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Guardian 01c For Marie Jenny Howe […] feminism meant a “changed psychology, the creation of a new consciousness in women”

Guardian 07a Feminism means having the balls to confront the stereotypes

Independent 08a Or feminism means shouting, “leave him, Tarquin. He ain‟t worth it”, before

bundling your fella into a cab

Independent 08a But feminism means something different to women now

Mail 03a To me, feminism means simply knowing the sexes are equal, that men and women have to work together in mutual respect create a better world

Mail 03a Feminism doesn‟t mean so much to my generation, not because we don‟t think it‟s important, but because our equality - at least in this country - has already been established

Mail 06b Feminism can mean a lot of things to a lot of people

Mail 08c Feminism never meant the degradation of women

Times 09b Feminism means no fun or make-up, anger and hating men

Table 5.2: Remaining occurrences of „feminism means X‟

The personal nature of definitions of „feminism‟ is again evident in adverbials that attribute particular definitions to particular people: “for Marie Jenny Howe” (Guardian 01c), “to women now” (Independent

08a), “to me” (Mail 03a), “to my generation” (Mail 03a) and “to a lot of people” (Mail 06b). The difficulty

of providing a clear definition is also explicitly acknowledged in Independent 08a and Mail 06b, in which the attributes are the vague “something different” and the open-ended “a lot of things to a lot of people”. Other attributes are more detailed in the definitions they provide, and accord with the OED (2015) definition of „feminism‟: Guardian 01c and Mail 03a observe the importance of women and equality between the sexes, while Guardian 07a is more allusive in its acknowledgement of the significance of gender with its definition of „feminism‟ as “having the balls to confront the stereotypes”, with “balls” denoting a body part and attitude usually associated with maleness.

The definitions provided by Independent 08a, Mail 08c and Times 09b depend on implied meanings. Each provides what is ultimately a positive interpretation of what „feminism‟ means, but does so by linking „feminism‟ with negative attributes. In Mail 08c, the use of litotes - a double negative “to achieve an ironic effect” (Beaton-Thome, 2013, p. 387) – produces the implied meaning that „feminism‟ is about a positive attitude to women through the use of the syntactic negation of the

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proposition, with “never” cancelling out the idea that feminism meant “the degradation of women”. This implied meaning can be seen as resulting from either a flout of the maxim of manner (the writer could state what they mean more clearly) or quantity (the writer does not say anything about what feminism actually is) (Grice, 1975): the reader is not told anything about what „feminism‟ did mean, but is left to infer that it meant the opposite of “degradation”.

In Independent 08a and Times 09b, flouts of the maxim of quality (Grice, 1975) produce implied meanings of „feminism‟. Each relies on the wider context for its correct interpretation, demonstrating the importance of looking beyond the sentence in which „feminism‟ occurs.

Independent 08a‟s definition is in the context of a discussion of why it is hypocritical that women

should be expected to remain sober in order to take care of drunk men, causing the writer to suggest that „feminism‟ means stopping men from getting into fights. The Times 09b definition appears in a discussion of the writer‟s opinions about young women who claim not to care about feminism, and represents what they perceive „feminism‟ to mean (“no fun or make-up, anger and hating men”), a perception that the writer clearly does not share. This example demonstrates the complexity of textual meaning. The sentence can be interpreted as a flout of the maxim of quality (Grice, 1975), as the writer means the opposite of what they are saying; however, the wider context means this definition of „feminism‟ could be read as part of the free presentation of direct thought, following the previous sentence - “The only feminist they can think of is Julie Bindel. Feminism means no fun […]” Here, the second sentence could be interpreted as a phenomenon of the mental process “think” in the first sentence, which is attributed to “they” (younger women). This example supports the argument that it is important to look at the wider context to interpret textual meaning – not doing so would result in a mistaken impression of the textual meaning of this occurrence of „feminism‟. These examples also demonstrate how writers argue with “an imagined interlocutor” (Dean, 2010, p. 397): writers use thought presentation and implying to present definitions which they then argue against, contesting the meaning of „feminism‟.

5.2.2 „Feminism is X‟

The analysis here looks at the 102 occurrences of unmodified „feminism‟ that fulfil the role of carrier in a relational process using the copular verb in a „feminism is X‟ structure. To make the discussion of a large quantity of occurrences of „feminism‟ manageable, the analysis is divided according to the type of grammatical entity that fulfils the role of attribute: section 5.2.2.1 looks at noun phrases (33 occurrences), section 5.2.2.2 at adjective phrases (42), section 5.2.2.3 at prepositional phrases (18) and section 5.2.2.4 at wh-complement clauses (9).

