Joining the Resistance

by Carol Gilligan

In Joining the Resistance, Carol Gilligan reflects on the evolution of her thinking and shows how her key ideas were interwoven with her own life experiences. Her work began with the question of voice: who is speaking to whom, in what body, telling what stories about which relationships? By listening carefully, she heard a voice that had been held in silence, and in the process realized the extent to which we--both women and men--had been telling false stories about ourselves.

In her subsequent work, Gilligan found that adolescent girls resisted pressures to disengage themselves from their honest voices, and by joining their resistance, she opened the way for the development of a more humane way of thinking about personal and political relationships. The central conviction of her work today--and the central thesis of this book--is that the requisites for love and the requisites for citizenship in a democratic society are one and the same. Both voice and the desire to live in relationships are inherent to our human nature, together with the capacity to resist false authority. Combining autobiographical reflection with an analysis of key questions about gender and human development, Joining the Resistance is a timely and highly readable book by one of America’s greatest contemporary thinkers.

Genres: Psychology, Feminism, Nonfiction, Gender Studies, Education, Parenting, Counselling

140 pages, Hardcover

First published May 31, 2011

About the author

Carol Gilligan is an American feminist, ethicist, and psychologist best known for her work on ethical community and ethical relationships.

Reviews

[Kasia · Rating 3 out of 5]

Mam wątpliwości, ale wytykanie mizoginii Freuda zawsze na plus

[Lobo · Rating 4 out of 5]

Upominając się o demokratyczne wartości i normy – prawo do głosu

W celnej interpretacji „Małej syrenki” zauważa się, że morska wiedźma Urszula nie tylko nie oszukała głównej bohaterki, ale też chciała jej przekazać cenną lekcję – w świecie ludzkim można mieć albo głos, albo cipkę. W tym sensie, być kobietą znaczy milczeć. Milczeć o sobie, czyli o kobiecości. I potakiwać, co można robić bezgłośnie – potakiwać męskim wyobrażeniom o nich samych i o kobiecości.

Gilligan napisała pracę o utraconym kobiecym głosie. Nie jest to nic nowego, już od pewnego czasu wiemy, że posługujemy się z gruntu wrogim kobietom porządkiem symbolicznym i językiem, który do mówienia o kobiecości nie jest przystosowany nawet na poziomie słownictwa. Wystarczy wspomnieć, ile lat zajęło mi oswojenie słowa „cipka” i polubienie go, bez względu na to, że same cipki lubiłam już dużo wcześniej, zwykle bez słów, bo nie mogłam znaleźć właściwej nazwy dla podmiotu mojej adoracji.

Gilligan jednak pisze przede wszystkim o dwóch kwestiach – psychicznych kosztach uciszania kobiet, jakimi są dysocjacja, rozszczepienie świadomości, wprowadzenie autocenzury i zaprzeczeniu własnemu doświadczeniu, w konsekwencji – podziałów pomiędzy kobietami, bo podchodzimy do innych kobiet z taką samą nieufnością jak do samych siebie. Drugą kwestią jest próba odnalezienia utraconego kobiecego głosu i wysłuchanie go. Gilligan odkrywa, że tym, co decyduje o inności kobiecej wypowiedzi jest nie płeć kulturowa, ale temat – zaprzeczenie patriarchalnym dualizmom emocji i rozumu, jednostkowości i wspólnotowości, zniesienie podziałów i hierarchii. W tym sensie inny głos, to, co Gilligan nazywa etyką troski, stanowi podstawę demokratycznego społeczeństwa, model koegzystencji różnogłosowości. Uciszanie kobiet osłabia żywotność demokratycznego społeczeństwa.

W kontekście punktu, w którym znajduje się polski feminizm czy też społeczna świadomość feministyczna, książka Gillian będzie radykalna. Z punktu widzenia zdrowego rozsądku będzie pełna truizmów. Badaczka postuluje bowiem rozszerzenie podmiotu ruchu feministycznego na całą ludzkość, definiując feminizm jako ruch dążący do wyzwolenia ludzi poprzez oczyszczenie demokracji z feminizmu; uznania mizoginii za zbrodnię nienawiści; odejście od modelu rodziny nuklearnej, widząc w niej narzędzie służące ograniczeniu społecznych wolności i możliwości kobiet, przy czym zwraca uwagę na sztuczność i jawną polityczność (ideologiczne obciążenie) modelu rodziny nuklearnej; uwolnienie psychoanalizy z jej patriarchalnego zakorzeniania i wykorzystanie jej wywrotowego potencjału oddania głosu kobietom; nawiązywania międzypokoleniowych relacji między kobietami celem oszczędzenia młodszemu pokoleniu strat psychicznych, które my już poniosłyśmy; praktycznego zastosowania etyki troski na poziomie instytucji edukacyjnych poprzez wzmacnianie empatii jako podstawowej wartości demokratycznej.

