Age History In Middle Silence West Woman

The history of feminism is the history of feminist movements. Most feminist historians assert that all movements that work to overturn gender inequality and obtain women's rights should be considered feminist movements, even when they did not (or do not) apply the term to themselves. Other historians assert that the term should be limited to the modern feminist movement and its descendants. Those historians use the label protofeminist to describe other movements.

The history of the modern feminist movement is divided into three "waves". Each is described as dealing with different aspects of the same feminist issues. The first wave refers to the movement of the 19th through early 20th centuries, which dealt mainly with suffrage. The second wave (1960s-1980s) dealt with the inequality of laws, as well as cultural inequalities. The third wave of feminism (1990s-current), is seen as both a continuation and a response to the perceived failures of the second wave.

Introduction

Main articles: Feminism and Feminist movement

The term "feminism" first appeared in France in the 1880s (as féminisme ), Great Britain in the 1890s, and the United States in 1910. The Oxford English Dictionary lists 1894 for the first appearance of "feminist", and 1895 for "feminism". It was the UK Daily News that first introduced "feminist" to the English language, importing it from France and branding it as dangerous. "What our Paris Correspondent describes as a 'Feminist' group... in the French Chamber of Deputies". Prior to that time, "Woman's Rights" was probably the term used most commonly, hence Queen Victoria's description of this "mad, wicked folly of 'Woman's Rights' ".

Defining feminism can be challenging, but a broad understanding of it includes women and men acting, speaking and writing on women's issues and rights and identifying social injustice in the status quo.

Protofeminism

Main article: Protofeminism

Activists who discussed or advanced women's issues prior to the existence of the feminist movement are sometimes labeled protofeminist . The use of this term, however, is criticized by some scholars. Some argue that it diminishes the importance of earlier contributions, while others argue that feminism does not have a single, linear history as implied by terms such as protofeminist or postfeminist .

An early example of a proponent for women's rights is Muhammad, who some historians call "one of the world's first feminists". He is given credit for advancing rights concerning marriage, divorce, and inheritance to Islamic women during the 7th century, long before women had those rights outside Arabia.

Works from the Italian writer of the 15th century, Christine de Pizan, who was the first woman to write about the relation of the sexes, up to and including the 17th century writers Hannah Woolley in England and Juana Inés de la Cruz in Mexico are sometimes described as protofeminist.

Eighteenth century: the Age of Enlightenment

Wollstonecraft and A Vindication

Main article: A Vindication of the Rights of WomanMain article: Mary Wollstonecraft

The Age of Enlightenment was characterised by secular intellectual reasoning, and a flowering of philosophical writing. The most important feminist writer of the time was Mary Wollstonecraft, often characterised as the first feminist philosopher. A Vindication of the Rights of Woman (1792) is one of the first works that can unambiguously be called feminist, although by modern standards her comparison of women to the nobility, the elite of society, coddled, fragile, and in danger of intellectual and moral sloth, may seem dated at first, as a feminist argument. Wollstonecraft saw that it was the education and upbringing of women that created their limited expectations based on a self-image dictated by the male gaze. Despite her perceived inconsistencies (Brody refers to the "Two Wollestoncrafts" ) reflective of problems that had no easy answers, this book remains a foundation stone of feminist thought.

Wollstonecraft believed that both genders contributed to inequality and took it for granted that women had considerable power over men, but that both would require education to ensure the necessary changes in social attitudes. Her legacy remains in the continued need for women to speak out and tell their stories. Her own achievements speak to her own determination given her humble origins and scant education. Wollstonecraft attracted the mockery of Samuel Johnson who described her and her ilk as 'Amazons of the pen'. Given his relationship with Hester Thrale it would appear that his problem was not with intelligent educated women, but that they should encroach onto a male territory of writing. For many commentators, Wollstonecraft represents the first codification of "equality" feminism, or a refusal of the feminine, a child of the Enlightenment.

Other important writers of the time included Catherine Macaulay who argued in 1790 that the apparent weakness of women was caused by their miseducation. In other parts of Europe, Hedvig Charlotta Nordenflycht was writing in Sweden, and what is thought to be the first scientific society for women was founded in Middelburg, in the south of Holland in 1785. This was the Natuurkundig Genootschap der Dames (Women's Society for Natural Knowledge). which met regularly to 1881, finally dissolving in 1887. Journals for women which focused on science became popular during this period as well. Other authors, however, point out that women have been scientists for 4,000 years.

Nineteenth century

The feminine ideal

Part of the rationale of nineteenth century feminists was not only a reaction to the injustices they saw but the increasingly suffocating Victorian image of the proper role of women and their "sphere". This was the "feminine ideal" as typified in Victorian conduct books for example by Sarah Stickney Ellis and Mrs. Beeton. The Angel in the House and El ångel del hogar , bestsellers by Coventry Patmore and Maria del Pilar Sinués de Marco, came to be symbols of the Victorian feminine ideal.

