DWF
donnawomanfemme
Roma, Editrice coop. UTOPIA, 1986-

Belonging, 1986, n. 4

EDITORIAL, Belonging, pp. 5-10

Belonging is investigated as a political sentiment, a measure of the subject's degree of intimacy with its self-representation, in the relationships it establishes within feminine sociality, in the way it confronts social structure. The feeling of belonging to the movement has been a strong sentiment, but in order do more than just instituting an organizational structure, and in so doing laying to waste acquired differences, a closer look is called for on the difficulties concerning the (related) discourses of subjectivity, individuality, female identity. The different nature of texts and the way different contributions cross one another underlines the problematical nature of the issue.

CAVARERO Adriana, Being with oneself. We who never were in Ithaca, pp. 11-16

The author attempts an analysis of the philosophical meaning of "appartenersi" (belonging to oneself), beginning with a philological examination of the term in Italian, Latin and Greek, where it meant being with oneself in/through the logos - the word. Man's modern thought is fraught with the separation being/word (logos) and the nostalgia born of the loss of the original unity between being and word. Women on the contrary are constitutionally lost and separated in the word, they have no origin where to dream or regret themselves as a whole. But they can dream of a space before logos came into being, or of a mythical space inhabited by the word of the mother. They can also dream of a time when man's word is silent, suspended. Belonging to herself, "appartenersi", for a woman cannot be mastering man word; on the contrary such a mastery uncovers her distance and separation from herself. The act of deciding to search for herself, wanting to find herself in/with herself, looking at herself and other women, is for a woman a turning point. Accepting her distance from man's word is both a condition for founding her own word, and already the realization of her word. The paradox of wanting to find oneself without ever having lost oneself becomes the "image of the future", when distance won't be experience but memory of a past time.

DOMINIJANNI Ida, Double movement, pp. 7-26

A double movement - "partenza/appartenenza", departing and being a part - philosophical and political at the same time, characterises Italian feminism: the will to re-trace and re-line the original belonging to (being a part of) the female gender, signifying this belonging into an ethical and political principle. In this perspective the author analyses the political and theorical developments of Italian feminism in recent years, after the stage of great symbolic mediation represented by the Movement in the 70s has come to an end. She examines what meaning and weight political affiliations outside the feminist movement have had in the history of the movement, and remarks a reversal of the relationship - the theme of sexual difference is now becoming central in institutional politics -. The risk is - the author maintains - a moderate interpretation of sexual difference, which would turn to little advantage as far as women's social existence is concerned. Belonging to (being a part of) the female gender, definite social contexts, the history of feminism are the three interrelated levels which today could be the space of enunciation of a female subject who wants to say: "I woman, feminist, and so much more - am".

SARACENO Chiara, Being part, being outside, transformations, pp. 27-34

In an autobiographical vein, the author, a sociologist, re-traces her research choices, concerning both subject-matter and methodology, in relation to her belonging to (being part of) the "Griff", a group formed in the 70s by scholars from different parts of Italy, different backgrounds and disciplinary areas, in order to exchange and discuss, among women, their teaching and research experiences. Of particular interest is the author's investigation of her motives in choosing, as a privileged field of enquiry, "the female story" - a key to the general understanding of social phenomena, and also an expression of a gender-related structure.

DE SANCTIS RICCIARDONE Giovanna, In passing, pp. 35-47, with five plates

Presenting some of her oils and oil pastels the author reasons on the difficulty for the contemporary artist to define herself in terms of belonging, and concludes that whoever claims to produce art cannot renounce the tragic condition of non-belonging.

SPINELLI Simonetta, Silence is a loss, pp. 49-53

The author investigates the concept of belonging - "being a part of" - in relation to the lesbian experience. The process of acquisition of knowledge has its first founding instance in the space of desire built by the relationship between two female subjects: "I belong to" (I am a part of), where belonging to another woman is the measure of one's self-knowledge. Fearing the loss of their defences, and the loss of their link with the women's movement at large - and therefore with their feeling of belonging to (being a part of) the collective subject woman - Italian lesbian women have not developed a political word, which could signify and communicate that experience in order to reach beyond the dimension of intimacy. The political act of stating one's loyalties, saying where one belongs - particularly concerning the prevailing signs which determine one's relationship with oneself and with the-other-from-oneself - is the act that marks the passage from belonging to another woman to belonging to oneself. From intimacy to women's culture.

SCARCIA Biancamaria, Inside the boundaries, along the edges, pp. 54-64

Analysis of an emancipation process - and of the growing awareness of one's condition as a woman - through the stages of a professional success-story as a scholar in the field of oriental studies. The turning points in the history of the discipline, and the author's personal development, are looked at as parallel and interrelated; the de-colonising process; third-world centrality, the institutional crisis of the Western world, and the gradual loss of meaning of traditional political and social groupings, are re-viewed in the light of her move towards feminism. Feminism, also for what it has signified and still signifies in the author's working life, opens up possible answers to the problematic area of a woman's belonging to (being a part of) something, and of something belonging to (being a part of, pertaining to) a woman.

WEIGEL Sigrid, Life behind the images. Ulrike Von Kleist (1774-1849), pp. 65-90

Very little is known, apart from what the famous poet writes in his correspondence, about his sister. There are documents, but most of them are still to be studied, and on the other hand, she has not written much about herself. Yet here is an attempt to reconstruct her life. Two are the reasons. First, re-reading and interpreting what her brother wrote, who accused her of not being feminine, although not being a man. A recurring stereotype, particularly for women "behind the scenes" in famous men's lives, and more so when these men are economically dependent on them. Secondly, a positive reconsideration of the little information one can find. Only in old age, when her economic situation is sound, Ulrike can express her pains, the nightmarish feeling of being "a sister" and not "a woman".