, more precisely, Lerner implies that the woman’s biological function made her more readily adaptable for this new, culturally created role of a sexual pawn in the very first societies established by mankind. Moreso, this historical contradiction in women?s value to society has regrettably been ingrained into the consciousness of women. Thus, they are then correctly perceived and named as deprivations that all women still share as a group to this day. However, this coming-into-consciousness of women becomes the dialectical force moving them into action to change their condition and to enter a new relationship to male-dominated society.

Finally, the misappropriation of control by men of women’s sexual and reproductive capacity occurred prior to the configuration of private property and class society. Unfortunately, women?s social status because of their sexual difference became the private property of men. Therefore, women were only important as to man?s interest in the maintenance of the patriarchal family where man instituted total dominance and hierarchy over women, thus beginning the institutionalization of women?s human subordination and slavery in society.

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