Passage 1:
"As Mark Piper observes, gendered socialization processes disadvantage women when it comes to opportunities for self-expression, since young girls and women are often be taught to be submissive to men and to focus on domestic life over other pursuits." (page 2)
My grandmother, at 70, still cooks, cleans, and does the laundry for my grandfather. Recently, she grew tired of dedicated her entire life to him, and chose to stop doing the chores or cook for him. After decades of relying on her, my grandfather didn't know how to complete basic tasks or even cook a simple meal. Many of my relatives disapproved of her decision, calling her selfish for no longer caring for him. This passage resonates with me as it reminds me a lot of my grandmother. After trying to be independent and express autonomy, she was only met with judgement for stepping outside of the role she had been expected to fulfill. My grandmother's experience and the examples in the reading just shows how gendered expectations become deeply rooted into society, and how it has become almost impossible for women to have full autonomy over their own lives in a male dominated world.
Passage 2:
"Relational views take for granted the plausible presumption that the Self is related to others in various ways; who we are and how we identify ourselves is never a practice that is achieved alone. As such, they reject the kind of individualism associated with “... some liberal and especially libertarian conceptions of autonomy” (Mackenzie, 2013, p. 42) and recognize, instead, that individual identities are shaped by agents' social relationships and social determinants like gender, class, and race. (Mackenzie, 2013, p. 43)" (page 4)
This passage resonates with how I have always felt that my personality and actions stemmed from other people throughout my life. Thinking about the biggest influences in my life, like my family, teachers, friends, and coaches, I realize how much of my thinking and sense of the world has come from experiences and conversations with them. Specifically, my coaches have shaped how I approach challenges and what it means to have autonomy. This reading made me appreciate the outside influences who have shaped my way of life and thinking.
Passage 3:
"Catriona Mackenzie...advocates an explicitly multidimensional approach to autonomy that recognizes three causally interdependent elements of autonomy: self-determination, self-governance, and self-authorization. These are supposed to help us make sense of the different intuitions about autonomy which arise from 'different value orientations and political commitments. (Mackenzie, 2014b, p. 15)" (page 9)
I strongly agree that there is no single, concrete definition of autonomy. In the reading, different philosophers, feminists, and ordinary people all have different understandings of autonomy based on different values and experiences. For me, I feel it is hard to concretely define autonomy, because of the rapidly changing social world and since autonomy may look different depending on context and relationships. Mackenzie's approach on autonomy appeals to me since it does not fit "autonomy" into one mold. Instead, she treats autonomy as different pieces that connect with one another, similar to how autonomy actually plays out in real people's lives.