Description
In 1986, Chandra Talpade Mohanty sent shockwaves through the academic feminist community with the publication of her "Under Western Eyes: Feminist Scholarship and Colonial Discourse." In this influential essay, she draws attention to the negative effects of the discursive practices of some feminist writers in the West on the material realities of women and men living in the so-called "Third World." Almost 30 years later, I am interested to see how well mainstream Western feminist communities have heeded the calls of Mohanty and other post-colonial and transnational feminists. As a Western feminist myself, it is my aim to rise to Mohanty's challenge and practice the principles of self-reflexivity and transnational solidarity. This thesis explores the ways in which a mainstream U.S.-based feminism discusses the "Arab Spring," a term which has come to refer to the wave of democratic uprisings sweeping the Middle East/North Africa region (MENA) since December of 2010. However, in addition to identifying a general mainstream U.S. feminist discourse regarding the "Arab Spring," I also explore the ways in which the three publications differ in their framings of the uprisings. My research goals and methodology draw from transnational, Third World, women of color, and Arab/-American, Middle Eastern, and/or Islamic feminisms that make suspect Western knowledge production as it is applied to "Othered" women.
