Analysis Of Emmeline Pankhurst 's Work Essay

America stands as the most prominent nation of liberty and freedom for all, yet some people still feel the reins of America’s oppressive past. Those include young African Americans and women, who feel that society places unequal expectations on them, simply based on their gender or race. Two young, American writers, Sylvia Plath and Langston Hughes especially feel this way through their works, Sylvia Plath at Seventeen and Theme for English B. Plath and Hughes employ tone, tone shift, and parallelism throughout their works to convey their message that young adults must stand up to demoralizing social expectations.

It tends to be the trend for women who have had traumatic childhoods to be attracted to men who epitomize their emptiness felt as children. Women who have had unaffectionate or absent fathers, adulterous husbands or boyfriends, or relatives who molested them seem to become involved in relationships with men who, instead of being the opposite of the “monsters” in their lives, are the exact replicas of these ugly men. Sylvia Plath’s poem “Daddy” is a perfect example of this unfortunate trend. In this poem, she speaks directly to her dead father and her husband who has been cheating on her, as the poem so indicates.

During the Age of Enlightenment in the late eighteenth century, Mary Wollstonecraft presented a radical essay, A Vindication of the Rights of Women, that shed light on the largest, underrepresented groups of the time, women. The essay voiced the inequalities women at the time faced and called upon Wollstonecraft’s audience to invoke a revolution for the rights of women. Through her writing, she presented a compelling argument that slowly allowed women to question their “place” in society and demand change to the British social order. While these changes did not happen quickly, her work sparked the feminist movements through its unique message and called upon women to demand equality through the Match Girls Strike and Women’s Suffrage

Focusing on the lives of women, they were not allowed such freedoms like we have in modern times. Education is something that these women were not granted a lot of access to. This is pointed out in the very beginning of the novel. One of the characters mentions, “You cannot read, Anna.” (Brooks, 1). Women were expected to be housewives, they would not need that much education to do that. It seems, though, that women in the book were able to learn a lot through experiences. They had no need of a proper education to be able to survive day to day. Going off the information I have learned and the information presented in this book, I believe that the author was able to properly portray the life of women in the seventeenth century.

To understand the reasons behind some women getting the vote in 1918, one must look back at the history of the women’s movement to fully understand the reason female suffrage was sought and gained. In Victorian Britain there was a longstanding and persistent belief that men and women occupied separate spheres. The

Elizabeth was an American Social Activist, Abolitionist, and leading figure of the early women’s movement. Her declaration of sentiments presented at the first women’s right convention held in 1848 Seneca Falls, New York which is often credited with initiating the first organized women’s rights and women’s suffrage movements in the United States. Elizabeth narrowed her political focus almost exclusively to women’s rights. She had been an active abolitionist with her

(Hollitz, Contending Voices, 167) but Elizabeth developed a strong sense of independence because her family wanted boys she decided to try to become more manly and courageous. (Hollitz, Contending Voices, 167) she began to become the son her father never had she started learning mathematics she learned to debate, she learned how to ride. (Hollitz, Contending Voices, 167) by being in her father’s office so much she started to learn how women were treated unequally. She believed that women should have the same equal rights as men, that women should be able to have a voice also. (Hollitz, Contending Voices, 167)

Interest quickly rose in the fourteen-year old girl, who were amazed by the speeches, especially the address done by Miss Lydia Becker. Through the persuasive speeches, Emmeline left the meeting convinced that she was “a conscious and confirmed suffragist. A year after, Emmeline went to Paris, where she pursued her higher education of girls in one of the pioneer institutions in Europe. Ran by Mlle. Marchef-Girard, who believed in the necessity for girls to have equally practical and thorough education boys received, Emmeline’s persistent character to gain equality was further shaped. After graduating and returning to Manchester at the age of eighteen, she worked for the woman-suffrage movement immediately, and came to know Dr. Pankhurst. In 1879, Emmeline became the wife of Dr. Pankhurst, and bestowed upon him four children. Moreover, with Dr. Pankhurst strong belief that society as well as families are always in need of women’s service, Emmeline continued to be involved, and served on the executive side of the Women’s Suffrage Committee. Emmeline’s energy was renewed upon the success of the committee in having Married Women’s Property Act passed in 1882

