Chauvinism

Chauvinism is a form of extreme patriotism and a belief in national superiority and glory. Whereas patriotism and
nationalism may represent temperate pride, chauvinism is intemperate. It can be also defined as "an irrational belief in
the superiority or dominance of one's own group or people".[1] Moreover, the chauvinist's own people are seen as unique
and special while the rest of the people are considered weak or inferior.[1]

According to legend, French soldier Nicolas Chauvin was badly wounded in the Napoleonic wars. He received a pension
for his injuries but it was not enough to live on. After Napoleon abdicated, Chauvin was a fanatical Bonapartist despite the
unpopularity of this view in Bourbon Restoration France. His single-minded blind devotion to his cause, despite neglect by
his faction and harassment by its enemies, started the use of the term.[2]

Chauvinism has extended from its original use to include fanatical devotion and undue partiality to any group or cause to
which one belongs, especially when such partisanship includes prejudice against or hostility toward outsiders or rival
groups and persists even in the face of overwhelming opposition.[2][3][4] This French quality finds its parallel in the British
term jingoism, which has retained the meaning of chauvinism strictly in its original sense; that is, an attitude of
belligerent nationalism.[4][5][6]

In modern English, the word has come to be used in some quarters as shorthand for male chauvinism, a trend reflected in
Merriam-Webster's Dictionary, which begins its third example of use of the term chauvinism with "an attitude that the
members of your own sex are always better than those of the opposite sex".[3][7][8]

Contents
As nationalism
Male chauvinism
In the workplace
Causes
Female chauvinism
See also
References
External links

As nationalism
In 1945, political theorist Hannah Arendt described the concept thus:

Chauvinism is an almost natural product of the national concept in so far as it springs directly from the old
idea of the "national mission." ... [A] nation's mission might be interpreted precisely as bringing its light to
other, less fortunate peoples that, for whatever reason, have miraculously been left by history without a
 national mission. As long as this concept did not develop into the ideology of chauvinism and remained in
the rather vague realm of national or even nationalistic pride, it frequently resulted in a high sense of
responsibility for the welfare of backward people.[9]

Male chauvinism
Male chauvinism is the belief that men are superior to women. The first documented use of the phrase "male chauvinism"
is in the 1935 Clifford Odets play Till the Day I Die.[10]

In the workplace
The balance of the workforce changed during World War II through the dramatic rise of women’s participation as men left
their positions to enlist in the military and fight in the war. After the war ended and men returned home to find jobs in the
workplace, male chauvinism was on the rise, according to Cynthia B. Lloyd. Previously, men had been the main source of
labour, and they expected to come back to their previous employment, but women had stepped into many of their
positions to fill the void, says Lloyd.[11]

Lloyd and Michael Korda have argued that as they integrated back into the workforce, men returned to predominantly
holding positions of power, and women worked as their secretaries, usually typing dictations and answering telephone
calls. This division of labor was understood and expected, and women typically felt unable to challenge their position or
male superiors, argue Korda and Lloyd.[11][12]

Causes
Chauvinism is seen by some as an influential factor in the TAT, a psychological personality test. Through cross-
examinations, the TAT exhibits a tendency toward chauvinistic stimuli for its questions and has the "potential for
unfavorable clinical evaluation" for women.[13]

An often cited study done in 1976 by Sherwyn Woods, Some Dynamics of Male Chauvinism, attempts to find the
underlying causes of male chauvinism.

Male chauvinism was studied in the psychoanalytic therapy of 11 men. It refers to the maintenance of fixed
beliefs and attitudes of male superiority, associated with overt or covert depreciation of women. Challenging
chauvinist attitudes often results in anxiety or other symptoms. It is frequently not investigated in
psychotherapy because it is ego-syntonic, parallels cultural attitudes, and because therapists often share
similar bias or neurotic conflict. Male chauvinism was found to represent an attempt to ward off anxiety and
shame arising from one or more of three main prime sources: unresolved infantile strivings and regressive
wishes, hostile envy of women and power and dependency conflicts related to masculine self-esteem.
Mothers were more important than fathers in the development of male chauvinism, and resolution was
sometimes associated with decompensation in wives.[14]

