Feminist Theory And Gender Inequality

She acknowledged how most people believed that women should be beautiful, emotional, and dependent on men. Therefore, women were discouraged from going to school. Out of all the problems in society during that time, this had affected the most amount of people. Wolstonecraft thought the both genders should live by the same principle and equality.You can infer this by when she says ‘’...both sexes must act from the same principle.. Women must be allowed to found their own virtue on knowledge, which is scarcely possible unless they be educated by the same pursuits as men.’’ This means both sexes should hold the same value and be educated the same, but men are afraid that they will be more intelligent than they turn out to be. Wollstonecraft used self-example to explain her reasoning. Wollstonecraft believed that your gender shouldn’t affect how you’re supposed to be treated, what kind of education you should get, or what kind of job you’re supposed to

In introduction, Mary Wollstonecraft wastes no time to illustrate and sadness and disappointment with their education system and their educators. Wollstonecraft believes that men see women as wives and mistresses and not “human creatures” and that the government observes the female as inferior to male. To Wollstonecraft, the instruction of women to be beautiful and yielding to men in search for marriage leaves their minds and usefulness sacrificed. Wollstonecraft’s writings are a clear and direct cry to women to have and explore their desires as well as curiosity, and in that regards, intelligence and human character. Wollstonecraft contends that a more educated woman would bring about a happier husband, child, and society. A quote that summarizes

She argues against the assertion that men and women have innately different personalities, saying that the perception that women are flightier than men should not excuse the refusal of an education: “If then women are not a swarm of ephemeron triflers, why should they be kept in ignorance under the specious name of innocence?” (Wollstonecraft). She correctly identifies the fact that women’s education would stop women from being effectively enslaved by men and threaten their cultural supremacy: “Strengthen the female mind by enlarging it, and there will be an end to blind obedience” (Wollstonecraft). Wollstonecraft believes that the continued oppression of women in terms of education betrays the Enlightenment virtues of reason in favor of a patriarchal system that uplifts some members and not others (i.e.

With this assertion, Wollstonecraft argues that the only reason that women are perceived as less than and incapable is solely because of the fact that they, women, are not afforded the same levels of education that are given to males leading to women using more primitive means to further their, societally created, frivolous goals of beauty and popularity, “they [civilized women] are, therefore, in a much worse condition than they would be in were they in a state nearer to nature…all their thoughts turn on things calculated to excite emotion and feeling, when they should reason.” (79). If education were given to these women who are clearly lacking in it,

Before the rise of the feminist movement in the late 19th century, women were denied social power and the ability to self-express which led women to desire a voice of their own. Since then, feminism has been widely perceived and controversial which provoked feminists to emphasize women’s needs by confronting the social oppression of women and analyze how their feeling of self-doubt results in response to the constant power struggle between the two sexes. Not only did women protest for more rights, but men also sought equal rights, thereby strengthening the feminist movement further. In Donald Hall’s book Literary and Cultural Theory, he explores the various lenses of feminism by discussing how patriarchy affects the social, economic, and psychological

In the preface of her book she writes, “my main argument is built on this simple principle, that if woman be not prepared by education to become the companion of man, she will stop the progress of knowledge and virtue; for truth must be common to all (Wollstonecraft).” She claims that without the gift and opportunity for women to be educated, society will ultimately become a tumultuous and uncivilized place seeing as primarily their mothers teach most young children, both boys and

G. D. Anderson said it the best, "Feminism isn't about making woman stronger. Women are already strong. It's about changing the way the world perceives that strength." Feminism is improving the inequality that women face. As women, we have come a long way from our catastrophic past, but we still have a long way to go before we are even deemed equal as the opposite sex. There are three historical areas of inequality in the feminist movement: political, cultural, and economic.

