But does the word woman, then, have no specific content? This is stoutly affirmed by those who hold to the philosophy of the enlightenment, of rationalism, of nominalism women, to them, are merely the human beings arbitrarily designated by the word woman. If today femininity no longer exists, then it never existed. Science regards any characteristic as a reaction dependent in part upon a situation. The biological and social sciences no longer admit the existence of unchangeably fixed entities that determine given characteristics, such as those ascribed to woman, the Jew, or the Negro.

It is frequently described in vague and dazzling terms that seem to have been borrowed from the vocabulary of the seers, and indeed in the times of St Thomas it was considered an essence as certainly defined as the somniferous virtue of the poppyīut conceptualism has lost ground. Is this attribute something secreted by the ovaries? Or is it a Platonic essence, a product of the philosophic imagination? Is a rustling petticoat enough to bring it down to earth? Although some women try zealously to incarnate this essence, it is hardly patentable. It would appear, then, that every female human being is not necessarily a woman to be so considered she must share in that mysterious and threatened reality known as femininity. And yet we are told that femininity is in danger we are exhorted to be women, remain women, become women. All agree in recognising the fact that females exist in the human species today as always they make up about one half of humanity. But in speaking of certain women, connoisseurs declare that they are not women, although they are equipped with a uterus like the rest. ‘What has become of women?’ was asked recently in an ephemeral magazine.īut first we must ask: what is a woman? ‘Tota mulier in utero’, says one, ‘woman is a womb’. After all, is there a problem? And if so, what is it? Are there women, really? Most assuredly the theory of the eternal feminine still has its adherents who will whisper in your ear: ‘Even in Russia women still are women’ and other erudite persons – sometimes the very same – say with a sigh: ‘Woman is losing her way, woman is lost.’ One wonders if women still exist, if they will always exist, whether or not it is desirable that they should, what place they occupy in this world, what their place should be. It is still talked about, however, for the voluminous nonsense uttered during the last century seems to have done little to illuminate the problem. Enough ink has been spilled in quarrelling over feminism, and perhaps we should say no more about it. The subject is irritating, especially to women and it is not new.

FOR a long time I have hesitated to write a book on woman.

The Second Sex by Simone de Beauvoir