Gender Roles In Imperial Russia

For most of recorded history, the central focus has been on men and their actions in the society they belong to. They are the military men fighting wars to expand their country’s territory or fighting against an enemy of the country. Men for the longest time ,until the twentieth century, had been in government positions. Working class men, peasants, and slaves were vital for the economy in the country they reside in as they provided the food supply for the population and worked in the various industries that supplied the country with steel, clothing, etc. Religion, such as the Abrahamic religions, centered around a relationship between man and the Divine. Imperial Russia was no exception to this patriarchal trend as was the case with mostly

every other society in the world. That is not to say that history should only be about men as women had always been around since the beginning of mankind as well. In Imperial Russia, women also had roles in society, although their experiences differ from that of men.
Women in the working class were often workers working as domestic servants for families of higher statuses or as factory workers.

In the case of domestic servants and factory workers, the women working as the former were not better off than the women working as the latter. It was believed that domestic servants enjoyed better working conditions since it was strongly believed that housework could not be bad compared to having to work with dangerous machinery in the factories. Although industries require at least a hundred workers to work the machineries, most domestic servants served middle-class urban families whose income can only pay one servant. Not only did the work pile up for one servant, but also these women were also required to work for eighteen hours every day compared to factory women. While factory work was seen as a unisex job, the job of domestic servants had been feminized and only a small number of men worked as

such.
In the case of peasant women or female serfs, they were forced to live off the land of their landlord or master. Alongside their male counterparts, these women were not only responsible for tending to their master’s land for the sake of his wealth, but also for growing as much food to feed the huge country. As was often the case, peasant women or serfs were often subjected to harassment of some sort by their masters or their wives. Some women were fortunate enough to have a compassionate master who wished to not harm any of his workers, while other women had to accept being exploited for work and for sexual favors for her masters.
Like in every other society, Russian noble women enjoyed certain privileges from women in other social classes.

These women were able to have autonomy through their dowry and the estates in the dowry remained under their personal property after marriage. Prior to Peter the Great’s ascension to the throne, elite women often lived in specialized quarters reserved for them in order to seclude them from participating in a male-base society. In these quarters [or terems], women were able to perform tasks such as forging alliances for their family members and negotiating marriage arrangements. When Peter the Great ended the seclusion of all elite women in Russia, he required them to integrate with men of the same status at parties and French-inspired assemblies. Alongside Peter’s obsession with European fashion, elite women no doubt indulged in Western fashion and dressed in the latest trends at the

time.
Women are often portrayed to be inferior to men and among the peasantry, wife beating often took place. It was difficult for women in these scenarios to live and work in another village because she was required to have permission from village authorities and the head of her household. As was the case, the victim’s husband was the one in charge of the household and the former would have had her request be denied. If the abuse was severe, the village authorities would allow the victim to live elsewhere without the approval of her husband, although this rarely happened. It did not help that the victim received little sympathy for wanting to leave her abusive husband since the village held the well-being of the community over the health of the individual. Divorce in Russian society was discouraged by the Orthodox Church and the victim had a better chance of being allowed to separate herself from her husband than divorcing him entirely. To have the chance to be separated, the victim had to avoid being promiscuous and acting immodestly during her marriage or her time away from her husband.