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IZOLDA TAKÁCS: THROUGH A GLASS DARKLY as a postulate,”®° based on which male power defines the woman as the other and as an object.?*f Feminist theorists write about the difficulties of conceptualising women up to this day, and conduct endless research to map the female identity, which — similar to the lapis philosophorum — seems to be completely intangible.**’ Certain papers attempt to identify the traits of female identity through the imagery of women appearing/represented in science, literature,*** arts, movies etc. Others try to do the same along the lines of the attitude linked to the abolitionist efforts, the various waves of feminism. Based on ample research and representation of forms of womanhood and the female identity, we can nonetheless logically assume that the actual aim of Sherman?” for instance, as well as numerous feminist critics was to describe the female identity not as fixed and monolithic, but as fluid, constantly changing (both in space and time) and diverse.*“° Especially so since the content of identity is socially divided to a certain degree. Individuals can differ in whether they accept and/or internalise the social opinion of a certain collective, not to mention the fact that the degree of their identification can show further differences." I have no means to delve into the detail regarding the above in this chapter, thus I would like to merely survey the key issues, which have also been in the forefront during the analysis of the individual interviews. I will present the popular models mapping the social gender identity below. Ihese helped me interpret the narratives of female scholars, and to give form to the different types which are representative of female scientists in Hungary. 235 Takács: Nők a tudományban, 141. 236 See also Joó, M.: A feminista elmélet és a (női) test, Magyar Filozófiai Szemle, Vol. 54, No. 2, 2010, 64-80; Benjamin, M.: A Question of Identity: Women, Science, and Literature, New Brunswick, NJ, Rutgers University Press, 1993. And these signifiers enveloping both internal and external traits have fundamentally affected the way women have created their self-image. Women see themselves as good or bad, talented or talentless, feminine or masculine as a reflection of male assessments. “And they want to fit their image of women in a male-construed history. Feminist theory uses the term male gaze as a collective term for analyses in this field” (Joó, guoted by Takács: Nők a tudományban, 136). Cf. Benjamin: A Question of Identity. Showalter, E.: A feminista irodalomtudomány a vadonban. A pluralizmus és a feminista irodalomtudomány, Helikon, Vol. 40, No. 4, 1994, 417—442. 239 The US photographer Cindy Sherman has been continuously dealing with the problem of female identity since the late ’70s. Her pictures try to reveal the wide palette of social roles and personalities of women (Benjamin: A Question of Identity, 1). 40 Gender identity is not unitary, see also Van Breen et al.: A Multiple Identity Approach to Gender: Identification with Women, Identification with Feminists, and Their Interaction, Frontiers in Psychology 8(1019), 2017, 1-19; Becker-Wagner: Doing Gender Differently. #1 Van Breen et al.: A Multiple Identity. 23 S 23 æ + 78 +
