The One or the Other? Textual Analysis of Masculine Power and Feminist Empowerment

Abstract

Psychological writing, both theoretical and empirical, is assumed to exist free of the social dynamics of the psychologist who produced it. If anything like social power or control is contained within psychological writings, it is presumed to be an acknowledged feature of the experimental design or a manipulated attribute of the subject-participants. However, close analysis of these writings reveals a rarely acknowledged yet elaborate system of power relations. In the present study, discourses of power and empowerment are defined and compared in two different forms of psychological writing. The first form stresses the perspective of the observer, employs the male gaze, is relatively unreflexive, embraces the experimental method and attempts to centralize knowledge among a few while marginalizing a mass of unknowing others. The second form is grounded in women's attempts to voice their own and other women's concerns. It is watchful of men, advocates a decentralization of power, and tries to achieve understanding through dialogue.