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Silencing The Self: Women and Depression – How to Achieve Connection in Relationships Without Losing Who You Are
"This book is relevant to anyone grappling with the central challenge of how to achieve connections to others without losing oneself."--Deborah Tannen (author of You Just Don't Understand), New York Times Book Review
276 pages, Paperback
First published October 1, 1991
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Displaying 1 - 14 of 14 reviews
June 15, 2012
Feminist analysis of depression, applying the insights of Carol Gilligan's In A Different Voice and Mary Belenky et. al.'s Women's Ways of Knowing to revise the standard therapeutic assessment of depressed women as dependent and overly attached. The criticism of the model of the independent self is sound and the focus on women's relational ideas of the self and how breakdowns in those relations are expressed by depression are intriguing, but the book is fundamentally flawed in three major respects.
First, and most basic, Jack's sample is small and nonrepresenstative and she extrapolates from it in unacceptable ways. Although she has women both poor and middle-class women in her study, she does not address class in any way in her analysis. Every one of her subjects is white, which she does not address, and every one is straight, which she does address,poorly. Jack makes a woman's relationship to a single monogamous "partner" the core of her thesis of depression: she frames her entire analysis of depression in terms of a woman's relationship with her boyfriend/husband, sometimes with the inclusion of an analysis of behavior learned from parents. She does not examine other relational bonds at all; there is a brief mention of supportive female friendships in the final chapter, but nowhere does she examine the impact of depression's isolation and sense of self on friendships, sibling relationships, parental or filial relationships, working relationships, or functioning outside the home. She brushes past her few examples of women with relatively supportive spouses who still suffer depression, and she does not discuss lesbians or single women at all.
It's been a while, but I recall Belenky et. al. being criticized for similar limitations among their samples--that is, their subjects were all white, from a particular geographic location, and confined to a particular class (working to lower middle class). They appear to have written a book of essays in response to these criticisms, but I haven't found a copy yet. However, they were doing an intensive long-term study of a particular population, and I recall them as being much more cautious and limited in their interpretations and conclusions, which paradoxically made their interpretations much more convincing. Jack, by contrast, didn't form relationships with her sources or do a long-term study: she synthesized existing knowledge (good) and did several extensive interviews (not so good). The problem with relying on interviews for material is that Jack is terrible at listening to her sources, even though listening to women's silenced voices is her key metaphor: See the passage on pp.30-32, where Jack offers extensive quotes from three women which she says use the metaphor of the silenced voice themselves. Except they don't mention voice or silence at all.
Second, Jack fails to acknowledge any organic component to any depression. Even if you lean towards depresson as a learned response, it's pretty clear that behavior affects thought and thought affects behavior; we have some pretty good evidence that patterns of thought are literally patterns made in the brain, through familiar and easier chemical synaptic paths. Whether or not depression starts in the brain or the behavior, it clearly alters the brain, and any thorough analysis of depression should acknowledge that, whether or not the writer believes most depression to be biological in origin.
This failure, I believe, contributes to some of the problematic or flawed reasoning in Jack's analyses of depression. She describes common traits among depressed women such as the tendency to condemn oneself for behavior and emotion in strict and moral terms and the common feelings of distance and inability to communicate in intimate relationships, but classifies these attitudes as the causes of depression, rather than as a more complex combination of cause-and-symptom. For example, the feeling of distance, the need to rely on oneself and the feeling of excessive vulnerability and overreliance on others, appear even in relationships which Jack admits appear to be healthy, with partners who are supportive and sympathetic, but Jack continues to speak of depression as a unambiguous response to the partner's socially-conditioned failure to listen to the depressed woman.
This culminates in an awful chapter called "The Movement out of Depression," which isn't based on anything said or experienced by the women interviewed: it's woo-woo theoretical stuff that's based on Jack's hopeful reinterpretations of fairy tales with depression as a natural stage in a woman's life rather than a biological or psychological breakdown of thought and behavior. However much Jack wants to see depression as the equivalent of a forest journey, the women she interviews do not speak of it as a worthwhile experience which taught them valuable lessons: they speak of it as crippling, painful, and difficult, even when past.
Third, and strangely for a feminist writer and one who is sometimes directly examining physically abusive relationships, when Jack speaks of the threats to the self caused by the failure of relational bonds, she speaks of withdrawal and emotional loss. The biggest threat she mentions is the end of the relationship. She doesn't discuss any of the material physical or financial consequences that relational failure can have for women: physical abuse, death, lowered economic status for women and their children. Jack discusses how society and family history influence how women relate to others, how they suppress their desires and develop their resentment, how their means of behavior are socially mandated and enforced -- but she doesn't discuss the social impact of the expression of women's desires, beyond the ostracism suffered by one woman who had an affair and divorced her husband in a small, rural, conservative, Christian county.
