A what? Are the words ‘perfect’ and ‘feminist’ being put together to commonly describe a noun?! And is that noun… ‘book’?!! So you’re implying that there can be a piece of literature; a piece of feminist literature that is perfect? As in, it includes the voice of every individual and has taken into consideration every possible perspective while ascribing equal value to all of them? Oh, now you’ve done it. Claws out. X-ray specs on. Bring it. This book is in for some serious debunking, problematizing, inequality-exposing, critical analyzing, ass-ki--
Whoa! Retract claws, fellow feminists. Take off the x-ray specs. No one is challenging your critical thinking abilities. The words “perfect feminist book” are not actively excluding silenced minorities to whom you must now call attention. But do you see what just happened? As educated feminists we are wired to situate ourselves as critics at the get-go. Our primary reaction when confronted with a text or even an assertion is to seek out the soft spots and attack. We are awesome at this. And often it can actually be a constructive process, not to mention a great intellectual exercise. But I feel like I haven’t stopped exercising since I sat down in my first Women’s Studies class and this girl is worn out. And I’m wondering now if this never-ceasing problematizing of everyone else’s ideas is really the right way to go.
If you’re looking for a list of all the serious issues with Sheryl Sandberg’s Lean In, you have the whole of the Internet’s feminist scholar sector at your disposal. But this student feminist has had enough of trying to get on the opposing side of everyone else’s theories and is ready to get behind something. I’m NOT going to try to tell you that Lean In is the perfect feminist book (sorry if I freaked you out with the title of this post), but for the next couple of paragraphs I’m going to relieve myself of my newly acquired obligation to highlight, star, and underline every glossed-over perspective and instance of privilege masquerading as truth, and say a little bit about a book I have not stopped thinking about since I picked it up. A book that I am permitting myself to love.
The first awesome thing that Sheryl Sandberg does is call the reader’s attention to trends of inequality that the vast majority of people accept as truths so universal that they don’t even notice them (duh, because she's a feminist and we're also awesome at that). These are tiny behavioral traits that when looked at as dry stats or anthropological facts are viewed as slightly interesting at the most and extraneous at the least: women often feel undeserving of praise or recognition of their accomplishments, women tend to raise their hands less than men, women tend to sit at the edges of the room, success and likeability are positively correlated for men and negatively correlated for women, women aren’t taught to negotiate during job searches, ect. etc. etc. I mean, God, it just goes on. And while Sandberg does give us these statistics, she also shows us what they translate to in the real world. Anyone who has read the book knows what I’m talking about, and anyone who hasn’t doesn’t have to take my word for it (ahem, read the book).
The next awesome thing Sandberg does is talk about what she’s found to be the most effective strategies for countering these kinds of unequally socialized interactions. Let me repeat that. She tells the readers what people can do to counter these patterns of inequality. She tells us what we can do. Not just women, not just job seekers—everyone. And often these changes are small and completely attainable. I don’t want to list them here because… honestly, I want people to read the book. It’s short—I gobbled it up in maybe five hours total and it will be worth it. I’m not promising it will change your life, but it kind of changed mine.
Oh really, Nora? Did this book change your life? Did you gain epiphanic insight from a highly educated, rich, thin, attractive, white woman?
…Yeah. Yeah, I think I did. I feel kind of like a fairy godmother (retract claws, fellow feminists; let the fairy godmother pass) handed me a potion to keep in my back pocket that would make me the most confident, impressive, successful version of myself. Oh, and I get $1000 dollars every time I take it. That is the most useful thing any feminist author has ever done for me, and I completely refuse to let her race, class, and/or socio-economic situation devalorize that.
Here’s the bottom line—for me at least. Sheryl Sandberg is doing something. Reading this book had a positive, tangible affect on me. And the fact that it’s a number one best-seller means that it probably has on other people, too. In my opinion, that is WAY more useful than innumerable discourses whose main purpose seems to be pointing out what’s wrong with all the others. Yes, there are many ways in which Lean In is problematic (as I said before, all you have to do is Google “feminist reaction to lean in” and you’ll be bombarded with examples), and I’m not saying I disagree with those criticisms. But I’ll hold that against Sheryl when someone CAN write the perfect feminist book. Until then, I’m going to get behind the book that has had the most powerful and constructive impact on me in terms of enacting more equal opportunities for myself. Allow me that, fellow feminists. Allow people to get behind things that are enacting positive change.
