Monday, June 14, 2010

According to Martha McMahon, in her piece, "Resisting Globalization," the idea of globalizations is actually destroying small farmers, in particularly, women, who could potentially make a difference. She argues that the world of agriculture is one that is based off of class, race and gender. She states that "there is more food produced every year than the world's population could consume. People are hungry, it seems, because they lack access. They don't have money to buy food or access to land on which to grow it" (482). Essentially, what is happening is that in this world, everyone could potentially have enough food to survive on during their lifetime. The reason why people are going hungry is because they are not able to afford to buy the food or the land to grow food. The real problem behind agriculture is the economy.

She argues that those who are in power are white men. They are in control and only care about the economic aspect. Through globalization, food is being produced and controlled by huge corporations. These corporations are taking over and making the small farmers no longer important. They can no longer go head to head against these corporations. An interesting point made about these small farmers is that many of them are women. So in this field alone, globalization is causing women to become undermined and devalued. If these women were given a chance, they could gain more of a voice and ultimately more power to feed those who are need.

Another interesting point brought up Winnie Woodhull's piece, is that the fight for feminist rights is something that is not global, contrary to popular belief. She says that "given the global arena in which third-wave feminism emerges, it is disappointing that new feminist debates arising in the first world context mainly address issues that pertain only to women in those contexts. At their best, they attend to issues of race and class as they shape the politics of gender and sexuality in the global North" (255). It is interesting to think that women fighting for the rights of women are actually not on the same page. Many times, it appears that many are fighting for a "universal" fight that actually only pertains to a specific group. Globalization has made communication with others easy enough to where one sides argument can be told around the world, influencing others. The fight for feminist rights should be one that includes women from all different contexts. There should be a united front towards these rights for women around the world. And if used properly, globalization could potentially allow for this to happen.

In the piece, "Cuidad, Juarez," globalization plays out another interesting point. This tells the story of a young women who ended up going missing. She grew up in a place where there was not a lot of money. When she was just fifteen years old, she ended up going to work in a factory making cables for American products. She worked very long shifts for not a lot of money. The factory was her only source of income and was one day told she was not allowed to work because she missed the bus and arrived three minutes late. She was under constant pressure to do her job perfectly, for fear of being fired. Globalization has muffled women's voiced. They are no longer given choices or freedom to make their own decisions. For many, working in these conditions is only for survival. While globalization may appear to be a positive thing, for those working to provide for the rest of us, it really isn't.

1 comment:

  1. Sam,
    When you say, "The fight for feminist rights should be one that includes women from all different contexts. There should be a united front towards these rights for women around the world. And if used properly, globalization could potentially allow for this to happen," you are actually touching on Woodhull's definition of "Global Citizenship" and a "transnational public sphere" (256). We'll talk more about these concepts. Beautiful post.

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