Faust: She's no Hellcat
Daniel Hemel responds to the right-wing jeers—predicted on this blog the day of Faust's choice—charging that Faust is a radical feminist with this Crimson editorial.
Forget, for a moment, that most intelligent people believe in equal rights for women and, like Faust, technically fall under the rubric of “feminist.” Faust has been branded with the F-word by writers who have clearly never read her work....
This is a fascinating issue, I must say, and a slightly tricky one for lefties, who are willing to cheer Faust for being a woman and writing history about women while at the same time saying, Don't worry, she's no "feminist."
Hey, she obviously is a feminist. Her rejection of the "it's a man's world, sweetie," line from her mother—and the centrality of that anecdote to her bio-narrative—establish that.
So what? What's wrong with being a feminist?
Problem is, of course, hardly anyone knows or can agree upon what that word means these days, which is why so many women shun it. But Faust is certainly of the generation that used it; she did graduate from Bryn Mawr in 1968.....
This may be one way that the Summers legacy continues. His presidency—his identity, his Washington experience, his leadership style—politicized the university, and his departure became a tug-of-war between the political left and right, particularly outside 02138.
Now that fight is continuing in an ongoing attempt by both sides to define Faust within a political box....
