Inequalities Of Women During The Enlightenment

Both Jean-Jacques Rousseau and Mary Wollstonecraft agree that in society women and men are not equals. Rousseau’s idea that socialization brings inequality in his Discourse On the Origin of Inequality is manipulated by Wollstonecraft in her A Vindication of the Rights of Women. She uses his arguments to prove that the inequality between men and women is not natural, but it comes from Rousseau’s idea of socialized inequality. The inequality experienced by women is a product of society, which Wollstonecraft tries to prove by uses Rousseau’s arguments about language and dependency.

Women in Renaissance Italy faced rigid societal standards to which they were supposed to conform. They lived public lives, directed almost exclusively by other people in regards to significant decisions. However, this does not mean that a rise above the oppressive nature of the Renaissance was impossible. Several exceptional women were able to challenge their given positions in a society through their education, practices, seclusion, beauty, and roles. In an examination of several positions, through the Exhortations to Women and to Others If They Please by Lucrezia Marinella and the letters of Laura Cereta, a Renaissance feminist, women can be seen as accepting of their position in society or rebelling against it. Their lives and prescriptive writings show how one can either follow the role given to them or exceed beyond it and become an exceptional woman.

The French philosopher and author of The Social Contract, Jean–Jacques Rousseau, postulated that “Women…possess no artistic sensibility…Their creations are as cold and pretty as women themselves” (Yudkin, 110). Rousseau wrote during the Enlightenment, a period of intellectual expansion in Europe during the eighteenth century. During the Enlightenment, philosophers explored the nature of religion, government, and society, capitalizing on themes such as freedom and equality. Yet, despite the social expansion of the period, the enlightened definition of equality did not include women. In fact, society clearly and limitedly defined the roles of women during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. As dictated by society, men and women not only

In Wollstonecraft’s work, she addresses the differences between men and women as being something that should be considered negligible, but instead is used to practically enslave one half of the population. The work details how women are akin to playthings when they lack an education, and that for her to truly be herself and practice her own free will, she must be knowledgeable. However, there are many different kinds of education, Wollstonecraft points out. Men received a formal education, consisting of a proper teaching of many subjects, while also aiding the young men in personal growth. Women, on the other hand, received a much less formal education. In their day to day lives, women observed, they leeched off

The Enlightenment was a movement that started in the 17th century, but continued in the 18th and 19th century. It was a turning point in history, where people explored, and considered answers outside of their religious beliefs. The Enlightenment challenged social structures, forms of government, and even religion. More people were led to ask more questions on sciences without the fear of being prosecuted. Writings of the Enlightenment brought on quite a few debates regarding women. A lot of women played active roles in the era of enlightenment, which was indefinitely a pro-male movement. The mentality of Enlightenment thinkers had placed women in a traditional “role”. They completely disregarded any benefits that these women could offer

Though women made up a significant part of an artist’s workshop crew, there is little documentation or representation of women as the artists or artisans in the writings and illustrations from The Encyclopédie, which represents one of France’s greatest contributions and influences on The Enlightenment movement. Though a majority of the illustrative plates of the Encyclopédie do not include any people, as the plates are mostly diagrams about anatomy, scientific concepts, machines, instruments and tools, those that do have people at work portray them as almost exclusively men, with women playing subservient roles when they are pictured. Furthermore, in discussing women from a scientific viewpoint, various contributing authors describe women as the lesser half of men, never given the respect of being considered an individual, with her roles as mother, sister, wife culminating in her definition and limitation. Women were prized for their “beauty, modesty, complaisance, cleverness, fertility, impressive ancestors, and lots of land.” (citation needed) Unable to train officially as an apprentice, women were rarely granted the protections of Guilds,

Wollstonecraft idealized vision of family life is compatible with women liberation as her actions have been working towards gaining the same equal rights men have, for women in society. Wollstonecraft published a book ‘Vindication of the Rights of Women’ to portray her views towards gender inequality and expressed key ideas about how this affected women in society. Her views towards the idea of marriage and motherhood in the late eighteenth century, stated that there needed to be a change and that women should be given equal rights to men (reference).

