Feminism through the lens of Existentialism

Abstract

Feminist history in different centuries have confirmed the fact that women under the patriarchal social system have faced existential crisis. I wish to study and analyse the ways through which mental make- up of women has been influenced and determined by different factors. Their lives are saturated with bad faith. I aim to explain the concept of bad faith as envisaged by Jean- Paul- Sartre in the context of feminist thinking. Society dictates that a girl ought to develop a particular perception and outlook of herself. The counter perception and opposite way of thinking are to be forsaken. She has to surrender some of her interests and ambitions for the sake of the family at large. The individual and social lives of women are perpetrated by a sense of pretension. The one who is rebellious has to struggle hard to fulfil her goals in life. She is destined to live in bad faith in a patriarchal society. However, the existentialists contend that human being is free and he strives continuously to transcend his state (normally an unhappy one) to reach a better end in view. The history of feminist revolutionaries has revealed in different times how they have tried to identify the feminist issues, grievances and sorrows and seek out their solutions. They are the harbingers of an ideal society based on liberty, equality and justice that is free from sexist bias and irrational discrimination. They look forward towards the emancipation of women who will transcend their facticity and claim their lost rights.