...activists are frequently judged—and not always about their cause. One example of this is Mary Wollstonecraft, who lived a considerably different life compared to most people. Mary was born on April 27, 1759, in Spitalfields, London. Her father unsuccessfully spent way too much money in farming, as well as abusing her. Her mother died in 1780, and after that, Mary could no longer stand her life at home and left to live on her own. Her best friend Fanny joined her, and the two of them started a school together. Fanny, though, died in 1785, and after that, Mary became a governess for an Irish family by the name of Kingsborogh. She quickly learned that she didn’t like that job. In 1787, she wrote a pamphlet called, “Thoughts on the Education of Daughters.” Then, she translated radical...
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...Mary Wollstonecraft is first to introduce the idea that women are worth more than just an being object. Wollstonecraft identifies why women are subordinate to men. From the beginning of a woman's life, the moment they enter the world, they are considered weak and dependent on men. Women are socialized to only want to be beautiful so they can attract men. They engage in rivalries with other women. They are focused on no other concerns or duties because they are confined to their private world. They cannot exercise reason or education, and are expected to stay in a dependent state. Wollstonecraft’s argument is based on the principle that if woman is not educated to be the equal of man, knowledge and truth will be prevented from progressing...
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...signing social contracts that would enable members of the community to co-exist peacefully. Members of the society transferred their rights to some few individuals who were bestowed with the duty of leading the society. This era paved way for the formation of various democratic societies, and increased interest in social studies by various sociologists (Coady, 2005). One such sociologist is Mary Wollstonecraft, whose sociological work largely transformed subsequent studies, formation, ideologies and inclinations of the society towards women, education and human rights (Browning et al, 1999). This essay is going to critically evaluate the works of Mary Wollstonecraft as well as a critical analysis of the socialist contribution to the sturdy of the society. The essay will also evaluate the impacts of the sociologist’s ideas on current sociological studies regarding the society. Discussion Background information Mary Wollstonecraft was born on 27th April 1759 and died on 10th September 1797. She was considered a prolific writer, a staunch advocate for women rights and a philosopher. Mary has...
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...The writings of Mary Wollstonecraft directly and indirectly explore the irony of the woman’s position in Wollstonecraft’s culture: the female figure is at once central and alienated. The following annotated bibliography features articles about the writings of Mary Wollstonecraft by Steven Blakemore, Maria J. Falco, Cindy L. Griffin, and Vivian Jones. Three of the four authors take a feminist approach: Falco provides a collection of feminist critiques of Wollstonecraft’s work; Griffin asserts that Wollstonecraft is the first author to write about an alienation from the perspective of women’s issues and rights; and Jones’s essay comments on the sexualizing of the historical narrative by Helen Maria Williams and Mary Wollstonecraft. Blakemore provides a different approach, examining Miltonic references in Vindications of the rights of woman. References (Blakemore S 1992 Rebellious reading: the doubleness of Wollstonecraft's subversion of Paradise Lost)Blakemore, S. (1992). Rebellious reading: the doubleness of Wollstonecraft's subversion of Paradise lost. Texas Studies in Literature and Language, 34, 451-80. Blakemore’s article is a close reading of the Miltonic references in Wollstonecraft’s Vindication of the rights of woman. His argument centers on the proposition that during the revolutionary period writers attempted to subvert texts which “stressed the satanic dangers of epistemological curiosity” (p. 451). However, he feels that Wollstonecraft’s use of Milton rebounds...
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...Marry Wollstonecraft and Her Role in Activism Mary Wollstonecraft was a powerful thinker, philosopher, and women’s rights activist born in Spitalfields, London on 27 April 1759. According to Taylor, Mary Wollstonecraft made several accomplishments during her brief career including writing several novels, making treaties, travel narratives; conduct books, history of the French, and the children book (32). Besides her career, Mary Wollstonecraft is well recognized not only for the vindication of women’s rights but significantly advocated for the equal rights and opportunities for both men and women. In 1792, Mary Wollstonecraft was quoted saying that women were not naturally inferior to men rather appeared to be because they had no education. The 18th century notion of women being less important part of the society deterred the “integration of their rights” into the human rights was unthinkable (Miriam 43). However, Mary Wollstonecraft argued that if a man was born free and entitled to every human dignity so should be the woman. The understanding of human rights and liberties became the core pillar of Mary Wollstonecraft in the vindication of equal education opportunities for men and women. Mary Wollstonecraft has been severally quoted by today’s human rights activists in the fight against gender based violence among other injustices in many parts of the world. Unfortunately, Mary Wollstonecraft’s vindications and vision for the women freedom has not been fully realized nearly...