Wollstonecraft strongly believed that educated women needed to educate children and wanted to redefine the role of women in society as free and rational citizens, independent mothers and working professionals. Like Rousseau she supported the idea of informal teaching methods and the ideas of equality, freedom and rationality though she believed, to much controversy, that these should also apply to women. ʻ… make women rational creatures, and free citizens and they will quickly become good mothers; that is - if men do not neglect their duties as husbands and fathers.ʼ - Wollstonecraft She too expressed her strong ideas and opinions in the form of a book, 'A Vindication of the Rights of Women'. Though she was a strong advocate for feminism, later in the feminist movement many women didn't want to associate their beliefs with Wollstonecraft as she was very public with her opinions of sexual freedom and marriage referring to it as prostitution and slavery, a statement that offended many

Wollstonecraft, outlines the issues faced with motherhood. Many women are expected to have children as this is a part of who they are (Ford, 2009). Wollstonecraft outlines the need for women in society to not conform and to try to teach their children equality, and not to please men, and she states that in society many “parents are the educators forced young girls into a precocious desire to please men at the expense of developing their intellects and capacity for virtue” (Field, 2011). This quote expresses Wollstonecraft’s need for women to not conform to society ideals, and as parents, they should try and teach their children that they do not need to please men, as they “must be taught to respect themselves as rational creatures” (Field,

Wollstonecraft thought that education should be made readily available to everyone in order to have a just community, and that by only educating the men they were leaving a major gap in the wider community in which an educated women could have easily filled. She also wanted women and men to hold the same virtues and ethics both citizenly and domestically. Although Rousseau and Wollstonecraft had many differences in the way they saw people and education they also had many similarities, both philosophers make note in the workings of educating both boys and girls, they ended up different views on the situation but they both consider the facts unlike multiple other writers of their time who ignored the fact that women should be educated too. They also both expressed a

Wollstonecraft’s thinking went further than Rousseau’s disagreeing with him because she believed women should be treated the same as men and be able to make choices for themselves and be independent from men.

The Primary documents, Freedom of a Christian (1520) by Martin Luther, Articles Concerning Predestination (1560) and The Necessity of Reforming the Church (1543) by John Calvin, and A New Kind of Catholicism (1546, 1549, 1553) by St. Ignatius of Loyola, show that 16th century Europe was very much religiously centered. Even though these documents highlight upon the differences between each branch of religion, we learn that all people were united under the general banner of “religion”. Religion was something the state could control. They could control the churches, unite the people under a common faith, distract them with religious righteousness and wars over the “one true religion”. Religious reasons even justified global expansion, spreading

According to her statement, “For if it be allowed that women were destined by Providence to acquire human virtues, and by the exercise of their understandings, that stability of character which is the firmest ground to rest our future hopes upon, they must be permitted to turn to the fountain of light and, not forced to shape their course by the twinkling of a mere satellite (Wollstonecraft 21).” She believe that if women were able to achieve the same education as men then they would have equal opportunity as men. She also argues that women should make new image of themselves with self-respect through education. In fact, Wollstonecraft believes that women who are not given the equal amount of rights with men are not considered free. Wollstonecraft believes that a women “are either as moral beings, or so weak that they must be entirely subjected to the superior faculties of men (Wollstonecraft 27).” Within this statement, it shows that Wollstonecraft argues that women in this society should not be displayed as a dependent figure, but as an independent figure. In general Wollstonecraft believes that women should be givens the chance to achieve the same opportunities as men and promote the weak figure they are seen as.

The Swiss philosopher and author of The Social Contract, Jean–Jacques Rousseau, postulated that “Women…possess no artistic sensibility…Their creations are as cold and pretty as women themselves” (Yudkin, 110). Rousseau wrote during the Enlightenment, a period of intellectual expansion in Europe during the eighteenth century. During the Enlightenment, philosophers explored the nature of religion, government, justice, and society, and their findings surged across Europe—in essays, in rebellions, and in art. Yet, despite the social expansion of the period, the “enlightened” definition of equality, one major thee of the Enlightenment, did not include women. The roles of women in society were limited and strictly defined during the eighteenth and

Jean Jacques Rousseau was a philosopher, writer, and composer of the 18th century. He argued for separate spheres in society for men and women, he desired a traditional and conservative role for women. He stated that women should be educated for a position inferior to men, accentuating specifically women’s function in taking care of children. Rousseau’s opinion was that there was barely anything for women to do but make themselves pleasing to men. He, like Montesquieu, portrayed women as weaker and inferior to men in realistically, all aspects except, maybe giving love. He excluded women from political life, unlike Montesquieu, and believed that men were to fill the roles in the world of citizenship, political action, and civic virtue, this