Essay Three Cultural Feminism and Care
Requirements
Each student will write a rougly three page essay.
This essay is due by 2 PM on Feb 20 either in my box in the Philosophy Office on
the 4th floor of Morrill Hall or via email attachment. If
via email must be in MS Word 2007 for Windows or below or WordPerfect
12 for Windows or below or pdf. I often cannot open Microsoft Works or other files.
You should send with a return receipt or ask me to reply to
make sure I have received the attachment.
1. Your essay should be word-processed, double-spaced,
one-inch to one and one-half inch margins. It should be spell-checked and grammar-checked.
Pages Numbered. Font no smaller than 12 point.
2. You should have a cover page with title, date,
prompt, class and section, and your name.
3. Number each paragraph.
Bold your thesis. After the end of the essay, attach an OUTLINE of the essay with
the thesis clearly stated and at minimum a line for each paragraph.
4. Each essay should be approximately two to three
pages long (not including the title page or Works Consulted page).
5. You must include a Works Consulted/Cited Page
and/or Complete Footnotes/Endnotes. You may use MLA, Turabian, Harvard, or
University of Chicago in-text, footnote, or endnote styles. APA
is OK, provided you add page numbers to it. CAREFUL
AND CORRECT CITATION IS REQUIRED. WHEN IN
DOUBT, CITE. Remember that simply paraphrasing or changing every third word is
not OK. Quote and cite or radically summarize and cite. Use quotation marks when quoting
or indent if quote is five lines or longer. Guessing at where your information comes from
is not OK. Use page numbers in your in-text citations, footnotes or endnotes. Book or
journal titles are italicized or underlined. You need not consult
any other sources than what we have read for class. Those sources and any other
sources you consult must be included in your Works Consulted/Cited and cited in-text or in
footnotes/endnotes.
6. Your essay should define
any key terms used, use examples to
illustrate and support your argument where appropriate, and discuss likely alternatives or respond to possible
objections.
Please consult the Essay
Grading/Proofreading Rubric for further details.
Choose One of the following prompts:
1. Pick a specific argument or issue in the assigned readings on Cultural Feminism and the Ethics of Care. Reconstruct the argument or issue in the first half of the essay and comment on it in the the second half. The comment may point out a strength or weakness, point to an important implication, show how one could develop the argument or issue further, etc.
2. Do you see the work of Gilligan or Held as an extension of cultural feminism (as described by Donovan)? Why or why not?
3. What is one way Gilman’s novel Herland (at least in the chapters we read) illustrates a tenet (or tenets) of the heuristic category of cultural feminism that Donovan frames. Are there elements don’t fit? Be sure to use specific examples from the novel in your essay.
4. Discuss one key similarity and one key difference
between Wollstonecraft and Gilman in the primary sources we read. How would you evaluate
the points? Use specific examples from the texts.
5.
Herland is a utopian novel. Utopias are often constructed to offer contrasts with
present circumstances and stereotypes as well as to envision an alternative future.
What contrasts did Gilman create? What alternative visions did it offer?
Be sure to give textual examples.
6. What do you see as the main contribution of Gilligan’s work as seen in the chapter we read? Why?
7. Develop one reason the discovery/creation of a distinctive woman’s moral voice might be a plus or minus. Be sure to explain why.
8. Pick one of the
criticisms of Gilligan Tong outlines. Explain
the criticism and why you think the criticism is or is not well-taken. Be sure to cite the pages in Tong where the
criticism is developed.
9. In the section of Held’s chapter, “Care as Practice and Value, Some Distinctions on pages 31 - 36 she reviews the definitions and conceptions of care in a number of thinkers. These involve such issues as whether care requires a certain attitude/intention or an emotional bond, whether care is a form of labor, what role relationships play in care, whether care is about meeting needs, what the care relationship requires, whether care is a virtue, the roles of the one who cares and the cared for, etc. Held also offers her critiques of various views. Which of the issues struck you as most important for a conception of an ethics of care? Why?
10. The conclusion of Held’s chapter is "Caring Relations" on pp. 42-43. This is a summary of her view. Outline the key points of her view and discuss one strength and one weakness.
11. **Wildcard.