Substantial Intermezzo
After I reread Harry Potter series, I planned to read Buru Tetralogy. But, I found a book that I bought last year and I only had read several pages of it, then discontinued reading it. So, I decided to read this one first before grabbing Buru Tetralogy as intermezzo.
Who knows, this one became such a rich, substantial intermezzo.
Ada Serigala Betina dalam Diri Setiap Perempuan: Psikologi Feminis untuk Meretas Patriarki (There is a Female Wolf Within Every Woman: Feminist Psychology to Transcend Patriarchy) by Ester Lianawati. To be honest, there's no English title of the book, but I just translated it into the words that I found suitable to the Indonesian title. I hope the author would be okay with this (if she happened to find this out, hehe). The genre of this book is non-fiction, specifically unfolding the issue of feminist psychology—its historical journey in the psychology scene worldwide and then finally, its journey within ourselves, myself, as a woman.
Living in heavy patriarchal society, I have learned that women and men, even though we all live in the very same Earth, don't live with the same situation, system, spheres. Men have been living and operating with much more privileges, that leads to gender inequality and the subordination of women—and it's not given.
Those situation, system, and spheres were made and rule by men for hundreds, or maybe thousands years.
Women had been considered as second class human being, less valuable than men. And what made me resentful during my journey reading this book was: that mystifying situation was supported by the (so called) scientific studies in Psychology. There were so many studies regarding the behaviour differences between men and women conducted in the past, of course by male scientists as well, and the result of those studies just didn't make sense for me, plainly stupid even, and I couldn't imagine what if me, who's a woman, had lived in that horrendous era.
Those psychological studies and researches were biased, misogynistic, narcissistic, and as I stated before: plainly stupid. Until eventually, female psychology researchers and practitioners started to emerge in the psychology scene with their more objective and sensible studies and researches. Even so, their journey was (and I think it still is) not easy and very rocky: the preceding studies by the senior male scientists that contradicted the newer studies by the female scientists had been (and still are) embedded deep in our society.
After learning the (oppressive) historical journey of the feminist psychology and feminism situation worldwide, the topic started to issue to the feminism aspects in my personal life, as the reader. I reflected a lot during this topic; I read and aligned the words within the book with the situation I was and are in as a girl, as a woman.
Perempuan-Perempuan Penyihir (The Lady Witches) was my favourite chapter of the book, personally. This chapter told you why in the past there were some women who were branded as witch, and then were hunted and exterminated—literally. Those situations were (sadly) deep rooted and caused by patriarchy and internalized misogyny.
Also this chapter also including Mona Chollet's writing about three traits common to many women that suspected of witchcraft: independent women (without husband or man and single), childless women, and elderly women. Even in this age and day, these women are still hunted and exterminated—figuratively. It means our society are still deep in patriarchy and internalized misogyny.
This chapter really has touched me to my core because I am definitely a witch, based on her writing (and it is interesting for me, of course).
Perempuan-Perempuan Penyihir chapter has really strengthens my mindset and validated my feelings, that sometimes, no lies and no pretending, got wavered because of the pressure and demands from the society and the existing norms where women should do this and that when they have reached a certain age because that's their destiny; that's what define them as women.
This part has validated me:
Bahwa Anda tidak menyerah pada tuntutan normatif dengan asal menikah, dengan mengatakan "yang penting menikah", menunjukkan bahwa Anda memang punya kekuatan spesial dalam diri Anda. Trans: that you don't give up to the normative demands by getting married on a whim, by saying "as long as I get married", showed that you certainly have special power within yourself.
Another interesting experience while reading the book was, I couldn't help but to make my own notes (or glossary, though it's not alphabetical) because there were a lot of terms that I didn't understand or even just read for the first time. It's a given situation, sure, because this is a nonfiction (and almost scientific) book. Even so, I really enjoyed the whole process of reading, learning, and taking notes.
So, this was my experience when I read Ada Serigala Betina dalam Diri Setiap Perempuan: Psikologi Feminis untuk Meretas Patriarki as an intermezzo before reading Buru Tetralogy. I hope I could read Ester Lianawati's other books to learn more and enhance my knowledge in Feminism.
Cheers,
𖹭chkmnpd𖹭