Female chauvinism
The term female chauvinism has been adopted by critics of some types or aspects of feminism; second-wave feminist Betty
Friedan is a notable example.[15] Ariel Levy used the term in similar, but opposite sense in her book, Female Chauvinist
Pigs, in which she argues that many young women in the United States and beyond are replicating male chauvinism and
older misogynist stereotypes.[16]

See also
Carbon chauvinism
Great Russian chauvinism
Han chauvinism
Jingoism
Planetary chauvinism
Sexism
Supremacism

References
1. Macmillan., Palgrave (2015). Global politics (https://www.worldcat.org/oclc/979008143). Palgrave Macmillan.
ISBN 9781137349262. OCLC 979008143 (https://www.worldcat.org/oclc/979008143).
2. "Chauvinism" (http://www.britannica.com/topic/chauvinism). Encyclopædia Britannica.
3. "15 Words You Didn't Realize Were Named After People" (http://www.quickanddirtytips.com/education/grammar/15-wo
rds-you-didnt-realize-were-named-after-people). Grammar Girl.
4. "Chauvinism" (http://www.oed.com/view/Entry/31017?redirectedFrom=chauvinism#eid). The Oxford English Dictionary.
5. "Jingoism" (http://www.britannica.com/topic/jingoism). Encyclopædia Britannica. Retrieved 22 June 2015.
6. "Jingoism & Chauvinism" (http://wordhistories.com/2013/06/15/jingoism-chauvinism/). Word Histories. Retrieved
22 June 2015.
7. "Chauvinism" (http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/chauvinism). Merriam-Webster's Dictionary.
8. The Columbia Guide to Standard American English (http://www.bartleby.com/68/24/1224.html). Retrieved 4 December
2008. "Chauvinism is "fanatical, boastful, unreasoning patriotism" and by extension "prejudiced belief or unreasoning
pride in any group to which you belong." Lately, though, the compounds "male chauvinism" and "male chauvinist" have
gained so much popularity that some users may no longer recall the patriotic and other more generalized meanings of
the words."
9. Arendt, Hannah (October 1945). "Imperialism, Nationalism, Chauvinism". The Review of Politics. 7 (4): 457.
doi:10.1017/s0034670500001649 (https://doi.org/10.1017%2Fs0034670500001649).
10. Mansbridge, Jane; Katherine Flaster (2005). "Male Chauvinist, Feminist, Sexist, and Sexual Harassment: Different
Trajectories in Feminist Linguistic Innovation" (http://americanspeech.dukejournals.org/cgi/reprint/80/3/256.pdf) (PDF).
American Speech. Harvard University. 80 (3): 261. doi:10.1215/00031283-80-3-256 (https://doi.org/10.1215%2F00031
283-80-3-256).
11. Lloyd, Cynthia B., ed. Sex, Discrimination, and the Division of Labor. New York: Columbia University Press, 1975.
Print.
12. Michael Korda, Male Chauvinism! How It Works. New York: Random House, 1973. Print.
13. Potkay, Charles R., Matthew R. Merrens. Sources of Male Chauvinism in the TAT. Journal of Personality Assessment,
39.5 (1975): 471-479. Web. 31 Jan 2012.
14. Woods, Sherwyn M. (January 1976). "Some Dynamics of Male Chauvinism" (http://archpsyc.ama-assn.org/cgi/content/
abstract/33/1/63). Archives of General Psychiatry. 33 (1): 63. doi:10.1001/archpsyc.1976.01770010037007 (https://doi.
org/10.1001%2Farchpsyc.1976.01770010037007).
15. "If I were a man, I would strenuously object to the assumption that women have any moral or spiritual superiority as a
class. This is [...] female chauvinism." Friedan, Betty. 1998. It Changed My Life: Writings on the Women's Movement.
Harvard University Press
16. Female Chauvinist Pigs: Women and the Rise of Raunch Culture, Ariel Levy, 2006, ISBN 0-7432-8428-3
External links
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This page was last edited on 23 February 2018, at 17:22.

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