This is the talk page for discussing improvements to the Simone de Beauvoir article. This is not a forum for general discussion of the article's subject.
This article is within the scope of WikiProject France, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of France on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.FranceWikipedia:WikiProject FranceTemplate:WikiProject FranceFrance
This article is within the scope of WikiProject Philosophy, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of content related to philosophy on Wikipedia. If you would like to support the project, please visit the project page, where you can get more details on how you can help, and where you can join the general discussion about philosophy content on Wikipedia.PhilosophyWikipedia:WikiProject PhilosophyTemplate:WikiProject PhilosophyPhilosophy
This article is within the scope of WikiProject Biography, a collaborative effort to create, develop and organize Wikipedia's articles about people. All interested editors are invited to join the project and contribute to the discussion. For instructions on how to use this banner, please refer to the documentation.BiographyWikipedia:WikiProject BiographyTemplate:WikiProject Biographybiography
This article is of interest to WikiProject LGBTQ+ studies, which tries to ensure comprehensive and factual coverage of all LGBTQ-related issues on Wikipedia. For more information, or to get involved, please visit the project page or contribute to the discussion.LGBTQ+ studiesWikipedia:WikiProject LGBTQ+ studiesTemplate:WikiProject LGBTQ+ studiesLGBTQ+ studies
This article is within the scope of WikiProject Women's History, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of Women's history and related articles on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.Women's HistoryWikipedia:WikiProject Women's HistoryTemplate:WikiProject Women's HistoryWomen's History
This article is within the scope of WikiProject Women writers, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of women writers on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.Women writersWikipedia:WikiProject Women writersTemplate:WikiProject Women writersWomen writers
This article is within the scope of WikiProject Women, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of women on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.WomenWikipedia:WikiProject WomenTemplate:WikiProject WomenWikiProject Women
1. "In the 1970s Beauvoir became active in France's women's liberation movement. She wrote and signed the Manifesto of the 343 in 1971, a manifesto that included a list of famous women who claimed to have had an abortion, then illegal in France. Some[who?] argue most of the women had not had abortions, including Beauvoir. Signatories were diverse[clarification needed] as Catherine Deneuve, Delphine Seyrig, and Beauvoir's sister Poupette. In 1974, abortion was legalized in France."
The bolded sentence is unnecessary in a paragraph about the history of B's involvement with the women's lberation movement, and can be deleted without injury to the article. 203.13.3.93 (talk) 23:33, 28 August 2023 (UTC)[reply]
2. Within many of the subheading paragraphs, there are a significant amount of quotes that stand alone and have not been worked into te article. I do not feel comfortable integrating these quotes into the text, but this seems to be dissimilar compared to other social theorists and I believe it could improve the clarity and composition of this page. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Sosullivan11 (talk • contribs) 20:43, 3 October 2023 (UTC)[reply]
From current article: "The Second Sex, first published in 1949 in French as Le Deuxième Sexe, turns the existentialist mantra that existence precedes essence into a feminist one: "One is not born but becomes a woman" (French: "On ne naît pas femme, on le devient"). With this famous phrase, Beauvoir first articulated what has come to be known as the sex-gender distinction, that is, the distinction between biological sex and the social and historical construction of gender and its attendant stereotypes."
It doesn't seem to me that this quote is endorsing the perspective that sex is one thing, and gender another (after all, she did not write "One is born a female, but one becomes a woman"). The SEP citation offered doesn't directly support that reading either. It's also worth noting that Butler uses this quote to introduce their perspective that there is no difference between sex and gender in Gender Trouble. So, I think the claim about the sex-gender distinction should be omitted or clarified. 2607:4A80:155:114:F4F7:6AD:8937:8F50 (talk) 14:32, 1 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Here's the relevant passage from the citation.
"To counter this kind of biological determinism, feminists have argued that behavioural and psychological differences have social, rather than biological, causes. For instance, Simone de Beauvoir famously claimed that one is not born, but rather becomes a woman, and that “social discrimination produces in women moral and intellectual effects so profound that they appear to be caused by nature” (Beauvoir 1972 [original 1949], 18; for more, see the entry on Simone de Beauvoir). Commonly observed behavioural traits associated with women and men, then, are not caused by anatomy or chromosomes. Rather, they are culturally learned or acquired."
I would say the argument in the Beauvoir article is reasonably supported by the source within context but would concur that additional sources (for or against) are welcome. And I appreciate the reminder I need to get around to reading Gender Trouble. Simonm223 (talk) 14:42, 1 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]