"To achieve a feminist standpoint one must engage in the intellectual and political struggle necessary to see nature and social life from the point of view of that disdained activity which produces women's social experiences instead of from the partial and perverse perspective available from the 'ruling gender' experience of men....it is women who should be expected to be able to reveal for the first time what women's experiences are."

-Sandra Harding, Is there a Feminist Method?

Feminist theory is currently caught in limbo between a rock and a hard place. Should feminist theorists reframe and adapt male theories of oppression that pertain to the feminist idea of oppression, or should we create our own unique theories? As Sandra Harding points out in the above quote, women must not look to others for representation because ultimately this will lead to misrepresentation. Instead, we must create our own theories which pertain to the unique oppression of women. But in doing so we must ignore that there are other forms of oppression besides just gender oppression. In an attempt to gain a better understanding of the way in which women have understood and created theories, I will analyze theory from both the positive and negative aspects of male adapted theories as well as new feminist theories.

Re-framing existing ideas can benefit feminism as it is successful in recreating traditional understandings of oppression. The most beneficial aspect of re-framing traditional views is that such ideas are familiar to the reader and have already upheld criticism; most are therefore thought to already be accredited. For example, if feminist theorist can frame theories such as Marxism or psycho-analytic theories such as those of Freud so as to work within a feminist context, it may help to validate the idea of gender oppression. Marxist feminism has made remarkable progress through the reformulation of theories of the oppression of women as stemming from a male-hierarchy whereby gender, instead of class, is the cause of oppression. In addition, almost all feminist psychology reformulates Freudian theories regarding the placement of the female as being determined by the Oedipal complex. Another positive aspect of turning male ideas around, is that it allows us to "dismantle the master's house with the master's tools." In other words, we are able to turn previously oppressive theories into a tool of learning by using male defined ideas of oppression to prove their theories invalid. If we are able to extend a Marxist view to women asserting gender as an oppressive factor, it will lend validity to our cause. If on the other hand we can disprove the Oedipal crisis, whereby women are defined in the negative as lacking something which would make them complete (the phallus), then we have successfully destroyed a long upheld male view of women using their own terms and ideas. Whereas it is imperative that feminism is able to address what are typically oppressive, male-dominated theories regarding women, it is not always in our best interest to adopt said theories as a form of possible liberation.

The most pressing problem that I see with adopting theories that are perpetuated by men regarding oppression, is that feminism then perpetuates theories which ignore difference. By adopting a Marxist perspective women are advocating a theory of oppression which states that women are subjugated to a second class status because of their gender. In such an analogy women are the proletariat and held down by the bourgeoisie. The major problem is that this is an oversimplification of the global situation of women. First off, it is naive to think that the only source of oppression in women's lives is gender. For example, a black women who lives in an urban environment and a white, upper-class, educated women are not oppressed by exactly the same forces and stereotypes. In this situation, it is likely that the white women has been afforded a better education, and therefore more possibilities in life. In addition, she is protected by the color of her skin which allows her to speak on issues of oppression that many women of minority status have not found the voice yet to speak on. In addition, such theories falsely assume that all women assume the same gender. Gender is the meaning given to a person's biological sex, which is not the same for a women because not all women are biologically the same. Rather, our biology is shaped by other factors including our cultural identification, our skin color, our religion and our sexuality and how such differences are valued within a given society.

Marxism, when interpreted for feminism, falls into the same trap of negating difference that has destroyed many other forms of feminism. Marxism is designed to focus on oppression from one source, economic class. When it is reinterpreted to fit feminism, Marxism ignores other sources of oppression including race, class, sexuality and religion and instead focuses solely on gender as the source of oppression. Such an oversimplification not only ignores difference, but does not address ways in which women are implicated in their own and other's oppression; Marxist-feminist theories do not address heterosexism or white privilege which would turn the oppressing force from being merely gender to being forces of dominant culture which define people as "other" based on the desirable qualities of the dominant culture. Such ideals are created through processes of socialization and are absorbed and distributed differently through society based on an individuals economic status, religion and race. Further more women are able to benefit from advantages such as skin color and education and thus able to use this advantage against other women.

As for Freud, by reformulating his theories of women we are merely perpetuating a definition of women as something which is "other." We are embracing a theory which, even in a feminist context, defines women in the negative through what it is that we are lacking. For example, in Nancy Chodorow's The Psychodynamics of the Family, Chodorow inaccurately uses the nuclear family as the basis for her analysis, which is not only outdated, but is not globally applicable. In her account of the Oedipal complex and its consequential development of the bisexual triangle, Chodorow asserts that women are socialized to heterosexuality through the socially necessary alignment with the father, which ignores families where there is no father. In addition, she perpetuates and naturalizes traditional views of women by stating that women have a need to "return to the womb" by bearing children, which embraces a cultural feminist ideal that women are inherently more nurturing and passive than men and therefore should be the primary caregivers of children; a stereotype which has been detrimental to the progression of women outside the household. It is one thing to address Freudian theory or even to reinterpret what could be of use to feminist thought, and adopting such oppressive theories thinking they can lead us to liberation as women, or even a new understanding of what women are, given the definitions used are still male determined and defined.