Wollstonecraft touches on various topics referring to equality of men and women, but one of the most prominent ones that she speaks of in this essay is the equality of education between the two. She

In Wollstonecraft’s Vindication of the Right of Women education is a tool used to gain freedom and be proactive in determining one’s fate. Wollstonecraft states that it is a farce to call any being virtuous whose virtues do not result from the exercise of its own reason (12). This means that in the eyes of Wollstonecraft is being proactive in determining your fate, which she considers a virtue. However, the only way to control your fate is to educate themselves about the society they live in(11). Through this education one is able to come to their on conclusions on what is right, and wrong as well as define virtues for themselves. With this freedom an individual has the ability to lay laws upon themselves and follow them, which Wollstonecraft considered a great virtue. This relationship between virtue and education greatly contributes to her belief that women should be able to receive an education like that of a man. For Wollstonecraft education equates to freedom and freedom to determine one 's life is virtuous. However, under oppressive patriarchy women are restricted from receiving equal education, which in

The topics of gender inequality become more and more popular in the society because a lot of reports show that many women are killed by bias on all over the world every year and women are hard to find a job in some places nowadays. Under this background, the “team” of feminist becomes stronger and stronger. In‘’ ‘I’ve been pondering whether you can be a part-feminist’: Young Australian Women’s Studies student discuss gender”, Kate Hughes presents the changing of students who has different gender perceptions . He mentions: “The background to this study is one Women’s Studies program which can be positioned as part of ‘new wave’ Women’s Studies.” That shows the women’s power has played an important role in people’s mind. In the article, people’s show thier ideas about ethnicity, equality, and freedom, but it doesn’t talk about the situation of the gender inequality and how people solve such questions from all over the world. How is the gender inequality affect people’s life? Are they being solved? What measures do people use to solve those problems? In this paper, I will discuss gender inequality issues and the different measures people use to fix up the questions.

As far as summarizing the equalities and inequalities of the sexes, Wollstonecraft completed the task the best by stating her points in a rational, logical manner. Wollstonecraft stated how men were physically superior, and commended men on that. She also saw society making a mockery of females through the education they receive and the roles that women played in society throughout their life. Her biggest point were that men did not take women seriously, but made them out to be more of an object of desire rather than a respectable, equal individual. Throughout the years this has changed to a point, but still is an issue because many females are not taken seriously in the work place and are even paid less because men tend to work as the heads

examine the scarcity of jobs and the patterns of inequality that arise when comparing who gets hired and who doesn’t. Or it could attempt to explain how people who are born into poverty may find it difficult to change their financial status. Through this theory, sociologists can infer why inequalities exist, what perpetuates them, and who is responsible. It should be noted, though, that this theory doesn’t reflect the ways in which conflict isn’t necessarily always a negative. Conflict and struggle often bring people together and motivate them to work hard. This theory takes a pessimistic view of society, because it assumes that people with power and wealth try to keep others away from it. It seems that most people are more optimistic than that, and they think that they can improve their lives through their own efforts. Conflict theory may be useful to point out inequalities, but it fails to convey how people view them.

Long time ago, parents tended to invest on their sons rather than their daughters. In the past, most of boys went to school, and girls stayed home. At that moment, the women were not treated equally because they did not go outside to work. The women only stayed home to take care of children and do housework, so they depended on their husband financially. Nowadays people have still treated one another differently based on group identity, especially when it comes to gender appearances. Gender inequality has been happening around the world, it still occurs at some careers, workplaces, and at home. Culture has a great impact on gender inequality in some developing countries. For instance, Vietnamese people like to have more sons rather than daughters because they believe in “raising a daughter is like watering your neighbors’ garden,” and raising a daughter as “ploughing someone else’s field” (Jayachandran, 2014, p. 11). In Vietnam, parents usually invest more on their sons rather than daughters because the sons play a significant role in religious rituals. Jayachandran (2014) reported that “sons will carry on the family name or widows wanting to retain family land also make the first son especially valuable” (p.14). Therefore, the sons are valued in my family. I still remember when I was a child, I saw my mother tried to be pregnant several times to have baby boys. However, she had only one boys, and four girls accidently. When I was a little, I noticed the gender was

Feminists seek to reconstruct decrepit ideas of femininity, and extinguish female oppression over the years. Feminist literary criticism, in the first and seconds waves, critique patriarchal language, by

For ages it was believed that the different characteristics, roles and status accorded to women and men in society are determined by sex, that they are natural and therefore not changeable.