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KEY WORDS: varieties of feminist theories, feminist theory ghettoization, theory canon revision, ubiquity of gender, critiques of feminist theories
ABSTRACT
Feminist theories in sociology reflect the rich diversity of general theoretical orientations in our discipline; there is no one form of feminist theory. The development of these theories over the last 25 years has only recently begun to influence the mainstream theory canon, which has much to learn from their insights. This chapter demonstrates why feminist versions of the following theory types should be more fully integrated into mainstream sociological theory: neo-Marxist, macro-structural, exchange, rational choice, network, status expectations, symbolic interactionist, ethnomethodological, neo-Freudian, and social role. Feminist standpoint theory, an epistemological critique of mainstream sociology, is discussed at the beginning, and the chapter concludes with a brief account of the newly developing effort to theorize the intersection of race, class, and gender.
INTRODUCTION
The term "feminist theory" is used to refer to a myriad of kinds of works, produced by movement activists and scholars in a variety of disciplines; these are not mutually exclusive and include: (a) normative discussions of how societies and relationships ought to be structured, their current inequities, and strategies to achieve equity; (b) critiques of androcentric classical theories, concepts, epistemologies, and assumptions; (c) epistemological discussions of what constitute appropriate forms, subject matters, and techniques of theorizing from a feminist perspective; and (d) explanatory theories of the relationship between gender and various social, cultural, economic, psychological, and political structures and processes. Much of this work is explicitly interdisciplinary in inspiration and intended audience. To complicate matters further, there is no consensus on the exact meaning of the word "feminist," which makes it difficult to distinguish with precision between theoretical material that pertains to gender (e.g. Parsons 1949, 1955, which no one would label feminist) and gender-related theory that is specifically "feminist." Finally, there is little consensus among feminist sociologists about the basic theoretical questions that require an answer, resulting in the proliferation of theories at a low level of abstraction that explain specific phenomena (e.g. pay inequity), in addition to more abstract, general works.
To remain within the limits of one chapter, I confine this review in several ways, beginning by excluding feminist theory that has not been produced or used...