Biology shapes but does not determine woman’s situation or destiny

Evidence

These biological data are of extreme importance: they play an all-important role and are an essential element of woman’s situation: we will be referring to them in all further accounts. Because the body is the instrument of our hold on the world, the world appears different to us depending on how it is grasped, which explains why we have studied these data so deeply; they are one of the keys that enable us to understand woman. But we refuse the idea that they form a fixed destiny for her. They do not suffice to constitute the basis for a sexual hierarchy; they do not explain why woman is the Other; they do not condemn her forever to this subjugated role. — Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, 102

Categorization

• DEFINE: Core statement of the situation concept: the body as instrument of our hold on the world, yet not a fixed destiny. This is the analytical apparatus the whole book runs on.
• XREF: Anti-essentialism that anticipates later feminist critiques of biological determinism; also echoes Sartre’s existence-precedes-essence. — connects to: Biological egg structure does not dictate the degree of female parental involvement; Female reproductive biology subordinates individual life to species demands — Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, 97; Biology alone cannot explain why woman is the Other — Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, 109 (+5 more)