In Search of a Model: Evolution of a Feminist Consciousness

ABSTRACT Unlike Russia, one of the most potent forces in reinterpretations of Ukraine’s cultural legacy is its matriarchal myth. This article explores the ways in which that myth has been reconfigured to conform to the requirements of Ukraine’s contemporary historical circumstances. It also examines how a cult figure, known variously as the great goddess, domestic madonna, hearth mother and today as the nation’s mother, and widely portrayed in the media as such, can be transformed into an instrument of women’s subjugation. Although in her original incarnation Berehynia conveyed a message of female empowerment, today she represents nothing more than a free-floating symbol of an allegedly unchanging Ukranian reality, and the woman’s essential status within it, without any real connection to the society in which she once flourished. The idea of female empowerment which she embodies, however, seduces contemporary Ukranian women into a false sense of their own centrality even as it consigns them to inferior status. KEY WORDS Berehynia deconstructing feminism gender specific matriarchal rituals superwoman I In discussions with Ukrainian activists on the nature of women’s ‘proper’ place in the family and society, I am reminded of the ways in which an enduring myth of ideal Ukrainian womanhood – encapsulated either in the term ‘feminine myth ’ or ‘matriarchal myth ’ – in all of its manifes-tations, can illuminate the forces that have shaped the country’s cultural legacy. To study what is, in this case, an echo of prehistoric beliefs, oper-ating in changing historical circumstances, is to gain an insight into the construction and reconstruction of gender identity in Ukraine, and th