Contemporary feminism has undergone deep changes and has been extended in a variety of directions in miscellaneous fields of study engaging with psychology, Marxism, ethnic and cultural studies, post-structuralism, etc. The frustration of proliferation, according to Julie Rivkin and Michael Ryan in their introductory note to Feminism in the book Literary Theory: An Anthology (2002) can be construed as pains of progress necessary to be made if we want to transcend the borders of a circumscribed definition of woman as the subject of study in early feminism. The concept of female experience in a male-dominant world was first introduced as a resistence to the immutable and stabilized representation of women whose concerns have been treated peripheral …show more content…
They argued that women considering their physical difference alone are innately closer to nature and mother earth. The unique biological events which are solely experienced by women like pregnancy, lactation, menstruation, etc enable the female psyche to transcend the abstract realm of male reason and the civilization which is based on it to a higher empathy with the world of matter. Irigaray ties etymologically the word matter with maternity and matrix and proposes that women are innately more attuned to identify themselves with nature and see their mere sustenance in maintenance and preservation of earth. They support the extermination of destructive weapons produced and sustained by an aggressive self-assertive male subject that views the material world around as an external object which needs to be gratuitously overcome. On the other hand a male subject is required to cut its ties with feminine parts of his essence to acquire the license for his initiation into a male constructed civilization with its male philosophical speculation and abstract