Womb and vagina envy

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Womb envy, a term coined by Karen Horney, is the neo-Freudian feminist equivalent of penis envy. Horney suggests that it is the unexpressed anxiety felt by men, naturally envying pregnancy, nursing, and motherhood — of woman’s primary role in creating and sustaining life — that leads them to dominate women and drive themselves to succeed in order for their names to live on.[1] Horney claims that men experience womb envy more powerfully than women experience penis envy because "men need to disparage women more than women need to disparage men".[2]


In his 2000 book, Eve's Seed: Biology, the Sexes, and the Course of History, historian Robert S. McElvaine supported and extended Horney's argument that womb envy is a powerful factor in the insecurity suffered by many men. He coined the term "Non-Menstrual Syndrome" (NMS) as another way of expressing male insecurity concerning female biological powers. He contends that womb envy leads men to define themselves in terms of opposition to women. McElvaine argues that men who envy women's power to reproduce insist that a "real man" must be "notawoman" and they tell women that they may not do certain things as a means of compensating for what men cannot do.[3]

Horney considers it likely that Womb envy is a psychosocial tendency, just as penis envy is, rather than a quality inherent in men.[1]


Vagina envy is a psychoanalytic concept that posits that men are envious of women having vaginas. It has been compared to penis envy in women.[4] Hendrik Ruitenbeek connects vagina envy to men's desire to be able to give birth or urinate in a different way. He writes that this envy can result in misogyny in neurotic people[4] Psychoanalyst Harold Tarpley differentiates vagina envy from breast and womb envy, in which men are envious of women's abilities to become pregnant or physically nurture children.[5]

Ruitenbeek also posits a phenomena of "parition envy", in which boys become fascinated and envious of the process of giving birth itself, independent of the organs involved.

[edit] See also

[edit] References

  1. ^ a b Horney, Karen (1967). Feminine Psychology. W.W. Norton Company, New York. 
  2. ^ Horney, Karen (1942). The collected works of Karen Horney (volume II). W.W. Norton Company, New York. 
  3. ^ Robert S. McElvaine, Eve's Seed: Biology, the Sexes, and the Course of History (New York: McGraw-Hill, 2000), pp. 72-78.
  4. ^ a b Hendrik (1966), p. 144
  5. ^ Tarpley (1993), Abstract.
  • Ruitenbeek, Hendrik (1966). Psychoanalysis and Male Sexuality. Rowman & Littlefield. ISBN 9780808402558. 
  • "Vagina Envy in Men" Tarpley, H. (1993). J. Amer. Acad. Psychoanal., 21:457–464.
  • Warnes, H., Hill, G. "Gender identity and the wish to be a woman" Psychosomatics v. 15, no, 1, 1974, pp 25–29. "Envy and fascination with the female breasts and lactation, with pregnancy and childbearing and vagina envy are clues to a femininity complex of men which is defended against by psychological and sociocultural means." (quote from abstract)

[edit] External links


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