playing at woman

PHIL 3125

Dec 13, 2004

How does one engage in transcendence while being a woman? The two concepts imply a contradiction. Being a woman is playing a role in bad faith, but the role of woman is so ingrained into society that it is easy to see it as something inherent and integral in human existence. In this essay, I will discuss what Simone de Beauvoir means by woman and how it conflicts with the idea of human being. To do this, it is necessary to discuss such terms as situation, transcendence and immanence and the Other.

To understand the fundamental problems with the role of woman, we must understand what it means to be a human being. We can see that herein lays a serious contradiction. Being human involves transcendence; human being projects itself towards the future by setting goals and then progressing towards those goals through free action. Being human also means creating meaning and values for existence that reflect authentic choices of individuals. All these things are impossible for woman. She finds herself in a world already denoted meaning. She finds that her life already has a value that she had no part in choosing. The goals have already been imposed upon her – marriage, children, housework and immanence – and her actions are rarely free. She is bound by her parents in a home ruled by her father and then passed from father to husband. Later she is bound to her home and her children, cut off from the society around her.

Both transcendence and immanence are necessary for human existence. In immanence we maintain and nurture our lives; we perpetuate our existence, but a life of immanence is only a vegetative existence. In order to fulfil ourselves as human beings, we must participate in transcendence to justify our existence through progress. The role of man is compatible for these qualifications of human being. He is encouraged to take jobs that allow him to interact with others, plan and create projects and practise his liberty. Woman’s situation on the other hand, is in opposition to her being a human subject (SS, 336). Her solitary jobs are the same every day, her entire life. Anything she creates – a meal for her family – is soon destroyed, and although she may sometimes confuse certain household duties for transcendent work, it is only because she lacks knowledge of what true transcendence entails. Cut off from society outside, left to perpetuate her situation inside her house, woman becomes frustrated, disappointed and unfulfilled as a human being.

What is a woman? The definition of woman springs forth from man. Woman finds herself thrown into a world that has masculine meanings and values. She finds that these masculine values are attached to her being and affect the way that others treat her. She is termed the Other because she is only defined as being not-male. Man is seen as the neutral or general while woman is set up in a relation to men (SS, xxii). Boys are raised as subjects. The young boy’s ambitions for power and independence are nurtured by his parents and the values that society holds. As the young girl grows, she must deny this subjectivity that she sees being cultivated in the males around her – her brothers and schoolmates. She sees her mother in the role as woman, being confined to her housework and immediate social sphere while her father ventures out into the world that will never be known to her. She is trained in the direction of object – as the Other – and is coaxed into denouncing her autonomy (SS, 328).

While man goes through adolescence in a direction towards a free future, the woman begins her wait for a man. Man knows that a woman is to be a part of this future towards which he directs himself, but he knows that she will not be an essential part of it. He will take a woman, while the woman waits to be taken (SS, 328). Woman waits for man because he is her future, not just a part of it; he is essential in her definition. Not only is she dependent on man to fulfil her role as dutiful wife and mother, but she can only attain transcendence through her husband and his projects. A girl waits for a man to finish or complete her; to justify her role as woman.

The division between male and female development can be seen at an early age. During adolescence, the male is urged to explore and to develop his power and independence while the female begins her training in passivity. Through his development, the male is taught to question the world and therefore he grows up with an awareness of his impact, his ability to change the world. The female is taught to submit to the world that is defined for her by men (SS, 331). Furthermore, the male is always granted freedom, while “the girl is required to stay at home, her comings and goings are watched: she is in no way encouraged to take charge of her own amusements and pleasures” (SS, 334). Thus we can see that the way in which a girl is raised already pushes her towards a fixed role of woman. Her situation is impeded in a way that the man’s situation is not.