Although Jack's critique is based on the feminist analysis of social pressures on women, the only pressures she examines are those that are focused on the family and romantic relationships. She briefly alludes to professional expectations of women, but does not examine them in any great depth, and does not explore the interactions of women's depression with their jobs, careers, or professional aspirations.
What's worthwhile here: The reframing of women's depression as a breakdown in the formation of healthy relational bonds, rather than as an overreliance on others in someone supposed to be independent; the examination of moral language in women's depression. But you have to comb through an awful lot of muck to get to it.
First, and most basic, Jack's sample is small and nonrepresenstative and she extrapolates from it in unacceptable ways. Although she has women both poor and middle-class women in her study, she does not address class in any way in her analysis. Every one of her subjects is white, which she does not address, and every one is straight, which she does address,poorly. Jack makes a woman's relationship to a single monogamous "partner" the core of her thesis of depression: she frames her entire analysis of depression in terms of a woman's relationship with her boyfriend/husband, sometimes with the inclusion of an analysis of behavior learned from parents. She does not examine other relational bonds at all; there is a brief mention of supportive female friendships in the final chapter, but nowhere does she examine the impact of depression's isolation and sense of self on friendships, sibling relationships, parental or filial relationships, working relationships, or functioning outside the home. She brushes past her few examples of women with relatively supportive spouses who still suffer depression, and she does not discuss lesbians or single women at all.
It's been a while, but I recall Belenky et. al. being criticized for similar limitations among their samples--that is, their subjects were all white, from a particular geographic location, and confined to a particular class (working to lower middle class). They appear to have written a book of essays in response to these criticisms, but I haven't found a copy yet. However, they were doing an intensive long-term study of a particular population, and I recall them as being much more cautious and limited in their interpretations and conclusions, which paradoxically made their interpretations much more convincing. Jack, by contrast, didn't form relationships with her sources or do a long-term study: she synthesized existing knowledge (good) and did several extensive interviews (not so good). The problem with relying on interviews for material is that Jack is terrible at listening to her sources, even though listening to women's silenced voices is her key metaphor: See the passage on pp.30-32, where Jack offers extensive quotes from three women which she says use the metaphor of the silenced voice themselves. Except they don't mention voice or silence at all.
Second, Jack fails to acknowledge any organic component to any depression. Even if you lean towards depresson as a learned response, it's pretty clear that behavior affects thought and thought affects behavior; we have some pretty good evidence that patterns of thought are literally patterns made in the brain, through familiar and easier chemical synaptic paths. Whether or not depression starts in the brain or the behavior, it clearly alters the brain, and any thorough analysis of depression should acknowledge that, whether or not the writer believes most depression to be biological in origin.
This failure, I believe, contributes to some of the problematic or flawed reasoning in Jack's analyses of depression. She describes common traits among depressed women such as the tendency to condemn oneself for behavior and emotion in strict and moral terms and the common feelings of distance and inability to communicate in intimate relationships, but classifies these attitudes as the causes of depression, rather than as a more complex combination of cause-and-symptom. For example, the feeling of distance, the need to rely on oneself and the feeling of excessive vulnerability and overreliance on others, appear even in relationships which Jack admits appear to be healthy, with partners who are supportive and sympathetic, but Jack continues to speak of depression as a unambiguous response to the partner's socially-conditioned failure to listen to the depressed woman.
This culminates in an awful chapter called "The Movement out of Depression," which isn't based on anything said or experienced by the women interviewed: it's woo-woo theoretical stuff that's based on Jack's hopeful reinterpretations of fairy tales with depression as a natural stage in a woman's life rather than a biological or psychological breakdown of thought and behavior. However much Jack wants to see depression as the equivalent of a forest journey, the women she interviews do not speak of it as a worthwhile experience which taught them valuable lessons: they speak of it as crippling, painful, and difficult, even when past.
Third, and strangely for a feminist writer and one who is sometimes directly examining physically abusive relationships, when Jack speaks of the threats to the self caused by the failure of relational bonds, she speaks of withdrawal and emotional loss. The biggest threat she mentions is the end of the relationship. She doesn't discuss any of the material physical or financial consequences that relational failure can have for women: physical abuse, death, lowered economic status for women and their children. Jack discusses how society and family history influence how women relate to others, how they suppress their desires and develop their resentment, how their means of behavior are socially mandated and enforced -- but she doesn't discuss the social impact of the expression of women's desires, beyond the ostracism suffered by one woman who had an affair and divorced her husband in a small, rural, conservative, Christian county.
Although Jack's critique is based on the feminist analysis of social pressures on women, the only pressures she examines are those that are focused on the family and romantic relationships. She briefly alludes to professional expectations of women, but does not examine them in any great depth, and does not explore the interactions of women's depression with their jobs, careers, or professional aspirations.