Despite being under the rule of a female monarch, women faced many inequalities and suffering during the Victorian age. Examples of these inequalities include not having the right to vote, unequal educational and employment opportunities. Women were even denied the legal right to divorce in most cases. As the Norton Anthology states, these debates over women’s rights and their roles came to be known as the “woman question” by the Victorians. This lead to many conflicting struggles, such as the desire by all for women to be educated, yet they are denied the same opportunities afforded to men. While these women faced these difficulties, there was also the notion that women should be domestic and feminine. There was an ideal that women should be submissive and pure because they are naturally different. The industrial revolution introduced women into the labor workforce, but there was still a conflict between the two identities; one of an employed woman, and one of a domestic housewife.

Social change in Britain has been achieved primarily through the hard work of organized political groups. These groups created events to recruit and educate supporters of social equality to join them in fighting for progress. The Women’s Suffrage Movement between 1866 and 1928 in Britain is no exception to this trend. The reason for the great efficacy of these political groups, including the National Union of Women’s Suffrage Societies and the Women’s Social and Political Union, was the women who pioneered the groups and fought alongside them to create the change that they believed in. The goal of these political groups was finally realized in 1928 with the passing of the Representation of the People Act. However, the Women’s Suffrage Movement in Britain would not have been successful without the influential actions of several significant women. In addition to the overall necessity of female leadership for British Women’s Suffrage, the central efforts of Millicent Fawcett, Lydia Becker, and Emmeline Pankhurst particularly played a large role in the movement’s success.

In Jane Austen’s day, there was no state-organised education system. There were church-run day schools in the best of cases for the lower class, but the genteel children of Austen’s novels were given lessons at home by their parents or by tutors, or they were boarders or in local schools to which girls were not admitted. Parents had the choice for their children’s education and upbringing, but the choice depended mainly on their financial resources. Women were not allowed to attend public schools and since they did not usually make a career (the exception being if they were obliged because of their financial situation to become a governess), parents (and society) saw no need for them to receive higher education. “Female education” referred to women receiving a practical (and religious) training for their future domestic roles. Domestic training would be sewing or needlework,

Wrapped in gaseous mystique, Sylvia Plath’s poetry has haunted enthusiastic readers since immediately after her death in February, 1963. Like her eyes, her words are sharp, apt tools which brand her message on the brains and hearts of her readers. With each reading, she initiates them forever into the shrouded, vestal clan of her own mind. How is the reader to interpret those singeing, singing words? Her work may be read as a lone monument, with no ties to the world she left behind. But in doing so, the reader merely grazes the surface of her rich poetics. Her poetry is largely autobiographical, particularly Ariel and The Bell Jar, and it is from this frame of mind that the reader interprets the work as a

     Cavendish clearly saw the lack of educational opportunities as a hereditary disease that sickened her gender and hindered its progress.  She recognized the training that young girls went through and later passed on to their daughters, and lamented over the time wasted in things that did not advance the mind or instill proper virtues.  Such

Due to their lack of educational opportunities during the Victorian era, women were more educated in domesticity, while men were taught in various subjects. Wollstonecraft describes the education that women receive to be “a disorderly kind of education” (161). If women were given equal educational opportunities as men, then it would allow them to become more empowered. Wollstonecraft states, “Strengthen the female mind by enlarging it, and there will be an end to blind obedience…” (163). Meaning that by providing women with a educational equivalent to men, then it would put an end to women having to be reliant on men and be able to independent. Therefore, women will not have to feel inferior to their male counterparts. She encourages women to become more empowered and challenge the gender constructs of society.

In Mary Wollstonecraft’s A Vindication of the Rights of Woman, she addressed many issues for women regarding civil rights and the expectations that were held for them at the time. “…men have… been led by viewing education in a false light; not considering it as the first step to form a being advancing gradually towards perfection; but only as a preparation for life.” (Wollstonecraft 58). Essentially, Wollstonecraft implied that men interpreted education only as a means of learning how to live life. In accordance with such an interpretation, women were only allowed to learn how to be wives and mothers. Wollstonecraft also stated her own perspective as to what education needed to be perceived as in contrast to what it was believed to be. After the large uproar that A Vindication of the Rights of Woman created, Wollstonecraft’s writing inspired many other female writers to join the fray.