Whoa! Retract claws, fellow feminists. Take off the x-ray specs. No one is challenging your critical thinking abilities. The words “perfect feminist book” are not actively excluding silenced minorities to whom you must now call attention. But do you see what just happened? As educated feminists we are wired to situate ourselves as critics at the get-go. Our primary reaction when confronted with a text or even an assertion is to seek out the soft spots and attack. We are awesome at this. And often it can actually be a constructive process, not to mention a great intellectual exercise. But I feel like I haven’t stopped exercising since I sat down in my first Women’s Studies class and this girl is worn out. And I’m wondering now if this never-ceasing problematizing of everyone else’s ideas is really the right way to go.
If you’re looking for a list of all the serious issues with Sheryl Sandberg’s Lean In, you have the whole of the Internet’s feminist scholar sector at your disposal. But this student feminist has had enough of trying to get on the opposing side of everyone else’s theories and is ready to get behind something. I’m NOT going to try to tell you that Lean In is the perfect feminist book (sorry if I freaked you out with the title of this post), but for the next couple of paragraphs I’m going to relieve myself of my newly acquired obligation to highlight, star, and underline every glossed-over perspective and instance of privilege masquerading as truth, and say a little bit about a book I have not stopped thinking about since I picked it up. A book that I am permitting myself to love.
The first awesome thing that Sheryl Sandberg does is call the reader’s attention to trends of inequality that the vast majority of people accept as truths so universal that they don’t even notice them (duh, because she's a feminist and we're also awesome at that). These are tiny behavioral traits that when looked at as dry stats or anthropological facts are viewed as slightly interesting at the most and extraneous at the least: women often feel undeserving of praise or recognition of their accomplishments, women tend to raise their hands less than men, women tend to sit at the edges of the room, success and likeability are positively correlated for men and negatively correlated for women, women aren’t taught to negotiate during job searches, ect. etc. etc. I mean, God, it just goes on. And while Sandberg does give us these statistics, she also shows us what they translate to in the real world. Anyone who has read the book knows what I’m talking about, and anyone who hasn’t doesn’t have to take my word for it (ahem, read the book).
The next awesome thing Sandberg does is talk about what she’s found to be the most effective strategies for countering these kinds of unequally socialized interactions. Let me repeat that. She tells the readers what people can do to counter these patterns of inequality. She tells us what we can do. Not just women, not just job seekers—everyone. And often these changes are small and completely attainable. I don’t want to list them here because… honestly, I want people to read the book. It’s short—I gobbled it up in maybe five hours total and it will be worth it. I’m not promising it will change your life, but it kind of changed mine.
Oh really, Nora? Did this book change your life? Did you gain epiphanic insight from a highly educated, rich, thin, attractive, white woman?
…Yeah. Yeah, I think I did. I feel kind of like a fairy godmother (retract claws, fellow feminists; let the fairy godmother pass) handed me a potion to keep in my back pocket that would make me the most confident, impressive, successful version of myself. Oh, and I get $1000 dollars every time I take it. That is the most useful thing any feminist author has ever done for me, and I completely refuse to let her race, class, and/or socio-economic situation devalorize that.
Here’s the bottom line—for me at least. Sheryl Sandberg is doing something. Reading this book had a positive, tangible affect on me. And the fact that it’s a number one best-seller means that it probably has on other people, too. In my opinion, that is WAY more useful than innumerable discourses whose main purpose seems to be pointing out what’s wrong with all the others. Yes, there are many ways in which Lean In is problematic (as I said before, all you have to do is Google “feminist reaction to lean in” and you’ll be bombarded with examples), and I’m not saying I disagree with those criticisms. But I’ll hold that against Sheryl when someone CAN write the perfect feminist book. Until then, I’m going to get behind the book that has had the most powerful and constructive impact on me in terms of enacting more equal opportunities for myself. Allow me that, fellow feminists. Allow people to get behind things that are enacting positive change.