Is Women's Fiction A Sexist Term? (Guardian Article)?

Yes.

Until there is a subgenre called "Men's Fiction", yes.

Until the idea that books about women must just be for women and books about men are considered gender neutral goes away and all books are either gender neutral, or divided into their gender categories, yes.

Until Franzen starts getting the same pastel covers that the female authors in women's fiction get, yes.

Yes.




ETA: This doesn't mean I think when they came up the category they were trying to be sexist. I believe it's another example of systemic sexism, something deeply ingrained in society. Just like people discuss writing books for boys instead of maybe discussing how to get boys to feel comfortable reading female protagonists just like girls/women have to read about boys/men and have had to for decades.

Granted it takes a lot to offend me, but I am in no way offended/insulted/belittled, etc. by the term.
In fact, I kind of appreciate that I know I'll be reading a book geared towards women.

Toothpaste said:

Yes.

Until there is a subgenre called "Men's Fiction", yes.

Until the idea that books about women must just be for women and books about men are considered gender neutral goes away and all books are either gender neutral, or divided into their gender categories, yes.

Until Franzen starts getting the same pastel covers that the female authors in women's fiction get, yes.

Yes.




ETA: This doesn't mean I think when they came up the category they were trying to be sexist. I believe it's another example of systemic sexism, something deeply ingrained in society. Just like people discuss writing books for boys instead of maybe discussing how to get boys to feel comfortable reading female protagonists just like girls/women have to read about boys/men and have had to for decades.

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^ Agree with this. And you saved me the trouble of typing it out.

Kay - Saying something plays into systemic sexism doesn't mean that I feel belittled. And I find it sometimes frustrating that the supposed way of determining if something is an ism is "do I feel belittled" because then we have people who come along and say they aren't offended and it becomes a debate about whether or not we need thicker skins. I respect that you are not offended by the category, but that doesn't mean that it doesn't reflect a real systemic issue in society.

Kay, you say you appreciate knowing books will be about women, but what about all the men who write about women but get shelved in General Fiction? Then all those should be shelved also in Women's Fiction. But they aren't. So you don't find those ones. If it was merely a matter of shelving any book about women in one section and any book about men in another, while I think that's silly personally, at least it would be equal. But this is more than just shelving books about women in one place. This is about implying that any books starring women and written by women are meant to only be read by women. This is implying that books about women are a) of no interest to men, b) that men's books, which do not have a "Men's Fiction" category, just "General Fiction", are for all genders whereas books by and about women are not.

This is the same for when bookstores shelve books by African American authors into "Urban Fiction", because again that can't be "General Fiction". Or books about LGQBT characters into their own section. The more we "other" works by anyone other than white males, the more we say that white male is the norm, and everything else is the divergence.

And that's why I don't like it. Shelve things by genre "Mystery", "SF/Fantasy", "Slice of Life", if you must. But not by humans.

But most of it is women's fiction. Only a tiny few men read it. And there is a category of fiction called "men's adventure".

And even if you call it cocker spaniel fiction, women will still be the primary readers.

Next someone will say "women's clothing" is sexist.

If anything, it looks to me that men are the ones being slighted. We don't even rank a category of our own on Amazon.

Agree to disagree James. If most women are reading, if most books are aimed at women, why isn't there a "General Fiction" category that is all those women's books, and a "Men's Fiction" section for the few men? And isn't it a pity that men won't read books about women, but women happily read books about men? Nope, nothing systemic in our society about that at all. That that which is feminine is lesser than the masculine, that masculine = gender neutral. That there is the "Everyman" who represents all humankind, but not the "Everywoman" who ALSO represents all human kind.

Also I've never seen a "Men's Adventure" section in a bookstore ever. But hey, with the demise of the big box bookstores, this all might be moot.

Yep. Feel "excluded," or put off by the term women's fiction. In honesty, the novels that are categorized as such are probably not novels I'd read for the most part. But I definitely might give a few a go just to find out what they are about. A good book is a good book and enough to interest me if so. But with the term women's fiction no dice. It's like a "men keep away" sign. OK, if you insist.

