Sweeping generalizations made against a subgroup of the population have never favored well within a historical perspective. Countless wars and revolutions were fought to discredit generalizations because they are often either societal racism, sexism, or other maliciously conceived fallacies. While the Fortunes and Misfortunes of The Famous Moll Flanders and Company by Daniel Defoe reflects many of the ideologies upheld by eighteenth-century social culture, the book also invokes some startling theories. The most disturbing and widely respected synecdoche was that members of the middle class are morally inferior to those in higher classes. While Defoe does allude to the immorality of Great Britain’s middle class, at several points within the …show more content…
As an infant, her life path was quite distorted. Moll states the “first account that I can recollect, or could ever learn of myself, was that I had wandered among a crew of those people they call gypsies,” a group of individuals that were widely looked down upon by the general public as thieves and sinners (45). ] It is important to note, all of the misfortune that were recounted in the former were not at the hand of Moll herself but instead at her mother’s, yet her status in society was lower because of them. In fact, Moll’s lot in life had been damaged long before she could even develop a moral standing. In a lucky twist of fate, Moll found herself in the care of a local parsonage where she was placed in the care of a woman who taught her how to make a living for herself as a seamstress. Individuals living in the middle class during the eighteenth century often had outside pressures placed upon them that kept their social mobility stagnant; these outside pressures, coupled with societal stereotyping, often lead to great resentment towards their oppressors. For society to say that Moll was placed in the middle or lower class because of her inferior virtue is unfounded, and this theme is reflected in Defoe’s writing about Moll’s early beginnings.
It is indisputable that Moll’s moral standing changes drastically to reflect the stereotypical immorality of her class, however, after some reflection, it is
Since Lynn was a busy town of commerce and trade, the middle-class inhabitants were wealthy. The status of Margery?s father, John, several times mayor of Lynn, helped to instill Margery with self-respect. She was very much influenced by the people of Lynn?s concern with status and wealth: ?She had a very great envy of her neighbors that they should be as well arrayed as she.? In her Book, she even goes so far as to say that her marriage to businessman John Kempe did no justice to her ?worthy kindred? and was a socially-imbalanced relationship, although they both belonged to the same social class. This haughtiness and sense of pride are distinguishing features of Margery throughout her life.
In her book about education as a vehicle for social mobility of women in society, author, philosopher, and women’s rights activist Mary Wollstonecraft uses several rhetorical devices to build her argument about women’s roles in society. She uses a comparison and contrast expository mode to help people understand the modern woman’s experience, especially as it differs from the experience of men, appeal to pity to create an emotional connection with her audience, and restrained diction to show how confined women are in society, all through an iconoclastic and indignant tone.
Women who had no claim to wealth or beauty received the harshest of realities in America’s Victorian era. Author Charlotte Bronte – from America’s Victorian era – examines and follows the life of a girl born into these conditions in her gothic novel Jane Eyre (of which the main character’s name
Raised in a single parent household, Ellis developed a strong sense of morals regarding home life. Having helped raise her siblings, we can infer that this influenced her belief in the importance of women in a matriarchal role. Ellis writes of the necessity to be educated properly, stating that school education ‘forms but a very small part of that which they will be expected to possess’. This statement can be reinforced from the Victorian notion that a woman of the upper or middle class, though did receive an education, were expected to become accomplished as opposed to academically knowledgeable. , thus Ellis’s writings can be regarded as typical of the time.
Throughout the course of history, social hierarchies have existed across the globe, spanning from prince to pauper or business tycoon to lowly scrivener. Authors, in turn, have written works regarding social class, often examining the negative effects of societal structure on personal growth. Charlotte Brontë’s Jane Eyre takes place in Victorian England, in the age of industry and genesis of industrial capitalism. The novel’s protagonist, Jane, first lives a life of neglect, then a life in poverty, and eventually finds her happy ending. Through Jane’s personal experiences and interactions with fellow characters, Brontë analyzes the effects of social class. Professor Chris Vanden Bossche’s article analysis “What Did ‘Jane Eyre’ Do? Ideology, Agency, Class and the Novel” examines social inclusion and monetary pressures placed on the central characters during this pivotal era of English history. Through the Marxist lens, Jane Eyre can be understood in terms of complexity and character motives. Vanden Bossche effectively argues that external forces, like money and people, both motivate and repress Jane into choosing her own path. Thus, a more developed explanation is made for Jane’s various behaviors regarding social inclusion and societal rebellion.
