In the 1800’s a women had to choose a mate or a partner, who she would give everything to. Her rights and property were lost to her upon marriage, and everything, if she had received anything from their fathers then it would belong to her husband. Basically, the men controlled the women after they handed over their lives to living and caring for them alone. Even after the marriage if a woman so wished to get a divorce she would be denied that right, and could be even in danger of being arrested if she was to run away. Each women of different class had different roles they were divided or distinguished as Upper class, Lower class, and under class. The women of the upper class who were entitled to an inheritance, was usually from their father’s wealth. But as it is …show more content…
Fiction was looked on as a sort of manipulating genre that supposedly made others think of things differently. In the Coquette, Foster defines many aspects of 1800’s living, marriage, and status, and she makes these views in her point of view that not many agreed upon. It showed how a woman is left with nothing and it began to stir commotions between others. To be successful during that time as put by Foster was to find a suitable mate, and know that he must receive your undivided attention, but as for Eliza things did not turn out so well. She was left alone and though she had some friends you tend to stay away when they inform you that you have done something wrong, in Eliza’s case her excessive need for freedom and her want to be with Sanford for fun, “He is a gay man, my dear, to say no more, and such are the companions we wish, when we join a party avowedly formed for pleasure” (114). Eliza sadly only focused on the parties and freedom not the fun of being a wife, if there was such a thing at the
The title character of Catharine Maria Sedgewick’s novel, Hope Leslie, defies the standards to which women of the era were to adhere. Sedgewick’s novel is set in New England during the 17th century after the Puritans had broken away from the Church of England. Hope Leslie lives in a repressive Puritan society in which women behave passively, submit to the males around them, and live by the Bible. They allow the men of their family to make decisions for them and rarely, if ever, convey an opinion that differs from the status quo. However, Hope Leslie does not conform to the expected behavior of women during that time, behavior that only further expressed the supposed superiority of males. Hope portrays behaviors and attitudes common in a woman today. Hope is capable of thinking for herself, is courageous, independent, and aggressive. Sir Philip Gardner describes Hope as having “a generous rashness, a thoughtless impetuosity, a fearlessness of the… dictators that surround her, and a noble contempt of fear” (211). In comparison to Esther Downing, Hope is the antithesis of what a young Puritan woman should be, and in turn, Hope gains a great deal of respect from the readers of the novel through her “unacceptable” behavior.
From the beginning of The Coquette Eliza Wharton is a headstrong, freedom-seeking woman. Having escaped her impending marriage with the death of her fiancé, Eliza is determined to enjoy herself, regardless of the consequences. Eliza disregards the warnings she receives from those around her, she disregards Major Sanford’s past, and she disregards the societal impact her actions will undoubtedly have. Eliza is reckless with her reputation and virtue and she pays the price.
In her article “‘But is it any good?’: Evaluating Nineteenth-Century American Women’s Fiction,” Susan Harris provides methods and criteria for examining Women’s Fiction in what she calls “process analysis” (45). To apply Harris’ guidelines to Catherine Maria Sedgwick’s A New England Tale, I must first “acknowledge the ideological basis of [my] endeavor” (45) as a feminist/equalitist critique of the text. Furthermore, I identify the three-fold approach that Harris describes as historical, in distinguishing early nineteenth-century from mid- to late-century attitudes, rhetorical, in labeling Sedgwick’s communication to readers didactic, and ideological, by understanding my objections stem from twenty-first-century attitudes. Harris also explains, “If we look at them as both reactive and creative…we can understand [texts’] aesthetic, moral, and political values” (45); I consider A New England Tale to have a sentimental aesthetic, a Christian morality, and a support of female subordination.
Eliza's assaults against True Womanhood are violations of the virtues submissiveness and purity. When Eliza refuses to ignore the gallantry of Major Sanford in favor of the proposals of Reverend Boyer despite the warnings of her friends and mother, she disregards submissiveness in favor of her own fanc...
