Women Of The Victorian Era

During the Victorian period, upper and middle class men and women existed in different spheres of life: the private sphere, and the public sphere. The private sphere, which included taking care of the home, entertaining guests, and raising children was dominated by women. Meanwhile men were superior in the public sphere, where they took part in politics and business. This lead to the archetypes of women being fragile and motherly, controlled by their emotions, and of men being rational and strong. Social norms, supported by laws, viewed women as “relative creatures” that were below men in the natural hierarchy and only defined in reference to men. These two ideas towards women created a gap of equality for women and constricted them to their sphere of domesticity. The suffrage movement, followed by the first and second waves of feminism gave rise to many civil rights for women, narrowing the gap of inequality. The quest for equality continues today, as these two spheres begin to merge, due to the rise in social media and the subsequent decreasing private life, and women gain more influence in the public sphere. While the forms of inequality are different and an issue for both genders, the Victorian ideas are still present and prominent today.

Thesis: A “true women” in the 19th Century was one who was domestic, religious, and chaste. These were virtues established by men but enforced and taught by other women. Women were also told that they were inferior to men and they should accept it and be grateful that someone just loved them.

Throughout history civilizations have been governed by patriarchal societies dependent on the status and respectability of men. Men held all the power while women were subservient and even sometimes owned by men. This notion is only emphasized the moment we go back in time in the Victorian Era. Women were subject to men’s oppression, held no actual roles besides motherhood and were reliant on their chastity to project an agreeable image of themselves and their spouse. The status of a Victorian woman is depicted in “The Lady of Shalott” by Alfred Lord Tennyson and in a more feminist approach in “Goblin Market” by Christina Rossetti as being dependent on their chastity, servitude to men, and ability to present themselves.

The ideal woman in Victorian Times epitomized the good and virtuous woman whose live revolved around the domestic sphere of the family and home. She was pious, respectable and busy with no time for idle leisure. Her diligent and evident constant devotion to her husband, as well as to her God. She accepted her place in the sexual hierarchy. Her role was that of a domestic manager: wives and mothers. By the time that the industrial era was well under way in Britain, the ideology that committed the private sphere to the woman and the public sphere of business, commerce, and politics to the man had been widely dispersed. Women had to fight for an education equal to that of men, many struggled for suitable,

Parisa Abdollahi November 25, 2014 ENG 125 Prof. Ravy Imperfection Queen Victoria says, "Let women be what God intended, a helpmate for man, but with totally different duties and vocations. " Sexism had a major role in the early 19th century literature. Numerous writers wrote about house chores, and how a real housewife should accomplish them. The society's expectations from a women role vary from a sexual satisfaction good to a caring and passionate mother, as well as a proper housekeeper. Although a minority of women stay single, they have no choice other than working as servants and cooks.

man or had a single sexual liaison with another man, her husband had legal grounds to divorce her, keep any money she brought into the wedding, and

The doctor William Acton (1813-1875) once declared, “The majority of women (happily for them) are not very much troubled with sexual feeling of any kind”. This view, and many similar, are what was assumed of women for many centuries. The condition of women was very poor, as they were seen as the weaker sex, and generally hysterical compared to men. Within more recent centuries however, this fact has changed. Throughout the industrial revolution, taking place within Victorian era England, the condition of women improved due to various changes in society. These changes included, but are not limited to: gender views, education, work, family laws and, representation in media.

The most common way to characterize a society at a given time is to divide it into social classes and evaluate the differences between each group. However, the period known as the Victorian era in England, from 1837 to 1901, witnessed such polarized gender roles that it can also be analyzed according to the different functions assigned to men and women, more commonly known as the ideology of separate spheres. The separate spheres framework holds that “men possessed the capacity for reason, action, aggression, independence, and self-interest [thus belonging to the public sphere]. Women inhabited a separate, private sphere, one suitable for the so called inherent qualities of femininity: emotion, passivity, submission, dependence, and selflessness, all derived, it was claimed insistently, form women’s sexual and reproductive organization”. Following such principles allowed men, allegedly controlled by their mind or intellectual strength, to dominate society, to be the governing sex, given that they were viewed as rational, brave, and independent. Women, on the other hand, were dominated by their sexuality, and were expected to fall silently into the social mold crafted by men, since they were regarded as irrational, sensitive, and dutiful. As Susan Kent observes: “Women were so exclusively identified by their sexual functions that nineteenth-century society came to regard them as ‘the Sex’”1. This essay will examine the Victorian social institutions of marriage, motherhood,