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...Imagine a society where “woman will either be the friend or slave of man, ” resulting in a separation of genders (34). During the 18th Century in Europe, there were many cultural and social differences between men and women. In her book, A Vindication of the Rights of Woman, Mary Wollstonecraft confronts the many norms of the time period that was a large intellectual and cultural movement. This period of Enlightenment spread throughout Europe quickly, especially through literacy. With people such as Wollstonecraft, Immanuel Kant, and Jean-Jacques Rousseau, the cultures of then and now are capable of tracking the norms by understanding through reason and ultimately thinking for oneself (McChesney 02/02/2015). By using logic and reason, the evaluation of the social and cultural norms during the Enlightenment are evident. Wollstonecraft primarily identifies that there is a large difference of respect upon women...
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...social and political structures were becoming increasingly challenged. The French Revolution was influenced by Romantic ways of thinking such as what it means to achieve liberty for the individual. The romantic exploration of liberty for the individual through a connection to nature, imagination and spirituality through the sublime are represented in both Coleridge's poem Kubla Kahn and Keat’s “Ode to a Nightingale”. These romantic views were a direct reaction from the art of the enlightenment era as explored in the 1768 painting of Agrippina Landing at Brundisium, emotional stoicism is represented as being a model for morality in society. Revolutionary questioning of the fundamental nature of humanity and change for women was explored in Mary Wollstonecraft's text "A vindication in the rights of women". The 1768 painting by Benjamin West of Agrippina landing at Brundisium depicts the qualities of the Enlightenment that the romantics rebelled against. The neoclassical painting was popular during the enlightenment as it stressed logic, harmony, proportion and reason over emotion. This is represented in the paintings frieze-like composition and the buildings in the city background represent a structured, ordered society. The emotional restraint evident within the widow’s grief emphasises the...
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...Karl Marx’s Capital and Mary Wollstonecraft’s A Vindication of the Rights of Women are both texts that have influenced modern ideas and withstood the test of time. Though on very different topics, Wollstonecraft writing of the plights of women and Marx commenting on capitalistic society, the both explore similar ideas and a structure within society that demonstrates a system of the weak and the powerful, and the issues with this societal structure. This paper will be scrutinizing the strengths of each writing, and how they are still congruent to modern society as it still stands. In Capital, Karl Marx states that the manner through which the social production takes place appears to based on both freedom and equality within the capitalistic...
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...Staying with topic of discrimination and the rights of individuals, is that of Mary Wollstonecraft, author of A Vindication of the Rights of Woman (1792). Although Wollstonecraft wrote about the issues that plagued females that limited their privileges, she also acknowledged that with these privileges also came a responsibility and an anticipated change (Van Camp, 2014). Wollstonecraft was a woman without a background in a traditional learning environment and therefore sought the commonality between logic and learning from instruction in the quest to find liberty and virtue (Van Camp, 2014). The commonality and link between these is that essentially liberty is freedom and freedom has the ability to lead to happiness, as well as to find what is good in an individual thus virtue, if liberties are not given to women in the form of logic and education there lacks the freedom to find ones virtue (Powell, 1996). Jim Powell elaborates by quoting Wollstonecraft, “Wollstonecraft called for eliminating obstacles to the advancement of women, “Liberty is the...
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...Excerpts from A vindication of the rights of woman, 1792 by Mary Wollstonecraft is about women that how they were treated. She explains that women should enjoy as much education, power and influence in society as men do. Women become a smart like a men if they get the same education that the men get. Women were not here to dressing nicely and keep quiet. Every men and women were born with equal human rights. Moreover, women life was full of house chores that they did not think about their natural rights of freedom. During the time of 18th century, women were considered intelligent by looking at a household skill. Even the adult women think that their child (daughter) should stay home and take care of their own children and husband. The author...