This role is so deeply imbedded in the female mind that it seems nearly impossible to choose a path other than woman. Woman, despite the fact that she is a free subject, finds herself being compelled towards this role as the Other and a situation in which she finds herself an inessential (SS, xxxv). Woman is something that one grows into, either by choice or by force but Beauvoir emphasizes the strength of the temptation that compels girls to choose woman. “Marriage, in a word, is a more advantageous career than many others” (SS, 431). Occupations open to women involve immanent work and pay much less than jobs open to men. A woman not only marries to secure her economic future, but marriage is essential for her integration into society (SS, 426). While it remains that she has other choices, society exists for woman in a way that sets marriage up as the best option. It is a severe disappointment when the woman realizes marriage doesn’t exist in the form of her fairy tales; instead it is revealed to her on her wedding night, the truth of the transaction. She is married to man – the generality of man - not a man. While she has been told that she will be fulfilled as a wife, she soon finds that transcendence can only be achieved through the intermediary of her husband, a poor substitute for a free existence.

Motherhood, it has been promised, is the true fulfilment of the role of woman. While male has always been justified in his role, a woman must enter into motherhood before she has truly fulfilled her existence. Finding her husband inept to facilitate her transcendence, the woman turns to children as an intermediary. By controlling every aspect of her children’s situation, she can progress the world in some way. But “like the transitions of puberty, sexual initiation, and marriage, that of maternity gives rise to a feeling of morose disappointment in subjects who hope that an outward event can renovate and justify their lives” (SS, 509). Instead of finding a companion, the woman finds herself with a wholly separate existent; an infant with which she incapable of communicating or controlling. She feels separated from what was once part of her own flesh, now a being with its own existence, freedom and rights.

Both the married woman and the mother create and maintain in immanence, the situation of their husband and children while the men and children struggle and revolt against her in order to transcend her imposed situation. A woman must get married to have children and a woman must have children to justify her life. The unwed mother is far from being accepted in society but maybe even less so, the old maid. Generalities of these kinds are used as scare tactics throughout the young girl’s childhood, so that when the young girl reaches a certain age, she is desperate to marry herself off to the first man that comes her way. These misconceptions stand right in the way of transcendence for young girls who are on their way to becoming women.

It can be argued that man is just as determined by society to fall into his gender role, but his role is very different from that of a woman’s. His role does not involve a contradiction with human being. From childhood he is encouraged to develop power and ingenuity. He is allowed to create, destroy, and socialize – in other words, his situation is far richer than is woman’s (SS, 53). The concept of transcendence is implied when speaking of male. Woman is kept in immanence. Her work is repetitive, and of a negative connotation. Her situation is far narrower than man’s, her scope of judgement is small and her ignorance is fostered by those around her (SS, 53). Woman is made a slave – as the Other – and she must play the role of Woman successfully in order to be accepted by society.

One can attempt at playing a woman – through femininity – but often, woman is something impossible to attain. This is because the role of woman often involves playing at two simultaneous and contradictory roles. For the married woman, she must agree and uphold her husband’s morality in the social realm, but in the bedroom, she must go along with his transgressions; “she will be an admirable mother – but she will carefully practise birth control and will have an abortion if necessary (SS, 614). She must remain sexually attractive for her husband, while she worries herself with laundry, dusting, cooking and rearing children. She must appear attractive to men; if the attempt is obvious, she will be ridiculed for her bad taste. If she refuses to play this game, she will be seen as a lesbian or masculine (SS, 531). In other words, the demands that are involved with being a woman are such that will never be satisfied. Simply by understanding that you can fail at being a woman, we recognize woman as a role and not as something inherent or essential. Taking on the role of woman will never attain a transcendent existence. This is simply because the woman’s role is one of immanence and in complete discord with what it is to be a free human being.

Woman’s situation is one of forced contingency. Coaxed and coerced into a repetitive life of immanence, the woman struggles against her chains to find justification in her life, a life that is a poor reflection of the free lives of her male counterparts. The woman needs to feel necessary. She depends on her husband and her children to fill that need and to open her doors to freedom and transcendence. Whereas they are essential to her, she is general and replaceable to them (SS, 527). This situation is in direct contrast with what it means to be a human being. The woman’s situation confines her to a colourless, flat, perpetual existence where her childhood dreams and goals end in staggering disappointment. The woman finds herself sacrificing her individuality, beliefs and self-expression, to become like someone else – like a man (SS, 653) – so she can experience for a fleeting moment, the freedom that they so readily take for granted.

Beauvoir, Simone de. The Second Sex. (trans. & ed.) H.M. Parshley. New York:
Vintage Books, 1989. Cited as SS.