From the History of Feminist Research of Female Body and Sexuality in English-Speaking and European Countries

Abstract

This article presents the analysis of the feminism history toward the female body, which has figured alternately as the source of women's oppression and as the locus of a specifically female power. Drawing on Europian and American feminist literature, the author of the article shows how feminist scholars focus first of all on the reproductive body and on female's sexuality. The key message of all these scientific works is that corporealities of women may be seen as making vulnerable to male domination and control, both directly through the exercise of superior physical power, and indirectly through social compulsions and the representation of sexual difference across a variety of discourses. It is shown that for feminist scholars, the body has always been of central importance for understanding women embodied experience, cultural and historical construction on the female body in the various contexts of social life.

Keywords

• history of body
• feminism
• women's body
• sexuality and reproduction