Feminist Thought: A More Comprehensive Introduction

An excellent top-level survey of all feminism's different flavors: close to twenty of them in this volume. It starts with liberal feminism, which stresses equality of opportunity. This comprises feminism's first forays against patriarchy. From there the paths of feminism diverge into quality of life issues, particularly the quandaries of women trying to balance family and career; and from there into more intellectual battlegrounds of identity, sexuality, freedom, psychology, and fulfillment. Name a possible line of inquiry, it seems, and you'll find its related feminism.

One senses the frustrations in this struggle. In the end perhaps too much is asked of feminism. No ideology can finally answer why an individual is unhappy or show more unfulfilled. There is something tragic in this, such powerful, not to say desperate drives to systematize a serviceable worldview, drives so often seeming to lead only to painful circularities. And tragic not just for women but for all of us. Are women a special case laying claim to preferential attention, or a facet of the larger tragedy of the human condition? The problem is, both. show less

I really liked this book. A trip down memory lane reading about the traditional liberal, radical and socialist feminism. Naming the more contemporary feminism: second wave and third wave. An intelligent (sometimes too deep for me) exploration of feminism is helpful in understanding the 'post modern' women. I liked that Tong says, "men as well as women have much to gain by joining a variety of postmodern and third wave feminists in their attempts to shape a feminism that meets PEOPLE's needs in the new millenium.