The Second Sex

In Part 3, Beauvoir shifts from discussing the history of women and their rights and oppression to describing “myths,” the dominant cultural and social ideas about women. Through myths, the idea of the Other is maintained. This is important for men, who also define and understand themselves in reference to this Other. Beauvoir writes, “Once the subject attempts to assert himself, the Other, who limits and denies him, is nevertheless necessary for him: he attains himself only through the reality that he is not” (159).

Beauvoir argues that defining themselves against an Other has always been important for men. There were two alternate ways men could have defined themselves: in opposition to Nature or in relation to other men. However, Beauvoir explains, Nature is too abstract and too unlike humanity to provide a basis for understanding. Meanwhile, men defining themselves in relation to other men only causes an endless struggle in “searching for being” (160). A man who tries to define himself according to his male peers is constantly struggling to keep up. On the other hand, woman “is the perfect intermediary between nature that is foreign to man and the peer who is too identical for him” (160).

The myths surrounding woman are ambiguous and complicated. She is both wholly good and wholly evil. Beauvoir gives the examples of Judith and Delilah from the Hebrew Old Testament, and Eve and the Virgin Mary from Christianity, among others (162). Beauvoir explains that women are defined negatively “such as she appears to man” (162). Traditionally, men associate women with difficult and frightening concepts and dual oppositions, such as birth and death, sexuality and spirituality, and the peaceful and violent aspects of Nature. As a result, social taboos and customs concerning women revolve around sexual intercourse, menstruation, and virginity.

Women are also limited by the positive myths surrounding them. Along with being traditionally associated with tenderness and compassion, they are cast in the role of man’s helpers and sources of inspiration. Women are reduced to a way for men to view and understand themselves and their work.

Yet women are also often seen as restricting ambitious men because they are associated with domesticity. Once women are seduced and become wives, Beauvoir writes, they lose their unique value. Men are determined to seduce or in some way conquer the “free woman” (208) who resists marriage. If she continues to resist, she may become the “bad” woman as a “witch” or a “temptress.” Nevertheless, men are still often drawn to the bad or fallen woman: “There is […] no feminine figure—virgin, mother, wife, sister, servant, lover, fierce virtue, smiling odalisque—capable of encapsulating the inconstant yearnings of men” (211).

Beauvoir concludes this discussion by citing a symbol of womanhood: the sphinx, a Greek mythological monster who quizzed passersby with riddles (209). Her main point is that the myths surrounding women are complex and even contradictory. Images of women veer wildly between extremes like housewife and “temptress.” This does not take away from the power of these myths. According to Beauvoir, these myths have at least as much power in shaping women’s lives as laws and politics do.