Language and Speech
"Because women speak and write...from the margins of patriarchy, we who are conscious of this phenomenon have wrestled strenuously with the problem of using language against itself - the joint impossibility and necessity of speaking and writing" (Walker, Waldman 1).
"We can no longer ignore that voice within women that says: 'I want something more than my husband and my children and my home.' "(Friedan 32).
"Within feminist circles, silence is often seen as the sexist 'right speech of womanhood' - the sign of woman's submission to patriarchal authority" (hooks 207).
"[Black women's] struggle has not been to emerge from silence into speech but to change the nature and direction of our speech, to make a speech that compels listeners, one that is heard" (hooks 208).
"Moving from silence to speech is for the oppressed, the colonized, the exploited, and those who stand and struggle side by side a gesture of defiance that heals, that makes new life and new growth possible. It is that act of speech, of 'talking back,' that is no mere gesture of empty words, that is the expression of our movement from object to subject - the liberated voice" (hooks 211).
I am quoting from the GWSS 3307 course packet, Friedan's The Feminist Mystique, and bell hook's Talking back: Thinkng Feminist, Thinking Black.
Women have been silenced for so long, it is necessary for our voices to be heard and not ignored. According to Friedan, we can no longer ignore the voices of women who are seen as 'unfeminine' because they are unfulfilled in their role as housewives. Speech and writing allow for women to be heard and resist the silencing that has for so long been the 'feminine' course. bell hooks does an excellent job describing and claiming voice. According to hooks, Black women's voice is very different from other women's experiences. Black women are allowed to speak, yet their talk is silencing in itself. "Talking back" is the term that hooks uses to describe the type of speech that is needed from Black women, because their talk is ignored and pushed aside as background noise by men. Talking back is a way from women to get claim their voice and be heard. In her quote above, she says that most who are oppressed, are silent and must move from silence to speech, whereas Black women need to move from empty talk to "talking back" and claiming voice.
Friedan discusses the "problem that has no name." Housewives were being ignored and their 'problem' was not taken seriously in the public sphere. Feminine expectations were to get married, have a home, and have children. Many women were not satisfied with this life yet couldn't speak of the problem for lack of 'voice.' She also describes what the problem is not: poverty, age, sickness, hunger, cold. Nor is it material fulfillment, too much education, loss of femininity or fatigue as many psychologists had named the issue. The "housewife's fatigue" was the term that many professionals used in describing the problem that had no name. Friedan says, "it is no longer possible to ignore that voice, to dismiss the desperation of so many American women. This is not what being a woman means, no matter what the experts say. For human suffering there is a reason; perhaps the reason has not been found because the right questions have not been asked, or pressed far enough" (Friedan 26).
We need to stand up and start "talking back." Get our voices heard, because without voice or a language to describe our oppressions and the issues that suppress our words and feelings, we will but stuck in the patriarchal language and ignored.
"some chick says
thank you for saying all the things i never do
i say
the thanks i get is to take all the shit for you
it's nice that you listen
it'd be nicer if you joined in
as long as you play their game girl
you're never going to win"
- Ani DiFranco -
- Face up and Sing -