Perhaps a better way for women to address feminist issues is for women to create their own theories stemming from their unique perspective and understanding of their own oppression. As Chandra Talpade Mohanty stated in her essay Under Western Eyes: Feminist Scholarship and Colonial Discourses (p.96), "It is time to move beyond the Marx who found it possible to say: They cannot represent themselves; they must be represented." We can no longer allow for men to postulate on the reasons for our oppression. Instead we must address such issues ourselves and formulate our own theories which take into consideration both our oppression as well as our compliance with the system, which implicates us as the possible oppressors of others.

By formulating our own theories, we will ultimately find a new place within society which will be both self-determined as well as self-defined. We can look to our own definitions instead of adopting or altering those of men; we will no longer have to tolerate being defined in the negative, but can rather create new definitions of both male and female so that neither is created as being the "other" or the inferior. In addition, allowing women the opportunity to formulate new theories from their own unique perspective will allow for women to take more than just gender into account as an oppressive force. As I stated before it is not just gender which oppresses women, rather it is whatever is defined as being desirable by the dominant culture. By this definition, women are not just oppressed by gender, but also by the color of their skin, sexual preference, religion, economic status and marital status. It has often been stated that feminism is a "white woman's thing" meaning that it does not or cannot apply to women of color or minority status. But a positive way of restating this is that it is a necessity that not only white, middle/upper class, educated women become involved in developing theory, but that women of all race and class become involved. It is important that women begin to address their own compliance within the system and the ways in which certain women are able to benefit from a racist and classist society. For example, the selections from Yours In Struggle were an application of theory where the reader could actually observe the process of determining one's own geographical standpoint and how this affects and shapes each individual's feminism and how, in response, he or she treats others.

Whereas it is both positive and necessary that women become involved in the feminist struggle by formulating their own theories, it is also imperative that women do not fall into the same traps that other theorist have succumbed to. A prime example is Catherine MacKinnon who perpetuates traditional views and stereotypes regarding women. Writing from a strict heterosexual bias, Mackinnon asserts that sex is defined as being vaginal sex-in other words, sex with a man, which ignores clitoral stimulation which would allow for lesbian sex because clitoral stimulation can be brought about by another women. She continues by stating that sex is the assertion of power by men over women which she simplifies to a reductive statement that pornography, the ultimate assertion of male power, is the source of female oppression. Taken literally, by shifting the focus from gender to sex, she implies that women are actually oppressed by their biological sex as being female and possessing a vagina. This is not the same as being oppressed by gender, which is the meaning given to a biological sex, and because sex is biologically determined it is not something we can change. Ultimately, she implies that women are victims and that this is natural and biologically determined. But there are other traps which we must avoid. We cannot address gender as the only source of female oppression, which would continue to ignore the differences among women and will eventually force the struggle to divide or assimilate into a homogenous group (most likely white, straight, privileged women). Many feminist theorist fail to recognize their own role as an oppressor or are afraid to address such an issue for fear of separating the movement. Such an attitude is ultimately destructive as it will perpetuate ideas of sameness. As bell hooks pointed out in her essay Feminism: A Movement to End Sexist Oppression,

"Bourgeois white women interested in women's rights issues have been satisfied with simple definitions for obvious reasons. Rhetorically placing themselves in the same social category as oppressed women, they were not anxious to call attention to race and class privilege."

hooks points out how white upper class women are able to benefit by ignoring their class or race privilege by stating that they are in the same position as "truly oppressed women," such as those in Indonesia who work in sweat shops for less than a dollar a day and are forced to prostitute themselves in order to survive. It is obvious that such women are not in the same position and that there are other forces of oppression at work besides just gender. This idea is the manifestation of the feminist slogan the "personal is political," which does not force women to look beyond the personal to what effects women on a global scale or sources of oppression to within which they may be implicated. This idea is further developed into a common idea of what the "third world feminist" is. Women produce a "composite, singular 'third world woman' -an image whichappears arbitrarily constructed, but nevertheless carries with it the authorizing signature of Western humanist discourse" (Mohanty, p.93 Under Western Eyes). What Mohanty is warning against is the idea of white women taking their vantage point as being normal and therefore judging all other people against their ideal creating an inferior "other" defined in the negative. In other words, white privileged women redefining minority groups in a similar way that white men have done to women across the board. This leads to the recreating of hierarchies through which you can rate oppression. For example, poor white women are not as oppressed as black women who are commonly considered "doubly oppressed" (because they are female and black), yet they are more oppressed than white upper class women. This is merely a recreation of the very structure feminist theorist are attempting to negate. Feminist ultimate goal is the destruction of such structures which cannot occur if we replicate them, therefore validating a system of hierarchy, privilege, exclusion and dominance.

This is a very complicated struggle without an easy answer. Though I believe that it is preferable that women become active in forming new theories which reflect their own unique perspective, it is also important to learn from those who have attempted and failed. We must not create new theories in the image of old, invalid, male created theories which would only repeat their mistakes by ignoring difference and therefore our own implication in systems of oppression, or through replicating oppressive systems of hierarchical rating of oppression.