Oppression, Essay Example

Marilyn Frye’s text “Oppression” is a meditation on the concept of “oppression” within the context of feminist discourse. The author intends to re-think the definition of the term, freeing it from non-rigorous interpretations that misconstrue the concept. Frye’s primary target is to dismiss the retort that men are also oppressed when a feminist discourse advances the proposition that women are oppressed. Frye uses an etymological approach to the term. She breaks down oppression to its derivation from the word “press”, noting that the latter primarily means a form of limitation. To say that women are oppressed, therefore, means that women are being limited in some manner. Comparing this limit to the metaphor of a birdcage, Frye argues that these limits are not clearly discernable from a perspective immanent to society, that is to say, from within it. One has to adapt a perspective outside of such limits, a “macroscopic” viewpoint that allows the limiting structure of society to present itself in order to understand the full extent and pervasiveness of oppression.

Frye’s attempt to re-think oppression according to its etymological root is a valuable approach to the concept that frees it from being overburdened by societal misconception. At the same this approach mimics her call for a macroscopic view of society, as she takes the word out of its use in public discourse to break down its true meaning. In other words, to understand phenomena objectively it is necessary to separate this understanding from its determination within a given social construct.

Thus, Frye’s point is particularly strong on the issue that it is difficult to criticize a given society from within this society itself. The metaphor of the birdcage serves as a powerful theoretical example, as it is only from a position exterior to the bird age that one can understand the entire scope of its limitation. At the same time, what perhaps is lacking in Frye’s account is a hypothesis regarding how to accomplish this break from the cage: if oppression is both pervasive and limiting, how can feminist discourse achieve the bird’s eye point of view that can see the society (the birdcage) as it is in itself? This paradoxical question remains left unanswered in the author’s analysis.