Olivia Goldsmith, in THE BESTSELLER, has her tough female editor muse about the different types of big-grossing books. One is the "Pink," or romance/women's fic. Another is the "Dick," adventure/military/Clancy-like thrillers. Men's fic, in other words.

So there you go: We need a Pink section and a Dick section.

Yes, in that at least they are equal, they do sometimes (not in all newsagents) divide magazines up by gender.

Quite frankly I don't think the solution is to do that, because, as Ken has demonstrated that can keep people from reading things that they might otherwise have. Also it's a bit of an insult to suggest that science is for men, fashion is for women. Though it is rather telling to me that you call the men's stuff the "good stuff". We all have our tastes and preferences, just because something is more feminine doesn't mean it doesn't have value.

For me, I would prefer, if we need to divide up books, to do it by genre, not by human. As I said above.



ETA: Thinking further on it, I think magazines are an example example of how you can divide things up by genre, and people do just fine. In Canada in our big box bookstore Indigo, the categories for magazines are things like: Entertainment, Sports, Science, Fashion, Lifestyle etc. No mention of gender at all.

What Toothpaste said.

I don't think the marketing people who came up with that term were necessarily sexist... they were being marketing people... ya know... the same people that use our emotions and identities to make their corporate overlords rich.

Would be interesting to have an imprint for men's tastes. I don't think it would be called "Men's Fiction" since I don't think that'll appeal to guys at all. Television has "Lifetime" for a mainly female audience (I watch Intervention reruns there! But that show started on A and E, not sure if it's still there) while there's "Spike TV" geared towards men.

I would say it's certainly a manifestation of sexism that we have the category, but it's more complicated than that. Because I don't think the category itself is *necessarily* bad.

I'll unpack . . .

Bear in mind I don't know anything about publishing or how or why books get labeled "women's fiction" (or how that category is marketed). So I'm talking in a broader manner about "women's ___" here -- it may or may not apply to women's fiction, but I have no reason to believe it wouldn't.

Because, see, I'm frustrated by all the people who say things like, "We have a Black Students Association, it's racist we don't have a WHITE Students Association!" or, "Why do LGBTQ people get a parade, straight people don't have a parade!" or, "Why do women have a special award in this male-dominated field; that's sexist!" The thing is, one of the (sloppy, imperfect) ways we have of counterbalancing institutional sexism (or racism, etc.) is by artificially elevating people when we know they aren't getting a fair shake for other reasons, to try to equalize it. That's what affirmative action does, in theory -- it tries to provide a counterweight for the institutional bias that means people hire/admit/whatever white men over women or minorities.

(I didn't used to believe in affirmative action. Then I saw the studies showing how huge the disparity is between what happens when equally qualified resumes of men/women or white people / black people are presented to employers or possible mentors. Then I read about what happened when supposedly-unbiased orchestra directors moved to blind auditions. Then I learned about all the assumptions people make, every day.....)

So, in this case...."women's fiction" may be imperfect. It may be just a stepping stone. But is there the possibility it is doing some good in providing women a market and a path to publication? I mean, obviously the audience is there, but there are plenty of types of representation that have an audience that aren't being served because it's "too risky." If women writing "women's fiction" were competing in the general fiction category, well, what are the chances institutional biases would cause many fewer women to be published and many more men?

I'm not saying that "women's fiction" as a category is a good thing on an absolute scale. But maybe it's a better thing than not having it. And maybe it's just a symptom of institutional sexism, something we need because of it, rather than something that's causing or contributing to it.

Just some thoughts. Like I said, I don't know much about publishing or about women's fiction, so what I'm saying might or might not apply here.

Toothpaste said:

Y
For me, I would prefer, if we need to divide up books, to do it by genre, not by human. As I said above.

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The library by me does this in the kids section. They don't divide the books by genre, but just stick a sticker on the spines to categorize them: adventure, mystery, and one or two other classifications. Very helpful to me when I seek out books to read. Maybe they could do that in bookstores?