A women’s profession can define her character in society during the Victorian Era. Women are known for strong work ethic. Originally a woman supposed to take care the house hold while the man work. The Victorian society was based off three classes. The Upper Class, Middle Class, and the Working Class. The Upper Class hold the most power because they were given authority, the best living, and control over the other classes. The Upper Class did not have to work hard because their families of years before their time had already gathered funds, so therefore, they would not run out of money. They lived Queens with a glamourous life. Aristocrats,

Historically, the average women in the Victorian era were only known for doing domestic chores. Middle class women were raised to be submissive, obedient and virginal to fit the image of the Virgin Mother Mary during this era, and having her rights taken away with the male of the household whether it be her father or eldest brother, who would decide what would be best for her. There were very few professions that were open to women who had an education such as a governess as a way to support themselves when times were tough. If a women were to have a higher level of education the men considered it to be of no use because they believed women to be the weaker counterpart both mentally and physically, as well as thinking that work made women ill.

Throughout the late 1800s and early 1900s, romanticism begins to fade, while the Victorian world begins to come into play. During this time, democracy and capitalism came together as one. Also, many poets described justice in two different aspects: spiritual and freedom. Carlyle believes capitalism should be replaced with a powerful individual whom is appointed (Ten Commandments) by God. However, Mill believes that a perfect society should be based upon individual freedom. Later in the Victorian period, the women of this period started to voice their opinions throughout Great Britain. These women started the Women’s Rights movement, and started joining the gentlemen by writing poetry through the two aspects of spiritual and freedom. So throughout

As a statewide organisation, our work to improve the sexual and reproductive health of all Victorian women is directed at achieving systemic change for population-wide health improvements. In doing this, we collaborate with individuals and organisations whose work impacts on the sexual and reproductive health of Victorian women. These include:

Both Victorian men and women felt strongly the tension between women’s desire for independence definitions of women’s proper role and genius. Feminism itself was shaped by this and other tensions. Feminists did not want to consider marriage as a woman’s only proper place and resisted, the conservatives tendency to decrease the Female Middle Class Emigration Society, but to some extent they viewed women’s work in the public sphere as an exercise of the moral superiority attributed to women by the Victorian myth and as an enlargement of women’s maternal and domestic duties to the teaching and organizing up of society as a whole.

Social boundaries and moral restrictions on women take over Victorian England in the Eighteenth and Nineteenth centuries. However, deviant women appear to be beyond such confines. As mentioned before, women were placed in the house and labeled as “the angel in the house.” Conversely, such criterion has been undermined with the emergence of the “femme fatale” as Victorian England becomes vulnerable to internal and external threats represented by such type of evil women. As Auerbach observes, “in Victorian England, an age possessed by faith but deprived of dogma, any incursion of the supernatural into the natural became ambiguously awful because unclassifiable” (75). More distinctively, such images of women were in line with the Victorian

The Victorian period spawned a spiritualist movement, abandoning ordinary religion. The movement, which ran from 1837 to 1901, was named after Queen Victoria. Economic activity increased as the period saw the rise of the industrial revolution and advancements in various technologies: steamships, electric power, and telephones. A prevalent aspect of the time was child labor, which was considerably cheaper than conventional adult workers (Mullan). Likewise, women in the Victorian period were often treated as second class citizens and needed to contend for basic human rights. The literature of this period was quite distinct, often dealing with new and unique topics such as: class, gothic, politics, and romanticism. Many authors during the time expressed an extreme amount of passion in their writing, occasionally including personal conflicts. The Victorian period was the first step to social diversity, in a time where literary criticism was on the rise, and social class was more important than ever. The unjust social conditions that many authors faced during the Victorian era continues to inspire literary innovations.