You can begin by reading these five short articles:
• Casey Cavanaugh’s “Why We Still Need Feminism”
• Cathy Young’s “When radical feminists treat men badly, it’s bad for feminism”
• Kay Hymowitz’s, “Do Women Really Want Equality?”
• Smith, “Decoding Victoria’s Secret”
• Khan, “Manspreading is an Important Feminist Issue” (This last link was giving me problems this week! If the link acts up, get to the CONTENT page for the article.)
Feel free to give me your opinion on any of these articles, but . . . only after you’ve given me an objective summary. Follow the guidelines for writing summaries I talked about in Assignment One.
QUESTION ONE
All three of these articles are contributing to an ongoing cultural debate. What is that debate? (100 words, 10 points)
QUESTION TWO
Now, take a look at Casey Cavanaugh’s “Why We Still Need Feminism.” What is Cavanaugh’s thesis? Answering this question, use my rubric: “You think ________
about feminism, but you’re understanding is wrong, or at least incomplete. You should think __________ about this topic, and I’m going to tell you why in this essay.”
(Fill-in-the-blanks, 10 points)
Reread through the Cavanaugh carefully. You’ll see that the article she has can be broken down into three key points—we’ll call these “topics”—and each of these topics support her thesis:
Thesis Statement: You may think feminism is irrelevant, but you’re wrong: fighting for women’s empowerment is still important.
Topic One: Misconceptions about feminism abound.
Topic Two: Women still suffer injustice, in the US and around the world
Topic Three: Both men and women benefit from feminism
Now, let’s take this scratch outline one step further. Under each of these key points, you’ll see that Cavanaugh provides her reader with “supporting examples.”
Thesis Statement: You may think feminism is irrelevant, but you’re wrong: fighting for women’s empowerment is still important.
Topic One: Misconceptions about feminism abound
Supporting Example: The site “Women Against Feminism” label feminists as “man-haters.”
Supporting Example: Lena Dunham notes her generation considers feminism “a dirty word.”
Topic Two: Women still suffer injustice, in the US and around the world
Supporting Example: Lack of political power, including Congressional representation.
Supporting Example: Violence against women, including rape
Supporting Example: Powerlessness of women internationally, including the prevalence of FGM and female infanticide.
. . . and so on, for the rest of the article.
College writing is simple.
• You start with a claim, a thesis statement, that reflects your own contribution to a discussion-in-progress.
• You break that claim into topics—key points—that help you illustrate and support your thesis, and you organize those key points in body paragraphs.
• And, for each of these key points, you provide supporting examples that come from your own, original, research.
QUESTION THREE
Now take out Cathy Young’s “When radical feminists treat men badly, it’s bad for feminism.” What is Young’s thesis? Use my rubric: “You think _________________
about feminism, but you’re understanding is wrong, or at least incomplete. You should think __________ about this topic, and I’m going to tell you why in this essay.”
(Fill-in-the-blanks, 10 points)
QUESTION FOUR
And now take outKay Hymowitz’s, “Do Women Really Want Equality?” What is Hymowitz’s thesis? Again, use this simple rubric: “You think _________________
about feminism, but you’re understanding is wrong, or at least incomplete. You should think __________ about this topic, and I’m going to tell you why in this essay.”
(Fill-in-the-blanks, 10 points)
You understand that these writers are having a conversation, in print, about feminism? And that each of these writers joins the conversation not merely to summarize the debate, but to make an original contribution to that debate? The pattern we’ll be following all semester long: “They say _____, and I say _____.” |
________________________________________________________________________
Let’s take another break and talk about paragraphs . . .
Revisit my outline above. You’ll see that, after we identified a thesis statement, we divided the essay into specific topics
In an academic essay, each of these topics will take up an individual body paragraph. We’ll open paragraphs with a topic sentence, which describes the main point of that paragraph, and we’ll develop these paragraphs using specific examples.
Can you outline of a body paragraph? Sure! Scroll down to the last paragraph of the article you just read, “Do Women Really Want Equality.”
Topic Sentence: Now, a lot of people might say that American women are stymied from pursuing their ambitions because of our miserly maternity leave, day care and workplace-flexibility policies.
Supporting Example: But even women in the world’s most family-friendly countries show little interest in the equality-by-the-numbers ideal. In Iceland, Norway, Sweden and Finland, according to the OECD, women still work fewer hours and earn less money than men;
Supporting Example: they also remain a rare sight in executive offices, computer- science classrooms and, though the OECD doesn’t say it I’m willing to bet, philosophy conferences.
