Thursday, July 19, 2007

Quick Question(s)?

Why is there no word equal to emasculation for women?

or

Is there, and I just don't know about it? And does it imply the level of dehumanization that 'emasculation' seems to for men? At least in terms of what is considered gendered dehumanization?

Let a witch know.

2 comments:

Medea said...

I don't think there is a feminine equivelant to "emasculation". Generally when a woman loses her "feminity", it is merely that she becomes masculine, rather than defemenized.

Emasculated suggests "stripped of power", almost an equivolent of rape in a weird way, whether it should do that or not. I suppose that this is because the loss of masculinity suggests such a loss of power, whereas the loss of feminity is often assumed to merely make you more brawny.

Or something. But there really should be a word for it...

Revista said...

All this talk at work about cutting off my waist long hair is making me think right now of a sort of feminine castration (as opposed to female castration--which is a totally different, horrific thing). That's about as close to emasculaton as I'm feeling right now.