Antonio Gramsci and feminism : the elusive nature of power

Abstract

True to a philosophy of praxis, as well as to feminist pedagogy, the author began her inquiry in experience. It is short but apt, and traces the role of Gramsci in the development of the author's own political consciousness. The author's drive for consciousness came from dissonance in her own practice; an inner discomfort that the reality she witnessed around her was not founded on justice and democracy. At that time, the author was a classroom teacher who felt a certain discomfort at the young lives acted out before her eyes. She could see that the life chances of the children she taught were determined by their early experience far more than the innate ‘cleverness’ by which they were judged for academic success by the state. She could also see that the competitive nature of education reinforced a sense of failure in those whose self-esteem already faltered in the face of the harshness of their lives.