Some of the occurrences below correspond to the OED and Kelly (1982, p. 67) definitions of „feminism‟, in particular occurrences that appear in „feminism is about‟ structures. However, „feminism‟ is also presented as complex. Whereas the analysis of the „feminism means/does not mean X‟ structures discussed in section 5.2.1 showed that feminism is presented as dividing into different personal varieties, the „feminism is X‟ structures demonstrate how writers attribute different meanings

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to different people, but then contest these definitions. In particular, thought presentation and deictic expressions for representing time and society are used to attribute particular (mis)understandings of what „feminism‟ means to particular people, and to suggest that certain understandings of feminism – in particular that it is dead – are misguided.

5.2.2.1 ‘Feminism is [noun phrase]’

The X element is a noun phrase in 33 of the 102 „feminism is X‟ structures. The nature of these attributes is varied. Many of the head nouns correspond to Kelly‟s (1982, p. 67) definition of „feminism‟ as a “movement” (Guardian 06c, Mail 06a), “belief” (Guardian 03c, Mail 03a) and outlook (“idea” in

Telegraph 05c, “ideology” in Independent 03a, “mindset” in Mail 03c). In other definitions the head

noun of the attribute – „name‟, „word‟ – highlights that it is the lexeme „feminism‟ itself that is being discussed. In these instances, the definitions are negative. However, similar to the instances of implying and thought presentation discussed in section 5.2.1, these show how writers contend with the (alleged) perceptions of others. In particular, thought presentation is used to attribute negative perceptions to others.

Table 5.3 comprises the examples of „feminism is [noun phrase]‟ in which the attribute is „word‟ or „name‟:

Publication Sentence

Guardian 04a Young women today could be forgiven for thinking that feminism was little more than the name given to an interminable media debate about how to get your work/life balance right

Independent 00b In a climate in which feminism counts as the F-word unless its politics have received an egalitarian makeover (as post-feminism or power feminism), Whelehan‟s book ought to be welcomed

Mail 09b You think feminism is a dirty, outmoded word we don‟t need any more?

Telegraph 08c She found that increasingly the most important thing to girls is how sexually attractive they are to men and, that for many young women, feminism is a dirty word

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Taken in isolation, each of the clauses in table 5.3 portrays „feminism‟ as having a negative meaning.

Independent 00b equates it with „fuck‟, Mail 09b and Telegraph 08c use the premodifiers “dirty” and

“outmoded”, and Guardian 04a uses the negatively evaluative “interminable”. However, the use of thought presentation makes it clear that these are negative connotative meanings, and that these meanings exist for people other than the writers themselves. In Guardian 04a and Mail 09b the proposition that „feminism‟ is “the name given to an interminable media debate” or “a dirty, outmoded word” is presented as the thought of others – “Young women” and “You” respectively. The attribution of this thought to “You” in the rhetorical question in Mail 09b is particularly noteworthy: this is a pertinent example of a writer arguing with an imagined interlocutor (Dean, 2010, p. 397), in this instance by making an assumption about the readers‟ own thoughts about „feminism‟.

Telegraph 08c does not use thought presentation, but the adverbial “for many young women”

performs a similar role to a reporting clause, restricting the applicability of “feminism is a dirty word” to this particular group. Similar to Guardian 04a and Mail 09b, it attributes a particular understanding of „feminism‟ to a particular group. Telegraph 08c differs slightly in that negative meanings of „feminism‟ are attributed to a “climate”, the head noun of a noun phrase in which “feminism counts as the F- word” is part of the postmodification. This example is also significant for the way it prioritises information: the climate is part of an adverbial of place, contextualising the main clause, which states that Imelda Whelehan‟s book Overloaded “ought to be welcomed”. The deontically modal “ought” in the main clause – which lacks a subject – strongly suggests that Overloaded should be seen as a good thing, and the adverbial presents the reason why, i.e. because „feminism‟ is seen negatively. These examples demonstrate the “defensive position” (Mendes, 2011a, p. 9) from which support for feminism often comes: while the writers themselves do not attribute negative meanings to „feminism‟, they do make observations of others‟ negative perceptions, using these to argue in favour of more positive perceptions.

5.2.2.2 ‘Feminism is [adjective phrase]’

X is an adjective phrase in 42 of the 102 „feminism is X‟ structures. A total of 48 adjectives are used to fill the attribute role in these relational processes. The most common theme concerns whether feminism is „alive‟ or „dead‟, with these antonyms – and synonyms of „dead‟ – accounting for 17 of the 48 adjectives. This accords with Jaworska and Krishnamurthy‟s (2012) finding that the adjective „dead‟ occurs frequently to the right of the „feminism is‟ structure (p. 416), and suggests that feminism is portrayed negatively and as a thing of the past – if it is dead, then it cannot be relevant today. However, as with the „feminism is [noun phrase]‟ examples, writers frequently attribute negative perceptions of „feminism‟ to others through thought presentation. Negating and hypothesising are also used to question the validity of the view that feminism is dead.