I never gave it a thought. Perhaps I'd call it unnecessary rather than deliberately sexist. When I shop for a book, I never use "women's fiction" as a search term.

For light reading, I'm partial to mysteries, science fiction, or fantasy, although I will also read outside of those genres. The protagonists vary.

Books should have no label other than their title and category. They should be free to be whatever the reader imagines them to be, without being pigeonholed into something that may not get read simply because of a category.

Bibliodiscrimination, I say. Just stop already.

I'm not sure if I'd say the category and the term itself is necessarily sexist, but it is certainly indicative of the larger-scale sexism in the literary world.

It's not malicious sexism, I don't think, just a symptom of society's prejudices.

I remember getting into an argument once, with a boy who started telling writers not to write about puppies or kissing in the rain. He tried to frame it as a "Go explore the boundaries!" type of thing, but it sounded like he was telling writers to stop writing "girly" things and write "manly" things instead. It was an unpleasant conversation. /derail

Of course it's sexist. You'll have to live with it, guys; it's their turn.

Toothpaste said:

This is the same for when bookstores shelve books by African American authors into "Urban Fiction", because again that can't be "General Fiction". Or books about LGQBT characters into their own section. The more we "other" works by anyone other than white males, the more we say that white male is the norm, and everything else is the divergence.

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I partly agree, partly disagree.

Genres like LGBTQ fiction and African American fiction serve a purpose: they deal with themes relating to sexuality, gender, or race, and give a voice to minority groups. To me, queer fiction is different than a novel that just happens to have a gay protagonist. Queer fiction is, in some way, about being queer. And the author is queer.

I think a similar purpose exists for women's fiction. If a college course is teaching "women's fiction," that generally means works that deal with themes relating to being a woman, that are written by female authors.

However, in practice, the way bookstores shelve stuff can be more random or discriminatory. And I've never cared for the fact that "women's fiction" seems to often just mean a book with a female protagonist that deals with themes of relationships, love, or family.

Is there an assumption that men necessarily like big guns and military fiction? And there are some men that read what is stereo-typically considered women's fiction.

With that said, I'm for eliminating gender-specific marketing.

DancingMaenid said:

Genres like LGBTQ fiction and African American fiction serve a purpose: they deal with themes relating to sexuality, gender, or race, and give a voice to minority groups. To me, queer fiction is different than a novel that just happens to have a gay protagonist. Queer fiction is, in some way, about being queer. And the author is queer.

I think a similar purpose exists for women's fiction. If a college course is teaching "women's fiction," that generally means works that deal with themes relating to being a woman, that are written by female authors.

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If I owned a bookstore, I would have shelves for things like women's fiction, LGBTQ fiction, African American fiction, etc.

And I would order twice as many of those books, and I would shelve half of them on the genre shelves -- just mixed in and mainstreamed.

In other words, I would try to break the ghettos. Let mainstream readers get exposed to everything that's out there; they might find they like it. Plus, there are a hell of a lot of great authors who deserve the exposure but can't get it, often for the most insulting of reasons.

Toothpaste said:

Until there is a subgenre called "Men's Fiction", yes.

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There is a subgenre called "Men's Fiction." Generally it involves heroic military exploits, lots of killing and the like. In terms of sales, it isn't anywhere near what "Women's Fiction" is, near as I can discern.

Women comprise the majority of the fiction-reading public, and women also comprise the majority of fiction-representing agents.

Try getting a female agent interested in representing anything even remotely perceived of as "Men's Fiction" and you'll understand the situation more fully.

caw

JustSarah said:

Is there an assumption that men necessarily like big guns and military fiction? And there are some men that read what is stereo-typically considered women's fiction.

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Apparently there is a big market in India among men for romance novels. Love stories are incredibly popular there, and there's no stigma attached to a guy wanting to read about romance.

Another thing to consider is that not as many men read for pleasure as women do, and you have to wonder if that's partly because of assumptions about what they like -- maybe the stereotypical man's story just isn't a good fit anymore for what most modern men want to read.

Sexism hurts everyone.