A couple of old but good sources: women writing about women

In another thread, DK suggested that it might be interesting for some of us here to explore the changing perspectives on both women and men in modern culture.  Here are a couple of sources that were considered pioneers in the study of women, both written about a quarter of a century ago when those changes in perception were first becoming apparent.

They both make the point that strong women are not trying to be like men.  They are discovering and calling upon a particularly female source within themselves that has been pushed down and repressed in a male-dominated society, a source that has been re-awakening and coming back to the surface as the position of women in society has been moving forward toward one that is closer to equality.

These are both books about how women are different from men.

Quote :

Within every woman there lives a powerful force, filled with good instincts, passionate creativity, and ageless knowing. She is the Wild Woman, who represents the instinctual nature of women. But she is an endangered species. In Women Who Run With the Wolves, Dr. Estés unfolds rich intercultural myths, fairy tales, and stories, many from her own family, in order to help women reconnect with the fierce, healthy, visionary attributes of this instinctual nature. Through the stories and commentaries in this remarkable book, we retrieve, examine, love, and understand the Wild Woman and hold her against our deep psyches as one who is both magic and medicine. Dr. Estés has created a new lexicon for describing the female psyche. Fertile and life-giving, it is a psychology of women in the truest sense, a knowing of the soul.
http://www.amazon.com/Women-Wolves-Clarissa-Pinkola-Estes/dp/0345409876/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1278623702&sr=8-1#

This second book grew, partly from the results of a study from the 1970's by William G. Perry on the development of cognition and cognitive styles, based on college-educated men.  The book by Belenky, et. al. shows that women's cognitive development, while parallel in many ways, has some significant differences that are equally valid as ways of understanding reality.

Quote :

Women's development theory refers to the seminal work of Mary Field Belenky, Blythe McVicker Clinchy, Nancy Rule Goldberger, and Jill Mattuck Tarule, published under the title "Women's Ways of Knowing: The Development of Self, Voice, and Mind" (Belenky, Clinchy, Goldberger and Tarule 1986). This work describes the process of cognitive development in women as five knowledge positions (or perspectives) through which women view themselves and their relationship to knowledge.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Women's_development_theory
This Wiki article includes a synopsis that briefly discusses the stages of women's learning, and how they differ from similar developmental stages of men as seen in Perry's study

Not to leave men out, this book by Robert Bly is a kind of counterpoint to that of Dr. Estes, and  he also uses myth and fairy tale to develop his position on the masculine psyche:

The wiki article here summarizes and explores Bly's book, Iron John

And here is a link to a wiki article about Perry and his study ofthe cognitive development of men.

And another, more detailed review and summary for Bly's Iron John:

http://www.butler-bowdon.com/ironjohn

Quote :

Bly makes the important distinction between the Wild Man and the savage man. The savage is the type who has wrecked the environment, abused women and so on, his inner desperation having been pushed out onto the world as a disregard or hatred of others. The Wild Man has been prepared to examine where it is he hurts; because of this he is more like a Zen priest or a shaman than a savage. The Wild Man is masculinity’s highest expression, the savage man its lowest.

A civilized man tries to incorporate his wildness into a larger self. When the prince in the story risks all and goes into the forest with the Wild Man, the parents simply think their boy has been taken by the devil; in fact it is a profound initiation, an awakening. Bly’s message is that the modern obsession with making childhood a cocoon of light closes children off to sources of power. Addictions and psychological disorders mirror society’s inability to accommodate the ‘dark side’.