Diversity and disadvantage: feminist perspectives from the USA and South Africa

Abstract

This article is concerned with how the current preoccupation with understanding ‘difference’ has displaced concerns with disadvantage and inequality. It argues that a central issue in both the USA and South Africa is how to address disadvantage and link diversity to unity. The article concludes that it is important to assert the transformative potential of feminism at a time when many define equality conservatively to mean integration into the existing social order. Gender (or racial) equality assumes an etiolated form when it simply involves integrating women (or blacks) into a society that is constructed according to and defined by male and/or while standards.