Feminism in fiction

Just as Jane Austen had addressed the restricted lives women faced in the early part of the century, Charlotte Brontë,Anne Brontë Elizabeth Gaskell and George Eliot depicted women's misery and frustration. In her autobiographical novel Ruth Hall (1854), American journalist Fanny Fern describes her own struggle to support her children as a newspaper columnist after her husband's untimely death. Louisa May Alcott penned a strongly feminist novel, A Long Fatal Love Chase (1866), that concerns a young woman's attempts to flee from her bigamist husband and become independent.

Some male authors, too, recognised the injustice women faced. The novels of George Meredith and George Gissing and the plays of Henrik Ibsen also outlined the plight of women of the time. Meredith's Diana of the Crossways (1885) is an account of Caroline Norton's life. One critic later called Ibsen's plays "feministic propaganda".

Marion Reid and Caroline Norton

At the beginning of the 19th century, although individual women, and some men, were speaking out, it is doubtful how influential they were, other than to create awareness. There was little sign of change in the political or social order, nor any evidence of a recognizable women's movement. By the end of the century the voices of concern began to coalesce into something more tangible, paralleling the emergence of a more rigid social model and code of conduct, that Marion Reid (and later John Stuart Mill) would refer to as a "Womanliness" that admitted to "self-extinction". While the increasing emphasis on feminine virtue partly stirred the call for a woman's movement, the tensions that this role duality caused for women plagued many early nineteenth century feminists with doubt and worry, and fueled opposing views.

In Scotland, Reid published her influential A plea for women in 1843 which set an agenda on both sides of the Atlantic, including voting rights for women.

Caroline Norton became active in advocating changes to British law. Upon entering into an abusive marriage she had become painfully aware that legally women were "non-existent". The publicity that she generated including her appeal to Queen Victoria helped change the situation for married women and child custody in England.

Florence Nightingale and Frances Power Cobbe

While many women including Norton were wary of organized movements, their actions and words often motivated and inspired such movements. Amongst these was Florence Nightingale whose conviction that women had all the potential of men but none of the opportunities drove her to a career that would make her a national figure as a scientist and administrator even if the popular image of her at the time emphasized her feminine virtues more. The paradox of the gulf between the achievements which we recognize now, and how she was portrayed underline the plight that women of talent and determination faced during the mid-1850s.

Women were not always supportive of each other's efforts, and often distanced themsel

Top 10 Myths About The Middle Ages - Listverse

The Middle Ages spanned roughly from the 5th ... were special women who stood out in history as being vastly different from any other woman ... the fall of the Roman Empire in the west ...

...

Equally in God's Image: Women in the Middle Ages ...

In Woman and Power in the Middle Ages. Ed. Mary ... Powers of Silence: The Case of the Clerk's Griselda.' In Women and Power in the Middle Ages. ... and Ideas: History, the Middle Ages ...

...

Ancient History to the Middle Ages: Sphinx to Thomas a ...

Ancient History to the Middle Ages: Sphinx to Thomas a Kempis Biography ... On the opposite side, closing the west end of the ... in wool? was also a typical way of praising a woman ...

...

Salem Press

Most of the Humanist writers of the Middle Ages agreed that woman's ... half centuries of literature in the West. ... Related Articles in Great Lives from History: The Middle Ages, 477 ...

...

Review: A History of Women in the West - Women in World History ...

A History of Women in the West Georges Duby and Michelle ... A History of Women: Silences of the Middle Ages, Christiane Klapisch-Zuber ... some women who broke their "silence" are ...

...

What About Those Middle Ages?

Duby's volume on the middle ages in "The History of Private Life" series ... Cathedral which has wonderful carvings on the West ... truth is, it was a time in Europe of relative silence ...

...

Middle-Age Church

Medieval Missionaries to the West. Benedict of Nursia ... However, should there be a time of silence, for prayer ... Church History in the Middle Ages. Comby, Jean How to Read Church History ...

...

Medieval churches of West Yorkshire / :: University of ...

Medieval churches of West Yorkshire / authors: ... silence of memory Armistice Day 1919 1946; English ... fourth estate a history of women in the Middle Ages

...

Powell's Books - Crossing the Bridge: Comparative ...

Sacred and Devotional Objects East/West: From the ... Comparative Studies * The Voice of the Court Woman ... Women and literature -- Europe -- History. Series: New Middle Ages

...

TEAMS -- Bibliography of General Books on the Middle ...

... Books on the Middle Ages ... A History of Heaven: The Singing Silence (Princeton, 1997)-----, Lucifer: The Devil in the Middle Ages (Cornell, 1984) ... the Barbarian West ...

...