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Structure Occurrences

„Feminism is alive‟ Guardian 06a, Mail 06a

„Feminism is dead‟ Guardian 03b (x 2), Guardian 05a, Independent 03a, Mail 02a (x 2), Mail 03a, Mail 03b (x 2), Times 03a

„Feminism is redundant‟ Guardian 03b, Times 03a

„Feminism is over‟ Guardian 07a

„Feminism is finished‟ Independent 03c, Mail 03b

Table 5.4: Occurrences of „feminism is alive/dead‟

There are two occurrences of „feminism is alive‟ against a total of 15 occurrences of „feminism is dead/redundant/over/finished‟. This suggests a grim diagnosis of feminism‟s health. However, the wider context reveals a more complicated picture. Seven of the 15 pronouncements of feminism‟s death appear in the presentation of speech/thought/writing, distancing the writer from responsibility for the proposition‟s accuracy:

 “People keep telling me that feminism is dead” (Guardian 03b).

 “A report ordered by the Equal Opportunities Commission suggests that feminism is dead” (Times 03a).

 “Feminism is finished, The Guardian announced last week” (Independent 03a).

 “Time magazine ran an article asking, „Is Feminism Dead?‟” (Guardian 05a).

 “Who says feminism is dead?” (Guardian 03b).

 “It‟s strange, isn‟t it, to be told that feminism is dead” (Mail 03a).

 “Everyone thinks feminism is over” (Guardian 07a).

In these occurrences, various others are presented as saying and thinking things about feminism and its apparent death. Only Guardian 05a uses a direct report of speech, quoting the title of a Time magazine article to observe a trend for articles questioning feminism‟s status (notable in the Mail 03a article discussed in section 3.2) noticed by previous studies of feminism in the media (for example Kamen, 1991; Redfern & Aune, 2010; Rhode, 1995). A further two „feminism is dead‟ structures are attributed to others, one through being the phenomenon in a mental perception process of hearing – “it‟s strange to hear that feminism is finished” (Mail 03b) – and another through a nominalisation of announcements by unspecified sayers - “such stern condemnation has already inspired a rash of announcements that feminism is dead” (Independent 03a).

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Six other „feminism is dead‟ structures are either defeased or modalised through negating or hypothesising. Mail 02a argues that even though the feminist writers Doris Lessing and Fay Weldon are not as “man-hating” as formerly, “it doesn‟t mean feminism is dead”, negating the proposition of feminism‟s death in the main clause, while Guardian 03b uses a conditional „if… then‟ structure to make it clear that feminism would only be redundant in particular circumstances – “if women and men […] were free, equal human beings, [then] feminism would be redundant”. Times 03a (“is feminism redundant?”), Mail 02a and 03a (“is feminism dead?”) and Guardian 03b (“who says feminism is dead?”) all use interrogative structures to question feminism‟s status, rather than to outright announce its death.

The remaining „feminism is dead‟ structure occurs at the beginning of the Mail 03b article, „Sorry, But Warthogs Have You Beat, Guys‟. In this instance, the writer is flouting the maxim of quality (Grice, 1975) to imply that feminism is, in fact, alive – a position made clear in some of the quotes noted above, including “it‟s strange to be told that feminism is dead after reading those loving obits of Katharine Hepburn”. This article, in particular, makes a point of linking the ideas of feminism and death, and then denying the association. However, as Lind and Salo (2002) observe, the linking of ideas such as „feminism‟ and „death‟ – even if the association is negated – still produces the “net effect” (p. 217) of an association between the two. These examples arguing against negative ideas about „feminism‟ also demonstrate Mendes‟ (2011a) point that when newspapers feature support for feminism, it is “often launched from a defensive position, arguing how feminism has not harmed society” (p. 9).

5.2.2.3 ‘Feminism is [prepositional phrase]’

The attribute is a prepositional phrase in 18 of the 102 „feminism is X‟ structures. The use of a prepositional phrase as a complement means there is greater variety in the grammatical realisations of the attribute – how-clauses, non-finite verb phrases and noun phrases. These definitions of feminism portray „feminism‟ as having a positive meaning. Like the definitions of „feminism‟ in articles in Dean‟s (2010) study, they emphasise the importance of gender equality. Some also hint at what Mendes (2011a, pp. 10-11) calls the „lifestyling‟ of feminism, whereby self-improvement is prioritised over a more collectivist ideology.

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