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...From the Enlightenment style of thinking, feminism ideas continues to build on the role of females and brought in great attention to the global social aspect. In one of her most famous work, “Vindication of the Rights of Women” (1792), Mary Wollstonecraft criticized what the Revolution’s phase “ the rights of man” meant and argued that the Enlightenment’s idea of universal peace between men and women can only be followed if a mutual respect is developed in both of their political and social equality. Many arguments say that men have the power to lead the nature of humans to virtue and happiness in life due to the amount of education they have, a strong body, and the society’s support while women have “knowledge of human weakness justly termed...
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...This essay explains three key features of the Age of Enlightenment that include liberalism, rationalism and equality. These key features will be explained in terms of how they reflect specific assumptions about children and education. Furthermore to evaluate how these ideas have impacted children’s education in both the past and the present. Liberalism requires members of society to develop liberal ideas such as individualism and independence amongst the likes of John Locke who wrote a book called ‘Some thought Concerning Education’ (1893) which emphasises the significance of early education in the home. “upbringing in the home is crucial for the development of good character” (May, 1997, p. 3). Rationalism is another imperative feature of the Age of Enlightenment as people used theory to make sense of human development along the likes of Rousseau. His book, ‘Emile’ is about the development of a young boy becoming a man using his ideas for child rearing. “education should be a response to the child’s curiosity and interest to natural world.” (May, p. 39-40, 2005) This theory was put into practice by Johann Heinrich Pestalozzi who was so impressed with his ideas that “he attempted to rear his child according to Rousseau’s principles” (May, 1997, p. 11). The Enlightenment implies equality necessary for females to be educated alongside men to allow for equal opportunity. In Wollstonecraft’s book ‘A Vindication of the Rights of Women’ (1792) she protests for women’s rights...
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...Rights for women have developed quite seriously over time, especially over the course of the last 300 years. Women have always been a marginalized group, so when they wrote novels up until the 20th century, it was a solid piece of literature always influenced by the world around them. This is especially true for Mary Shelley, author of Frankenstein, who was a growing young adult during the victorian era in which “Separate Spheres” developed, but Shelley was born to two significant political figures: William Godwin, a known anarchist, and Mary Wollstonecraft, a large advocator for women’s rights. Shelley was never meant to follow societal expectations, and the female characters in her novel represent the belief that women can easily fit into both spheres. The women in Frankenstein are a combination of both tradition and non-traditional female roles which allow them to have superiority above other characters in the novel, but their tendency to lean towards motherhood prevails. Characters such as Safie, Justine, and Elizabeth all made lasting marks upon the two male characters in the novel, shaping Frankenstein and his creations’s actions by leading them...
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... and the eighteenth century was no exception. In some ways, the family grew in its importance to female identity in the Enlightenment age. Education played a prominent role and became encouraged more than ever before, but mainly on the basis of their eventual role as mothers. Women’s reproductive function became their sole claim to significance. Mothers and wives were elevated as man’s partners in preparing a new generation of enlightenment thinkers and workers. In order to fulfill the enlightenment idea of femininity, an eighteenth-century women needed the social position, the fertility and the resources of the middle class to permit her to focus all of her attentions upon nursing and educating them. Many such as career woman, Mary Wollstonecraft, vigorously protested against the subjection of women and argued against being reckoned as a frivolous sex and ridiculed by writers. She made the argument for women to receive a careful education in order to contribute to society and become more notable and against the slavish obedience to share rights in order emulate the virtues of man. Other scholars such as J.A Sharpe criticized the view of a women’s first duty as obedience and subordination to her husband, as well as how marriage consisted of mutual support and equal contribution. This view of marriage became a milestone for the role of women in the eighteenth century as women progressed from being obedient and subordinate to their husband. This idea was supported by the growing...
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...with your own terms of comparison. Marx and Wollstonecraft both had a strong knowledge of what was wrong in their current society between either a laborer and capitalists in the work force for Marx, or the coexistence of men and women in society for Wollstonecraft. Wollstonecraft argued women should have the right to be modest intelligent people, as to make better companions to their husbands. Not to rise above them but to be equal as gender and reasoning for both men and women should be the same, making a better society. For Marx, his argument was there are two classes the capitalists (bourgeois) and the laborers (proletarians). The relationship they had, which made up the work force, was a miserable and dreaded place which was not at the...
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