Supporting Example: Sweden, the gold standard of gender equality in many minds, has one of the highest percentages of women working part time anywhere in the world.
And she ends the paragraph with a quick sentence connecting her supporting examples back to her topic sentence: “Equality-by-numbers advocates should be thinking about women’s progress in terms of what women show that they want, not what the spreadsheets say they should want.”
Pretty clear what’s going on here, yes? Your topic sentence announces the topic of the body paragraph, and—if necessary—connects that body paragraph back to your thesis. And, the paragraph itself is built up of specific examples illustrating the topic sentence.
Academic writing is simple: you are simple marshaling evidence to support a claim. All the “rules” of academic writing—an introduction that lays out the topic of the essay and the problem or controversy being considered; a thesis statement laying out the writer’s position; body paragraphs that organize research into a series of clear topics; original research conducted to support and illustrate the writer’s thesis—facilitate a clear, simple, presentation of the writer’s own argument . . .
QUESTION FIVE
Open up Hymowitz’s “Do Women Really Want Equality?” handy, and scroll down to the paragraph that begins, “There are reasons for this particular wage gap that are gender-blind.” Now, outline that body paragraph:
Topic sentence:
Supporting Example:
Supporting Example:
Supporting Example:
(Cut-and-paste, 10 points)
Let’s move onto something a bit more challenging, yes?
QUESTION FIVE
Now turn to Sarah Khan’s “Manspreading is an Important Feminist Issue, Not Just Bad Social Etiquette.” Find this on the CONTENT page. You all have a grasp on what the word “manspreading describes, yes? If you don’t get over to Wikipedia and do some on-the-spot researching. At first glance, according to Khan, “manspreading” might seem relatively innocuous, nothing more than example of bad manners (like, for example, talking too loudly on your phone in public). But, Khan says, that’s incorrect: there’s a lot more going on here. What, according to Khan, can “manspreading” tell us about gender roles in the contemporary United States, and what can “manspreading” tell us about female oppression. Oh! I realize some of you are rolling your eyes—and Khan realizes that as well. She more or less assumes that a lot of her readers will think this is a really innocuous issue.) (250-300 words, 20 points)
________________________________________________________________________
‘Manspreading’ chair wins award for forcing dudes’ legs together
Laila Laurel designed his and hers chairs to show the way men and women “command space.”
________________________________________________________________________
Finally, let’s take a look at Marie D. Smith’s “Decoding Victoria’s Secret,” which examines the marketing phenomenon that is Victoria’s Secret lingerie. There are a few things you should understand before you read Smith’s article.
• The first point: women don’t buy VS lingerie because it’s comfortable. • The second point: women don’t purchase VS because they believe it is a quality product. • The third point: women don’t buy VS lingerie because they believe it’s a good value. |
“Where are you getting this information?” you may be wondering. In fact, I’m getting this information from the folks who actually designed Victoria’s Secret’s marketing strategy. (Visit the link. Ignore the “Warning!” dialogue box. You won’t get a virus, I promise.)
Let me summarize this report: women who want comfort and value, according to Victoria’s Secret executives, purchase Playtex or Bestform. Nevertheless, Victoria’s Secret is one of the biggest underwear brands in the United States.
One final point before I get to the question. Some of you know that Victoria’s Secret is a dying brand. A lot of women—especially younger women—don’t shop at Victoria’s Secret anymore, for a variety of reasons.
Does this invalidate Smith’s article?
No! And I’ll tell you why: the fastest growing lingerie companies in the United States have become successful by copying the Victoria’s Secret marketing playbook Marie D. Smith discusses here, though sometimes with a “woke” component. As you read Smith, you can replace “Victoria’s Secret” with AdoreMe, Journelle, and ten other brands. These companies, marketing lingerie directly to women, have learned to beat Victoria’s Secret at their own game.
Okay . . .
QUESTION SIX
Why, according to Marie Smith, do women buy Victoria’s Secret products? Again, just to keep things clear. Women don’t buy Victoria’s Secret because it’s comfortable, they don’t buy Victoria’s Secret because it’s a quality product, and they don’t buy Victoria’s Secret because it is perceived as a good value. And, in fact, Marie Smith claims there’s another explanation for the popularity of Victoria’s Secret. What is that explanation? HINT: take a look at her concluding paragraph. (250-300 words, 20 points)
________________________________________________________________________