Reboot

Recently, Zaadz has seen a surge in discussion of ‘Integral Women’ and the ‘Integral Feminine’ in response to both what has been going a on in the sphere of Integral Institute, and What Is Enlightenment’s most recent issue on women. I think, more generally, a tipping point has come, a time when feminism has overspilled its boundaries, or indeed come to an obstacle which requires a creative leap. And not just feminism, but perhaps more generally, we as a human community have reached an edge where the trajectory of feminism is arriving vis-à-vis with the Integral movement at the cusp of a new developmental challenge, and the two must now find a way to dance together.

Vanessa Fisher and I, for some time now, have been engaged in an ongoing private discussion on exactly these matters. We have both been involved with the Integral theory movement as well as carrying a deep interest in the wider feminist movement. For both of us these issues are deeply enlivening, compelling, in our hearts and under our very skin.

Here’s Vanessa:

As a fourth year liberal arts undergrad student in Vancouver Canada, I have found that my particular passion has come to lie within the field of gender and sexuality studies. In an attempt to devise my own “integral academic program”, I have continued to take as many courses as I can on gender and sexuality studies within as many of the different discipline fields that offer them (i.e., philosophy, politics, psychology, art, spirituality). I have found that my particular cross-disciplinary path has left me more confused, more inspired and ultimately aching for new discussions that can address the issues of gender and sexuality from a broader and more encompassing perspective. My desire for this forum is to go deeper into issues related to gender and sexuality by flexibly utilizing and integrating the unique gifts offered by spiritual, philosophical, artistic, biological, and feminist traditions.

My most prominent interest now is beauty; more specifically women’s relationship to beauty throughout history and how that relationship has changed with the emergence of the feminist movement. I started articulating my first ideas on an integral approach to women’s beauty two years ago which has just recently culminated in my second official academic publication, entitled: Beauty and the Expansion of Women’s Identity. (To come out in AQAL journal in the near future).

I am now particularly interested in issues of female representation, specifically representation of the female nude body, which has drawn me more and more to the art world for guidance. I am most curious about what it means to live in a “female body” in a post-feminist world, where women’s bodies themselves have become perhaps the most problematic terrain for feminist debates. Thus, my personal writing, outside of academia, has focused specifically on reinvigorating debates on the two greatest feminist taboos: beauty, and the female body. I am particularly interested in how these taboos can be reconceptualized in new ways that will allow women to inhabit a more healthy and embodied existence in the 21st century.
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As for me, I am in the last six months of PhD completion. My thesis begins in the journey. I start with Joseph Campbell whose work on mythology I feel deeply in love with some years ago. So, I begin with that seed and I look at his figuration of the hero’s journey. The journey in mythology, he says, is each of our journeys – if we choose to take it. The journey of waking up to the world, of asking what it is to be human, asking why we are here, askin who we are. But, as I examine his work on the journey, which he generously writes is the journey of man and woman, it became clear to me that at the crucial part of the journey woman was only a symbol, for man. Her journey was unarticulated. So my thesis takes that journey. It scoops up the trajectory which has been forged by feminist work in archaeology, anthroplogy, psychology and religion and brings it into a vibrant conversation with integral theory and with the spiritual philosophy of evolution.

Vanessa and I would like to extend our private conversation and ask others to join us in the threads that we are about to unfold here. As Vanessa notes, our desire is to try to create clear, productive and engaging threads with direction, clarity, and a commitment to something higher than just how people “feel” about their gender; a commitment to diving deeply to interrogate gender, the feminine and their place in an integral world.

Re: Reboot

Thanks so much for the invitation. I feel fear/excitement at the very notion of trying to get so deeply into this nascent space with all of you. This gets at the very core of my deepest issues, as I think will be true for many women. Hence the fear. But having already dived into so much with many of you, I'm pretty sure this is going to be a fruitful, maybe even (r)evolutionary, journey together.

Liz

Re: Reboot

Its lovely to have you with us Liz.
We are interested to discuss some of the most recent articles that are pertinent to this topic.. as I am *still* awaiting my copy of the Women’s issue of WIE (over the seas here in Australia), we thought we might begin by having a look at Anita Floris’ article ‘Feminine Spirituality’ on Ken Wilber’s blog - here:
http://www.kenwilber.com/blog/post/348?page=32

Re: Reboot

Jesus, mine is all dog-eared and in the bathroom magazine rack, already…I'll go read the article.

Liz