Those are tumultuous time for women. While the experience of solidarity and sisterhood through campaigns such as #MeToo can be empowering, hearing the numerous accounts of sexual violence, harassment, and humiliation has been painful and draining for many as well. And while women are in increasing number speaking up against gender discrimination and mistreatment on various forms, things seem to be sliding backwards in parts of the world. The rise of authoritarian movements with fascistic tendencies is bound to be perceived as a threat not only to women‘s rights, but to many other social justice movements that we thought had made progress in the past decades. And as is often the case, the more severe problems tend to be aggravated for women belonging to other marginalized and underprivileged groups.
Recent events have clarified that if there is anything that all women can be considered to share, in spite of all their other differences, then it is having to live under the threat of sexual violence, the experience of sexual harassment, and experiences of various forms of gender-based humiliation and disrespect, if not downright violence. However, we may still wonder whether this feature is something that should define the category ‘woman’. Does being a woman downright consist in being undervalued, abused, and disrespected? Definitions of womanhood of that ilk have been put forth (e.g. by Sally Haslanger), but others have found such accounts unfulfilling because they are bound to be eliminativist and getting rid of gender altogether is unrealistic or undesirable. In this respect, we can think of a double bind within feminism, concerning whether to appreciate or reject womanhood (e.g. Ann Snitow‘s essay “A Gender Diary”).
If we consider what makes up a social category such as ‘woman’, the hope for a clear definition may be futile. Rather than think of the category, or womanhood, as determined only by the ideas and norms of those holding power, we should think of the many forms of women’s resistance to those ideas and norms, and women’s own conflicted attitudes to womanhood as highly relevant to determining it as well.

Eyja M. Brynjarsdóttir holds a PhD in philosophy from Cornell University and works at the University of Iceland. Her research is focused on feminist philosophy and social metaphysics and epistemology. She recently participated in two projects funded by the Icelandic Research Fund: „The Reality of Money“ and „Feminist Philosophy Transforming Philosophy“. Her book „The Reality of Money: The Metaphysics of Financial Value“ was published by Rowman and Littlefield last October.

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