Conference turris::womannotes-v1

 	What does it mean to be "women centered" and/or "women
    	identified"....
    
    	My perception of those terms is that they are meant to convey
    	a better sense of pride and community among women (very much
    	like the emergence of Black Pride with the accompanying
    	attention payed to Black History and the significant contribu-
    	tions made by Black Leaders, Black Scientists, etc.)
    
    	I've seen various people in this file speak of the need for
    	disenfranchised minorities (including women) to have time and
    	space to empower themselves by centering on positive attributes
    	or achievements by persons of that particular group (not as
    	a way to lessen the esteem of other groups, but as a way to
    	help "reclaim power" for the disenfranchised group.)  I see
    	this as a very positive thing (and not as something that should
    	be threatening to any other group.)
    
    	What I've noticed, however, is that a "woman centered" attitude
    	is treated as if the primary intention is to bring down and/or
    	discredit men (and I personally feel that this is a serious
    	misunderstanding that needs to be cleared up.)
    
    	Just as there were whites who marched with black friends on
    	Martin Luther King day to honor the man and the dream he had
    	for black people, I think we also have men who help women to
    	celebrate the advances that women have made in our culture
    	(without feeling slighted that, for that moment, attention
    	is being focused on the positive aspects of WOMEN with the
    	goal of helping women to reach a level of treatment that is
    	more equitable in our culture.)
    
    	What do the terms "woman-centered" and "woman-identified"
    	mean to others here?
    
    							Thank you.

    My perception of woman centered/woman identified is a woman who
    identifies primarily or exclusively with women and centers her life
    around them. 
    
    Many such women are lesbians, but this is not necessarily so.  We all
    know of women who are in traditional marriages, but their life centers
    around their women friends.  These women are women centered as well.  I
    think it is a matter of degree.  A seperatist of any sexual orientation
    is woman centered.  Any woman who has approximately equal numbers of
    women and men friends is not woman centered.
    
    Elizabeth

    	It seems to me that many of us go through periods of our
    	lives where we *are* woman-centered (alternating with periods
    	where we are not.)
    
    	As a child, I'd have to say that I was not woman-centered.
    	I was much closer to my Father (have been closer to him all
    	my life and he to me, although I also get along fairly well
    	with my Mother, now, too...)
    
    	As a teenager, I was maximum_boy_crazy (as were all my close
    	female friends), but as much as we thought about boys for much
    	of our waking lives, we were definitely woman-centered socially.
    	We were (as they say) "joined at the hip" to our female friends
    	(and wouldn't dream of letting a single day of our lives go
    	by without significant amounts of time being spent in interchanges
    	with each other.)
    
    	In Junior High, I spent as much time on long "notes" to my friends
    	as I did on homework at night.  We kept several notebooks of
    	ongoing written conversations that we passed around among eight
    	or nine female friends.  (The parallels of our "notebooks"
    	to VAXnotes is *amazing*, by the way.  Each notebook had a
    	different theme and tone -- one was for short humorous quibs
    	and little cartoonish drawings, one was for longer and more
    	thoughtful notes about our feelings and experiences with parents,
    	teachers and boys, for example.  Each of us used a pseudonym
    	-- all of them were taken from cartoon characters from TV. :-))
    	
    	As crazy as were about boys (and although nearly all the long
    	thoughtful notes involved our intense love of various boys),
    	we never allowed any male contributors to join our notebook
    	group.  It allowed for a much more free kind of interchange.
    
    	Eventually, the notebook with the "long, thoughtful" prose fell
    	into the hands of the teachers, however.  One of the notes
    	caused quite a scandal, too.  One of the girls had written
    	(about our teachers), "Most of them are so rude that I think
    	they must have left their manners in their Mothers' stomachs."
    	Pretty risque, I guess, for a group of 8th graders.  :-)
    
    	In High School, we no longer had "notebooks," but we were every
    	bit as close to our female friends as ever.  We each had serious
    	romances with boys, but our first priorities (socially) were
    	always with our female friends.  They were our life's blood
    	to us.
    
    	After having a child, going to college, etc., I have not been
    	woman-centered in my adult life.  But I would like to be (even
    	if/when I remarry and possibly have more children.)
    
    	I miss the closeness with other women and would like to find
    	it again.

    I prefer to think of myself as people-centered.
    
    I like to think that I value my friends, acquaintances, and role
    models for their real worth, for their integrity, warmth, and inner
    strength, and for the things we can teach each other, instead of
    for what genitalia they happen to have been born with or what social
    role they happen to have been raised in.
    
    I have about equal numbers of men and women friends.
    
    --bonnie

re [.3]
I really identify with you're experience during the school years Suzanne.  

I'm not clear on what "woman-centered" means...at least I haven't been able
to come up with a definition for me personally.  However, "woman-identified" 
holds a very special meaning to me.  In a nutshell, it's where I may 
*identify* with other women the 'female' things that I feel (and eat, breath, 
think, experience...), AND, receive some validation (whew!).  It does not 
diminish, but rather enhances, that space where I may explore further
dimensions and relationships with men, women, children, etc, because now I
have a greater sense of who I am.  

I'm pretty new to this discovery process and I admit that I'm excited and happy
about what I'm experiencing today.  I suppose that tomorrow, or the next
month, or year(s), "woman-identified" will hold an entirely different meaning 
for me, as I'm still very much in the infant stages of exploring "me" as an
individual, woman, mom, career person, wife, student, daughter, 
sibling, etc. etc.  

I'm glad I have both a daughter and a son...to watch the next generation 
develop and bloom.  Hopefully to help mold it's direction toward a society 
which continues to mature in its respect of all living creatures.  
Rather idealistic?  Maybe....                       

ap
    

    re: .6 (and sort of .3) --
    
    I like your saying that woman-centered means identifying with the
    female things that you feel.  That's a very positive way to phrase
    some very positive feelings and actions.
    
    Perhaps I'm weak in this area because I have had very little chance
    to become close to other women in the way you and Suzanne describe.
    I have no sisters, and when I was in high school I was more interested
    in existentialist philosophy and saving the world from itself than
    I was in boys.  (I even thought about being a nun -- and I'm not
    Catholic!)  And in my school, if you didn't like boys, the other
    girls wouldn't have a thing to do with you.  I think they felt too
    threatened by the idea that life could be lived without them, but
    whatever the reason, I had no chance to compare feelings and interests.
    
    I've had good female friends since then, but I often feel like I'm
    struggling to learn something that other women understand
    automatically, almost intuitively.
    
    --bonnie