Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of Tables, Figures and Maps
- Acknowledgements
- List of Abbreciations
- INTRODUCTION: The Europeanization of Bulgarian Society: A Long-Lasting Political Project
- CHAPTER ONE Institution-Building, Political Culture and Identity in Bulgaria: The Challenge of ‘Europeanization’
- CHAPTER TWO Appropriations of Bulgarian Literature in the West: From Pencho Slaveikov to Iordan Iovkov
- CHAPTER THREE Communism and Cold War in Bulgaria: The Absence of Europe?
- CHAPTER FOUR Bulgarian Turks During the Transition Period
- CHAPTER FIVE Women's Identity and Social Policy in Bulgaria Before and After 1989
- CHAPTER SIX Legal Status and Migrant Economic Performance: The Case of Bulgarians in Spain and Greece
- CHAPTER SEVEN Bulgaria's Path to EU Membership – and Beyond
- CHAPTER EIGHT Accession into the Euro-Atlantic Institutions: Effects on Bulgaria's Balkan Policy(-ies)
- CHAPTER NINE Mirroring Gazes: Europe, Nationalism and Change in the Field of Bulgarian Art and Culture
- CHAPTER TEN The Emergence of Regional Policy in Bulgaria and the Role of the EU
- EPILOGUE
- Appendix I Tables, Figures and Maps
- Notes
- List of Contributors
CHAPTER FIVE - Women's Identity and Social Policy in Bulgaria Before and After 1989
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 March 2012
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of Tables, Figures and Maps
- Acknowledgements
- List of Abbreciations
- INTRODUCTION: The Europeanization of Bulgarian Society: A Long-Lasting Political Project
- CHAPTER ONE Institution-Building, Political Culture and Identity in Bulgaria: The Challenge of ‘Europeanization’
- CHAPTER TWO Appropriations of Bulgarian Literature in the West: From Pencho Slaveikov to Iordan Iovkov
- CHAPTER THREE Communism and Cold War in Bulgaria: The Absence of Europe?
- CHAPTER FOUR Bulgarian Turks During the Transition Period
- CHAPTER FIVE Women's Identity and Social Policy in Bulgaria Before and After 1989
- CHAPTER SIX Legal Status and Migrant Economic Performance: The Case of Bulgarians in Spain and Greece
- CHAPTER SEVEN Bulgaria's Path to EU Membership – and Beyond
- CHAPTER EIGHT Accession into the Euro-Atlantic Institutions: Effects on Bulgaria's Balkan Policy(-ies)
- CHAPTER NINE Mirroring Gazes: Europe, Nationalism and Change in the Field of Bulgarian Art and Culture
- CHAPTER TEN The Emergence of Regional Policy in Bulgaria and the Role of the EU
- EPILOGUE
- Appendix I Tables, Figures and Maps
- Notes
- List of Contributors
Summary
Let me start with the truism that gender is a political, cultural and epistemic category, as well as a historical one. The key feature of gender is concerned with relations, as R. Connell defines it as ‘the structure of social relations that centers on the reproductive arena’. In order to read the post-communist situation using the language of gender, we have to keep in mind all dimensions of this category. Let me also clarify at the beginning, that I will attempt to focus only on gender identity, keeping in mind that identities have multiple dimensions including ethnic, educational, generational, etc. Moreover, the concept of ‘identity’ can be defined as a twofold process: on the one hand, to identify oneself means to take up positions which are imposed on the subject, whose representations are constituted through ideological discourses; on the other hand, identification means expending energy and investment to perform these positions. The second key concept I am using, that of ‘social policy’, can be defined as a set of policies and measures directed toward implementation of the basic principles of the social system. These principles reflect complicated and dynamic relationships between men's and women's public and private roles, the state and broad social communities.
Taking into account this ambivalent approach to identification – considered both as artificially enforced and as achieved ‘selves’ – I would like to point out two main levels of gender identity-building in the post-communist period.
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- Bulgaria and EuropeShifting Identities, pp. 79 - 90Publisher: Anthem PressPrint publication year: 2010
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