What's worthwhile here: The reframing of women's depression as a breakdown in the formation of healthy relational bonds, rather than as an overreliance on others in someone supposed to be independent; the examination of moral language in women's depression. But you have to comb through an awful lot of muck to get to it.
November 6, 2012
This is an excellent book on the topic of female depression, where that depression is rooted in a inequitable, unhappy, and/or dysfunctional heterosexual relationship. (The author's studies were solely based on heterosexual couples).
When a women is in a relationship where the balance of power (economic, social, emotional, intellectual) is skewed in favour of the male, that women must make a choice of subordination (submitting to that control) or isolation (speaking up/exerting herself at the risk of losing the relationship). A lose/lose situation. As a result, the woman conforms to outer demands, values, expectations at the cost of her true self. She silences herself out of fear of loss of the relationship, retaliation by the male, or social, self, and family rejection and judgement. Women exhaust themselves, "trying so hard" to make the wrong relationship work. Anger, resentment, and contempt for herself and her partner grows, and depression takes root. In the final chapter of this book, Jack discusses what can be done (although a bit too briefly).
When a women is in a relationship where the balance of power (economic, social, emotional, intellectual) is skewed in favour of the male, that women must make a choice of subordination (submitting to that control) or isolation (speaking up/exerting herself at the risk of losing the relationship). A lose/lose situation. As a result, the woman conforms to outer demands, values, expectations at the cost of her true self. She silences herself out of fear of loss of the relationship, retaliation by the male, or social, self, and family rejection and judgement. Women exhaust themselves, "trying so hard" to make the wrong relationship work. Anger, resentment, and contempt for herself and her partner grows, and depression takes root. In the final chapter of this book, Jack discusses what can be done (although a bit too briefly).
July 18, 2016
I really enjoyed this book for what it was. I felt it defined many common forms and causes of depression in women. Most of the book was written like "Women who have depression say this or that. *insert examples of real women*"
It went into issues many women don't discuss often such as loss of creativity or and how women are taught by society to connect to each other and to men with a sense of "oneness". That we're valued more when everybody agrees with us or that we're valued more if we're quiet and agreeable. How culture plays into the idea of the Ideal Woman and how that can be toxic for real women.
It's a very important and very interesting topic to me.
It went into issues many women don't discuss often such as loss of creativity or and how women are taught by society to connect to each other and to men with a sense of "oneness". That we're valued more when everybody agrees with us or that we're valued more if we're quiet and agreeable. How culture plays into the idea of the Ideal Woman and how that can be toxic for real women.
It's a very important and very interesting topic to me.
February 24, 2017
اگر سکوت نشانه دوری جویی از صداهای قاهره و جبارانه دیگران و چشمان زل زده باشد و زن توجه به "من" خویش کند این سکوت نشانگر پویایی و بالندگی زن است.
May 24, 2017
This book was great! Firstly, it is not altogether too long and packed with information, so it is a great starting point in the self-silencing realm of thought. What I loved were the examples from actual depressed women and their words. They are so relatable to women and so real, so much so that a lot of us can say "wow, I have felt that..." She touches upon feminist theory and that really paved the way for my master's research focus. The book is a great read and really gets you thinking about some prevalent issues in our society.
November 4, 2018
Excellent. Cathartic. Helped to connect and make sense of a lifetime of behaviors, attitudes, and emotions.
January 28, 2014
As an avid student of gender theory (both traditionally academic and self-guided) for the better part of a decade, it really takes something completely new or out-of-the-box, so to speak, to really dazzle me at this point. (I just re-read that and laughed at how snobby I sound, but seriously I’ve just read A LOT of feminist theory in every arena imaginable – what used to really challenge my thinking about anything and everything is now mostly just regular thought process. Come at me with something mind blowing. Please. I need it.) Babbling aside, I think this is why I just felt so-so about this dive into potential contributions to female depression.
Like some of the other reviews I have read, I do agree that the sample population lacked in size and diversity. The theme of “silencing the self” sort of seemed like a no-brainer to me as a contributing factor to depression, but perhaps I do need to take the publication date into consideration and realize this may not have been as commonly discussed in the early 90s (hell I was 3, how would I really know.) Even so, the cases cited seemed to have very similar relationship patterns (which I suppose was the point, huh?) that pointed to somewhat obvious conclusions with my very limited formal psychological training (albeit many hours spent on psychology on a purely recreational basis). Again, I just didn’t find anything that truly challenged my thinking but that doesn’t really surprise me. For someone new to gender theory it might very well be an eye opening analysis – can’t quite say.
