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Feminism and spatial power relations-
Research on Feminist Geography

Entering the post-industrial society, a group of postmodern thinkers such as Foucault, Lacan, and Derrida led a wave of postmodern feminism. The latter basically denied all grand theories and androcentrism, and then put forward the thesis that power is everywhere, discourse is power, body politics, shaping technology, disciplinary gaze, etc., and a large number of Western feminist scholars and works have emerged[1], such as Mary Wollstonecraft's A Vindication of the Rights of Woman: with Strictures on Political and Moral Subjects, Kate Millett's Sexual Politics, Shulamith Firestone's Dialectic of Sex, Juliet Michel's Women: The Longest Revolution, Heidi Hartmann's Capitalism, Patriarchy, and Job Segregation by Sex, and Margaret Benstone's The Political Economy of Women's Liberation.

 

While history, sociology, anthropology, and other disciplines pay close attention to feminist research paradigms, geographers are also trying to intervene in this field through their unique comprehensive characteristics and powerful spatial analysis capabilities. Under the influence and promotion of postmodernist and neo-Marxist geographers such as Harvey, Lefebvre, Suja, etc., the traditional geological research field-the study of the distribution of geographical elements, has also begun to focus on the fairness of resource distribution and based on gender. The social system and the structural mechanism behind the distribution and distribution of the elements have been studied in depth. Geography experienced a socio-cultural turn in the 1980s, and the perspective of space research has turned, that is, from space, The production in space turned to the production of space, and social space began to replace material space and became an important research object of social and cultural geography[2]. In the realistic context of the women's movement in the Western world, gender, as a keyword in social and cultural studies, is naturally associated with the study of social space, and feminist geography is on the rise.

 

The main research areas on space include: body space (Longhurst‘s pregnant body in space[3]; Mohammad explored the concept of female chastity and the process of implanting Muslim community identity from the clothing of Pakistani Muslim women in the UK[4]; Kern believes that the city commercializes the female body and sexual desire, and commercial advertisements are gazes by men, and the female body is represented as the freedom and joy of the city. Correspondingly, the body is re-engraved with the urban landscape, and the city is made into a body simulacrum[5].), working space(Nelson found that some employers moved to the suburbs to get closer to middle-class housewives, because the latter were willing to work at lower wages; on the physical scale, female bodies were often dominated by men such as investment banks, steel mills, and masculine bars. Feel at a loss in the workspace[6]; McDowell emphasized that "work" is not gender-neutral, but is shaped as a job suitable for men or women, and the work division of gender differences constitutes and maintains the whole set of patriarchal discourse practice of "male superiority to female inferiority"[7].), dwelling space(Juliet Michel pointed out that in The Origin of Capitalism, the discussion of the status of women and the discussion of the family are separated from each other, or the former is only a supplement to the latter, and the family is only regarded as the premise of private ownership[8]), and public space(McDowell believes that the design and configuration of public spaces in Westbrook in London symbolize the authority of men and the legal possession of these spaces by men. The internal configuration of streets and squares, trading halls, and business halls all consolidate idealized masculinity, and women in them generally feel a sense of rejection and alienation[9]; Valentine puts forward the concept of "geography of women's fear", pointing out that women have a "cognitive map" in their minds, knowing that in some places and at some moments, they are easily violated by the opposite sex. Many people So adjust behavioral habits and action strategies[10]).

[1] Li Yinhe. Ideological trend of post modern feminism[J]. Philosophical Research, 1996(5): 65-70.

[2] Xue Desheng, Wang Li. Progress in urban geography studies since 1978 in China[J]. Acta Geographica Sinica, 2014, 69(8): 1117-1129.

[3] Longhurst R. Situating bodies[M] //Nelson L, Seager J. A Companion to Feminist Geography. Oxford: Blackwell, 2005:337-349.

[4] Mohammad R. British Pakistani Muslim women: Marking the body, marking the nation[M] //Nelson L, Seager J. A Companion to Feminist Geography. Oxford: Blackwell, 2005:379-397.

[5] Kern L. Selling the 'Scary City': Gendering freedom, fear and condominium development in the neoliberal city[J]. Social and Cultural Geography, 2010, 11(3): 209-230.

[6] Nelson L, Seager J. A Companion to Feminist Geography[M]. Oxford: Blackwell, 2005: 1-10.

[7] McDowell L. Women's paid work and moral economies of care[J]. Social and Cultural Geography, 2005, 6(2): 219-235.

[8] Juliet Michel's Women: The Longest Revolution

[9] McDowell L. Women's paid work and moral economies of care[J]. Social and Cultural Geography, 2005, 6(2): 219-235.

[10] Valentine G. The geography of women's Fear[J]. Area, 1989, 21(4): 385-390.

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Nelson L, Seager J. A Companion to Feminist Geography, 2005

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Juliet Michel's Women: The Longest Revolution

Feminist geography, as an emerging branch, focuses on the interaction between women and space, and more specifically the process and mechanism of women's role in urban space and local growth. In other words, this is a theoretical model that studies the relationship between women, space and power.

This part of the study of feminist geography, expressed in Lefebvre's theory, belongs to the subdivision of the first space and the third space.

I hope that I can discuss the power relations of the all three spaces mentioned by Lefebvre in my work.

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