Situando Simone de Beauvoir: uma filosofia da condição feminina em O Segundo Sexo

Abstract

Thinking about the dualistic factors that make up the world, as well as the binarity of the subjects, socially and culturally divided by their biology - namely, in the male and female sexes, the question is: what led women to live as submissives? What conditions justify this female subordination? What is the problem of women's condition in philosophical discussions? With this in mind, this paper aims to present the philosopher Simone de Beauvoir's (1908-1986) thought regarding the ontological construction of the female identity as the Other of humanity, which is generalized in the image of the male subject. Thus, based on the work The Second Sex, we will seek to portray Beauvoirian notions about the feminine condition and its situation of inferiority. In this sense, we will analyze the concepts of being a woman, of femininity, of the Eternal Feminine, and of the Other, as well as the way in which this feminine inferiorization is presented in the situation of women in everyday life. Therefore, we intend to prove how the formation of women into submission goes through a process of socialization that aims not only at the maintenance of their condition of inferiority, but also at the materialization of their subordination, historically given, through the objectification of their bodies. Thus, the understanding of which phenomena led women to the position of subordinate subject, or rather, led them to situate themselves as the second sex.