The Coquette; or, The History of Eliza Wharton narrates the tribulations of an unmarried woman in post-revolutionary America. The author Hannah Webster Foster uses the story of Miss Wharton as an allegory of female moral decay. The highly patriarchal demands that women be submissive, domestic, and married. However, the protagonist Eliza Wharton has conflicting ideas of her expectations within the society. She is highly intelligent and yearns for self-determination. Though the novel is about seduction, Foster significantly altered the basic structure of novels at the time by relating it from the female perspective. The result is a novel that explores several significant themes in post-revolutionary America among them, the existence, and the need for female education.
about marriage that our society assumes to be true today. These include ideas about single
For a very long time, men always had a higher status than women. In marriages during the beginning of the 1900s, men were dominant over their wives. They were the providers and the leaders of their families.(Bernstein, 2011) For women, their main goal in life was to get married to a man that could provide for them financially. Women did not attend college or have careers, so having a man asking for their hand in marriage was a need and a privilege. Originally, marriage contracts stated that any property that the woman owned automatically became his once they were married. (Bernstein, 2011) Even though marriage contracts were changed so that women could own their own property and they gained the right to vote in 1920, women were still looked down upon. (Bernstein, 2011) Until the 1980s, rape within marriages was legal because technically it was the wife’s job to have sex with her husband. (Bernstein, 2011) Women literally only seen as something for men to marry so they had someone provide them with children and to take care of them
Women during the medieval period had certain role with their husbands, depending on his social status. The wives were placed into a class according to their husband’s line of work or social status (Time Traveler’s 54). This social status may be favorable, but not all wives were able to make it into the elite social status. Once the woman was committed, and married to her husband, she was totally controlled by her husband. Even though the wife was able to maintain the same social status of the husband, she lost a lot of rights after she married. Women during the medieval period not only lost a lot of their rights, but also became somewhat of a slave to the husband in many ways.
In Charlotte Perkins Gilman's short story "The Yellow Wallpaper," the reader is treated to an intimate portrait of developing insanity. At the same time, the story's first person narrator provides insight into the social attitudes of the story's late Victorian time period. The story sets up a sense of gradually increasing distrust between the narrator and her husband, John, a doctor, which suggests that gender roles were strictly defined; however, as the story is just one representation of the time period, the examination of other sources is necessary to better understand the nature of American attitudes in the late 1800s. Specifically, this essay will analyze the representation of women's roles in "The Yellow Wallpaper" alongside two other texts produced during this time period, in the effort to discover whether Gilman's depiction of women accurately reflects the society that produced it.
It takes a creative imagination for a women of the 21st century to realize what their life would have been if they were born 150 years ago. In today’s society, almost any woman could have the career of their dream if they apply themselves. They can choose to marry or not to marry, or choose whether they want children or not; Women have the option to be independent individuals. However, in the 19th century none of those were choices for women. Women weren’t allowed high educations or careers, they had to marry men for social and economic purposes, have children and be housewives. The women of Hamlet and Pride and Prejudice appear to have no exception; both texts show women to be dependent because of their gender, birthright and social class.
The right to vote went to the land holding male of the family, all-though in many instances women were capable of swaying their husband’s opinions. Women were not the furthest from liberty, though they were still subject to man’s will. “As factories began to do many of the things women had done at home previously, such as spinning and weaving, women were left with a little time to devote to other projects.” Other projects, including: education, protection of women and later women’s suffrage. Laws did not protect women from their husband’s the way they act today; when a woman married, she lost control of her rights, under coverture: “that is, the very being or legal existence of the woman is suspended during the marriage, or at least is incorporated and consolidated into that of the husband: under whose wing… she performs everything.” Safeguards did exist, that kept men from treating women outside of their station, however women had no protection, financially, from their husband’s poor decisions. Unmarried women were starting to become a common occurrence in the years leading up to the civil war. “They had the legal right to live where they pleased, and
The starting of the 19th Century was not kind to women, being seen as less then equal to their male counterparts. Women were not allowed to vote, own land, all their possession belonged to their
society. Women’s rights and feminism did not exist. In the 1800s divorces were frowned upon and everything was given to the males.
During the 19th centuary a women’s role in society was to function only in household. Meanwhile male played a dominant role in provding for the family finacally. Women during this time period didn’t have rights to own property much of it was their husbands. Women could not work outside their household duties. Jansson (2012) noted “ Women were virtually excluded from medicine, law, and clergy” (p.111). Although women couldn’t inquire these proffesions, after the Civil War they were motivted to become school
Throughout the early 1800s, British women most often were relegated to a subordinate role in society by their institutionalized obligations, laws, and the more powerfully entrenched males. In that time, a young woman’s role was close to a life of servitude and slavery. Women were often controlled by the men in their lives, whether it was a father, brother or the eventual husband. Marriage during this time was often a gamble; one could either be in it for the right reasons, such as love, or for the wrong reasons, such as advancing social status. In 19th century Britain, laws were enacted to further suppress women and reflected the societal belief that women were supposed to do two things: marry and have children.