Anzaldua and Kingstons Feminist empowerment - Essay Example

Largely, a call for feminism marks the initiation of a long journey to empower women and to champion for their rights in a male dominated culture. Anzaldua and Kingston examine the topic of feminism in the context of “Borderland: La Frontera: The New Mestiza” and “Woman warrior: China Men” and ending to occupy strong empowering position in the post-colonial male dominated society. The works of both authors also traces the journey of women struggles for empowerment in a larger historical structure.

Quite strongly, the works of both authors emerge to represent a defensive and generative debate that aims at countering women oppression of their cultures by providing a strong feminist voice of empowerment in a patriarchal society. “White Tigers” in the Woman Warrior brings to life the struggles of a woman warrior in the context of male dominated culture. In writing this chapter, Kingston is inspired by traditional myth exploring a woman’s struggle in a patriarchal culture. Kingston creates Fa Mu Lan to defy traditional Chinese customs concerning the role of women in her society.

In a precise manner, Kingston presents a traditional Chinese society that expects its women to merely be at the point of taking up already determined ideas and not being able to determine by their own ability what is best for them. Kingston creates a woman who goes beyond this traditional cultural limitation who can take up traditional roles that are largely perceived to be male dominated. Fa Mu Lan ties up her hair and being able to command a unit of army fighting under her. Kingston uses these acts cement the ability of a contemporary woman taking up the perceived male roles.

The feminism that Kingston promotes is a complex one. Her creation of a feminist is one who is able to balance male roles and female traditional roles. This exemplifies a woman’s ability to function both in doing male roles and female roles. The ability to give birth and take it enables her to function as both a mother and a wife. By creating a woman who can double task the role of a woman and a wife, Kingston presents a strong feminist voice in Fa Mu Lan representing how feminist voices can go beyond the limits of time and liberty, but also past the rigidity of customs that the society sets for women.

(Kingston) While Kingston works can be largely perceived as a strong opposition towards the oppression of women in the society, her writing can also be understood not just as a tool for attacking or competing for traditional male roles. Equally, their works look at the position of women in the society and a strong voice that creates an alternative platform for women empowerment in the contemporary society. As the novel opens, Fa Mu Lan’s mother tells her daughter of the great stories of historical woman who have made it as swordsmen and shamans.

At the same time, her mother is represented as a doctor who has accomplished her training in the male dominated society. These representations, however, do not exclusively aim at subordinating the societal concept of patriarchy nor to disprove its existence but rather to enable women have ways to give these women a voice of existing and empowering themselves in the patriarchal context. At the same time, Anzaldua creates a woman being who has to transcend the limitations set upon her by her culture and her customs to live beyond the “Borderlands” experience she finds herself into.

While an Anzaldua’s piece is largely considered a generative story with appropriateness within different cultures, Kingston is more of a defensive essay detailing a woman’s refusal to be limited by her male society and chooses to rise above the occasion in defining her true