[Karyn · Rating 4 out of 5]

Excellent book by Carol Gilligan- While I've read excerpts from her most famous work "In a Different Voice," I never had the chance to read the entire thing. I was in the process of getting that, when I saw this newer version. She gives a brief summary of the landmark book, but then takes it further. She writes about how adults, despite their good intentions, teach adolescent/pre-adolescent girls not to speak their minds. I love how she weaves examples from her own interviews, with classic stories to make her points. Really makes me think about how I interact with my students and hopefully how I will one day interact with my own children. By releasing these girls, and hopefully ourselves, from the obedient or "perfect" girl goals, we have the opportunity to create a more compassionate society.

[Gizem Kendik Önduygu · Rating 4 out of 5]

Uzuuun süredir bakım etiği kitaplarını bekletiyorum. Sonunda bu tavşan deliğine dalabildim.
Carol Gilligan ile başladım. İlki “In a Different Voice”. Kabaca Gilligan, erkek merkezli ahlak ve gelişim anlayışını sorguluyor. Kurallar ve adalete odaklanan etik anlayışının ötesinde ilişkiler ve sorumluluklar etrafında da şekillenen bir etik anlayışı ortaya koyuyor.

Joining the Resistance kitabında ise 30 yıl sonra geriye dönüp In a Different Voice’da yazdıklarına bakıyor. Bu defa Gilligan’a göre direnişin kendisi de bir bakım eylemi: hem kendine hem başkalarına yöneltilmiş bir ihtimam biçimi. Joining the Resistance’da hem bakım etiğine gelen cinsiyet özcülüğü, kadın-erkek, adalet-bakım gibi ikilikler içinde düşünmesi gibi eleştirilerine karşılık veriyor hem de bu kitapta etikten politikaya geçiş yaparak hem bireysel hem de kolektif bir direniş çağrısı yapıyor.

[Monica · Rating 4 out of 5]

Interesting to read Gilligan after so many years-I especially appreciate the ways in which she grounds her theoretical argument historically- I am fascinated with the ways in which we continue to address gender issues.

[Ryan Mishap · Rating 4 out of 5]

I thought this was a memoir of her life--and you get a bit of that--but it is mostly a review of her published work, research with adolescent girls and boys, and a summary of her life long work with the latest information in psychology.

Gilligan is perhaps remembered as the foremost proponent of essentialism in feminism--that gender comes with inherent traits and women's nurturing and peaceful, cooperative nature is better suited to a free world.

She begins this book by arguing that this is not what she was saying. Her work led her to discover a "different voice" in girls that was part of the resistance to patriarchy before they matured and dissociated in order to live under patriarchy. Gilligan proposes that the traits inculcated into women are human traits that benefit democracy and patriarchy will not be defeated until we recoginze and act on this.

[Susan · Rating 4 out of 5]

Since it has been some time since I read her previous works, it was interesting to see how the author has woven together the threads of her research and analysis. The references to her longitudinal research with girls and adolescent females are quite fascinating. The author quotes the final quatrain of King Lear to encapsulate her theme of resistance:
“Speak what we feel, not what we ought to say.”
She defines feminism as a liberation movement to free democracy from patriarchy and the book seeks to join this non-gendered feminism with an “ethic of care.”

[Clivemichael · Rating 5 out of 5]

Well written insightful explanation of a current dilemma, transition is possible.

[Lynette Monteiro · Rating 5 out of 5]

Gilligan's work has inspired and informed my understanding of relational,psychology since the publication of In a Different Voice. It saddened me to watch her work diminished and disregarded and yet that very eliding of her power stood as evidence of what she tries to point out about our views and how we come to betray ourselves by "adultery of the brain" - an astounding term by Virginia Woolf for the way we silence ourselves. The call to action in Joining the Resistance is the call for a greater ethic, an ethic of care that has the potential to liberate us from the stranglehold of our unseen yet absorbed cultural assumptions and expectations of what it means to be a good person.

[Caroline · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book uses the author's extensive knowledge and understanding of literature and psychology to reveal how women lose their voice and can be enabled to regain it. Her interviews with teen girls provide some very interesting insights.

[Gladys · Rating 4 out of 5]

Carol Gilligan is the mother of feminist psychology and was an inspiration during my dissertation! Meeting her in 2014 and reading this text which is about everyone finding and expressing their voice was mind blowing!

[Nance · Rating 4 out of 5]

Food for thought, as all her books are.