Affidamento - Entrustment

by Amanda Samson

The concept of affidamento has its origins in Italy and its roots in the autocoscienza movement. Autocoscienza is the Italian word for the consciousness raising groups that were a fundamental part of the second wave feminist movements across the world. It will come as no surprise that the Italians decided to do something a little different from the Anglo American version imported there initially by Carla Lonzi. These early groups were the foundation for a feminist philosophy and a women’s movement that differs quite significantly from those created by their English speaking sisters. The Italians were also heavily influenced by the French feminists, in particular Simone Weil and Luce Irigaray.

Italian feminists were wary of emancipation and eventually rejected it as a form of colonisation designed to maintain the status quo, where society was run along male dominated principles and women could access society only through the neutralisation of their sex. Through the process of emancipation, society was forced to concede space for women to enter its various activities. The catch being that they could only find socially defined success (a career, independence, access the knowledge, politics and so on) on the basis that they distanced themselves from their sex – that they conducted themselves like men.

The relationship of entrustment or affidamento is straightforward yet extremely powerful. It is based on the idea that in order for women to define their place in the world they must look to each other as points of reference and value. The relationship of affidamento ties you to another woman in order to help you achieve what you know you are capable of but have yet to obtain. The strength provided by the other woman assists you in the process of achievement and at the same time allows you to maintain a sense of your female self that would otherwise be lost.

Many successful women today are quick to proclaim that their sex did not play a role or hinder them in obtaining their position in the world. This very statement is indicative the lack of value given to the female body and women in general. What sort of a society is it that asks us to negate the very thing that defines our physical self? This is not a reductive argument meant to restrict women to the biological process of child bearing; rather it is an attempt to see the world in the context of containing two sexes; female and male. Society continues to be dominated by an androcentric structure, a structure in which male defined activities and behaviours are perceived as valuable. In many places in the world there is now little overt resistance to women entering public life (though much covert resistance remains, especially in business - see Hite 2000 Sex and Business). Women are told they can do whatever they wish and achieve their dreams. Furthermore only those without courage will remain in the restricted traditional roles of wife and mother. Yet is this really the case? Women today often find themselves forging a path that is outside the regulated socially acceptable ones on offer in order to remain true to their principles, true to their sex. The constant pressure to deny one’s sex, the internal process required, sap women of energy they would otherwise be free to use. The old adage “In order to be successful a woman must be better than man, fortunately this isn’t difficult” rings true. But in the effort to be equal, women can lose their sense of self, their sense of being women.

Women are becoming increasingly dissatisfied with the narrow, masculinised options available to them. They have seen the spurious nature of the superwoman image and the emptiness that a life consumed by work eventually brings. They wish to address and redress the problems with the world and are disillusioned with the choices presently available, the rhetoric of equality. Many of these women have rejected feminisms and have turned away from joining a society where their sex has no meaning. This issue has yet to be truly explored by the Anglo American world, though there have been strong indications of it in the works produced by feminists on the margins of society for different reasons; race, ethnicity, poverty, religion and so on. A recent spate of articles in the UK press discussing the merits of the full time mother versus the working mother debate, highlight society’s and women’s failure to address the real issues underlying the problems women have in society, attempting to reduce it to a simplistic choice of to work or not.

One way out of this black and white bind is contained in the concept of affidamento or, as it is translated, entrustment. In the past this type of relationship – not unlike that of the Mentor/Protégée – has taken place between men or between men and women. Affidamento between women has been rare due to the lack of value perceived in being women.

For many years – perhaps forever – women have known that they have something extra. Yet at present that something extra only provides external benefits and does not nourish the women themselves. The relationship of affidamento seeks to make that something extra visible and in doing so make women visible as women and not as pseudo men. For affidamento to be powerful it is vital that the women involved have a common desire for change. That they refuse to accept their lot, and those of other women and wish to overcome a society that rejects them and is marked by androcentric desires. Within the relationship of affidamento they offer the other woman (women) a means of identification that values her sex and provides different markers of success and achievement, thus encouraging the expression of that something extra. Affidamento helps us become aware of what we wish to be and gives expression to our existence.

References

Campari, M. Grazia., Canzano, Rosaria., Cigarini, Lia., Loaldi, Sciana., Roseo, Laura., Shanmah, Claudia. 1985 ‘Entrustment Enters the Palace’ in Bono & Kemp 1991 Italian Feminist Thought Blackwells UK p.127

Muraro. L. 1985 ‘Bonding and Freedom’ in Bono & Kemp 1991 Italian Feminist Thought Blackwells UK p.123

Hite. S. 2000 Sex and Business Pearson Education UK

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