With all my negative bull aside, I did find myself making little notes on almost every page, making connections to personal or outwardly observed relationships. I’ll admit, at first I made a snap judgement thinking – I can’t personally relate my own romantic relationship to the specific type of partner/self/societal induced concession of female relational “power” (if I am silencing anyone, it isn’t myself, which is a problem for a whole different day) so this is clearly outdated. But of course, its not. At all. Extremely evident when I think of comments I’ve gotten on how “women should talk to their husbands” (or not talk at all) on occasions when outside parties have heard me speaking my peace on a regular basis (some younger than you’d think.) So perhaps this book is a necessary reminder – just because you, your partner, the people you choose to associate yourself with share similar views – the whole world is not out having some progressive little tea party.
One important point made by the author that I do think really, really, really, needs to be broadcast to today’s world: having a need for strong, meaningful emotional connections IS NOT A WEAKNESS. To the countless girls I see on twitter everyday: YOU ARE NOT NEEDY. Needing emotional connection is completely healthy for everyone, male/female, EVERYONE. This normal human desire is traditionally deemed as “female” (honestly, because we condition our young boys to be ‘strong, independent men’) and consequently seen as a weakness but that is, of course, complete bull. Don’t propagate this view. Stop putting that damn #needy on the end of your tweets … ELIZABETH (insert smirking emoji.)
Like some of the other reviews I have read, I do agree that the sample population lacked in size and diversity. The theme of “silencing the self” sort of seemed like a no-brainer to me as a contributing factor to depression, but perhaps I do need to take the publication date into consideration and realize this may not have been as commonly discussed in the early 90s (hell I was 3, how would I really know.) Even so, the cases cited seemed to have very similar relationship patterns (which I suppose was the point, huh?) that pointed to somewhat obvious conclusions with my very limited formal psychological training (albeit many hours spent on psychology on a purely recreational basis). Again, I just didn’t find anything that truly challenged my thinking but that doesn’t really surprise me. For someone new to gender theory it might very well be an eye opening analysis – can’t quite say.
With all my negative bull aside, I did find myself making little notes on almost every page, making connections to personal or outwardly observed relationships. I’ll admit, at first I made a snap judgement thinking – I can’t personally relate my own romantic relationship to the specific type of partner/self/societal induced concession of female relational “power” (if I am silencing anyone, it isn’t myself, which is a problem for a whole different day) so this is clearly outdated. But of course, its not. At all. Extremely evident when I think of comments I’ve gotten on how “women should talk to their husbands” (or not talk at all) on occasions when outside parties have heard me speaking my peace on a regular basis (some younger than you’d think.) So perhaps this book is a necessary reminder – just because you, your partner, the people you choose to associate yourself with share similar views – the whole world is not out having some progressive little tea party.
One important point made by the author that I do think really, really, really, needs to be broadcast to today’s world: having a need for strong, meaningful emotional connections IS NOT A WEAKNESS. To the countless girls I see on twitter everyday: YOU ARE NOT NEEDY. Needing emotional connection is completely healthy for everyone, male/female, EVERYONE. This normal human desire is traditionally deemed as “female” (honestly, because we condition our young boys to be ‘strong, independent men’) and consequently seen as a weakness but that is, of course, complete bull. Don’t propagate this view. Stop putting that damn #needy on the end of your tweets … ELIZABETH (insert smirking emoji.)
August 28, 2008
This book gets only 2 stars for being difficult to read (as are most self-help books). But it is a very, very good book to read for women who struggle with depression. It specifically covers the problems women face in marriage. I didn't relate to everything in it, but I related to alot to alot of it and it was very insightful into the world of the struggling woman.
January 17, 2010
Good crit theory on how males analyze from the individualistic paradigm. Female mode of relating not as individualistic but as relational critical to understanding female depressions. May be a very different animal than the male. Insightful and at times too concerned about academic pathways but establishing credibility is sometimes the name of the game.
May 21, 2012
This book is from 1991 so some of the insights have become more a part of culture. A bit dry. Subjects were heterosexual women... Clearly some LGBT people may find themselves in the same conundrum of whether to hide their authentic self in order to meet competing needs (parental approval, cultural acceptance), leading to similar damage to self-esteem.
June 12, 2013
Insightful look at women's depression, a subject not much discussed elsewhere. Great information on various concepts of self-silencing and gendered communication strategies. However, the sample of the study is exclusively from a white rural demographic, limiting the applicability of the results and analysis.
May 2, 2009
Dana Jack teaches at Fairhaven College at WWU. I think this is a fantastic book. It's really about the cost of getting along, I guess. There's a generational difference here, but not as much as you'd think.
March 18, 2016
Definitely worth a read if you know a woman that has a sadness in her, wether it be a friend, family, or yourself. Not all of it is for everyone, but I think each person who reads this book would take away with them a helpful nugget or four.
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