The seventeenth century was full of challenges; political, social, and economical. Across the board individuals struggled to live, although the conditions had much improved from the beginning of the colonies. Women in particular had a difficult time fitting into this patriarchal this society. Women were defined by men and were seen as an accessory to men. In the colony of New England women were learning how to have a silent voice, while still maintaining the proper role of time. The way women were seen by men, who ran the colony, and the way men thought, not only about women, but also about the world would sculpt the society and the
1. The first essay clearly shows the impact that an ideology of domesticity on women in New England in the 1830’s. The writer at first calls this time period a “paradox in the “progress” of women’s history in the United States”. During this time apparently two contradictory views on women’s relations to society clashed, unusually, those two being domesticity, which essentially limited women, giving them a “sex-specific” role that they must abide to, this mostly being present at the home with their husbands and whatever kids they may or may not have had at that time, and feminism, which essentially tried to remove this domesticity, trying to remove sex-specific limits on women’s opportunities and
Ewen then presents the reader with Ira Steward, a weaver and leader in the Massachusetts movement for and eight hour workday. Steward goes into further detail of the reason that the middle class felt the need to focus so much on their appearance. “To advertise one’s self destitute, is to be without credit, that tides so many in safety- to their standing in society- over the shallow places where ready resources fail” (qtd. in Ewen 192). Ewen uses Steward to explain that “the poor man is an unsuccessful man” (qtd. in Ewen 192). In America, we are judged by what we own. Being poor not only means that the person is unsuccessful but it is almost as if that person isn’t even a citizen. Keeping up an image that looks good is almost like buying your way into citizenship and acceptance. “The more expensive and superior style of living adopted by the middle classes must therefore be considered in the light of an investment, made from the soundest considerations of expediency- considering their risks and their chances-and from motives even of self preservation, rather than the mere desire for self indulgence.” (qtd. in Ewen 192). Ewen presents the idea that a person’s image
The novel in which Jane Eyre stars in can be seen criticizing many aspects of those times such as the role and nature of women, child negligence and social hardships for those in a lesser class. Jane Eyre’s alienation from society allows for a greater reveal of the story’s culture, values, and assumptions. It’s presented through the use of gender, class and character conflicts throughout the story. On multiple occasions, Jane is judged for the presented factors reflecting the type of society Jane lives in and what the times were like at that time.
Wollstonecraft’s A Vindication of the Rights of Woman and Jacobs’ Incidents In the Life of a
Mary Fissell talks about how the women in the peasant class and the middle class often suffered from the idea of women being “baby machines”. One thing that I found interesting was that this belief also extended to the aristocratic class. The last chapter of Fissell’s book gives an example of an instance where the paternity of the child was called into question. The example Fissell gives is of the birth of the heir to King James II of England. Through Fissell’s research she discovered that it had originally been thought that the heir of King James II was the son of a miller. Another thing that Fissell discovered was the belief that King James II’s wife had been faking the pregnancy and while she was in the birthing room a baby had been smuggled in, in a warm pan. Fissell stresses the idea that patronage meant everything to people; children were expected to look like the
In Charlotte Bronte’s novel, Jane Eyre, Bronte seemingly condemns the existing social hierarchy. Not only are the characters who are most concerned with the allure of fortune and rank portrayed as either deceitful or unethical, but even characters who’ve accepted their means of poverty and demonstrate honest moral natures are mocked. Rather than use the normal class structures, the book suggests that a person of impoverished means can be viewed as socially respectable with the condition that they maintain a sincere desire to better both oneself and their means of living.
At a moment’s glance, Daniel’s Defoe’s 1719 publication “The Education of Women” looks to be quite progressive for the time period in which it was written. He makes a claim of policy, stating that women should be educated in order to better serve men as companions. It is his justification for his claim that falls flat when viewed under a modern lens – he cares little for the individual benefits a woman may receive from an education, instead focusing on how education will further their ability to please men. That said, Defoe does state that although they should be educated to better serve men, he does not believe they should “Stewards, Cooks, and Slaves.” He believes that “The great distinguishing difference… between men and women, is in their education”, and that women’s souls are “capable of the same accomplishments with men”. The mix of traditional and progressive views present in his essay, as well as the reasoning for such views, make the piece an interesting look into the social views of the Age of Enlightenment.
Throughout the Industrial Revolution, the lower class’s population continued to increase as more and more people became poor and fell into poverty. Although the upper class was prosperous and wealthy, they failed to assist the struggling population; this only made the problem worse. As the issue of poverty became more critical, it became a topic that authors commonly wrote about. George Orwell, Charles Dickens, and Jonathan Swift were authors who presented the problem of a poor community and a neglectful upper class to the people through the use of allegory and satire. This helped to easily convince and influence their readers. Through the use of satire and allegory, George Orwell, Charles Dickens, and Jonathan Swift effectively address the pressing issue of the upper class’s ignorance and mistreatment towards the lower, struggling class.
Wollstonecraft’s early life was, by modern standards, quite miserable. She was born as the second child on April 27, 1759 into a relatively poor family, and her father was an abusive alcoholic who often beat her mother. Her mother favored her older brother Edward over her- Wollstonecraft was never praised for anything that she did, even though she often protected her mother from her father’s attacks. These blatant injustices helped her to learn from an early age to be independent and to not depend on anyone, and this want for independence would follow her into adulthood (Ferguson and Todd 1). After seeing her mother’s unhappy state, she began to hate that marriage was unequal and unbalanced in power, which led her to avoid marriage until she was 38. Most of the male figures in her early life were unreliable and unjust, and she realized that she would have to rely on herself.