The Victorian era established strict guidelines and definitions for the ladies and gentleman. Noble birth typically defined one as a "lady" or a "gentleman," but for women in this time period, socioeconomic rank and titles held no prestige or special privileges in a male-dominated society. Commonly, women in this era generally tried to gain more influence and respect but to no avail as their male counterparts controlled the ideals and practices of society. Women were subject to these ideals and practices without any legal or social rights or privileges. In the literary titles by Frances Power Cobbe, Sarah Stickney Ellis, Charlotte Bronte, Anne Bronte, John Henry Cardinal Newman, Sir Henry Newbolt, and Caroline Norton, the positions, opinions, and lifestyles of men and women during the Victorian era were clearly defined. Men in the Victorian era were raised to be intellectually and physically sound in order to be skillful in the workplace and the military while women were typically restricted to fulfilling roles within the home. As the female desire for equal rights and representation under the law mounted, an international vigor for female equality would produce a call for equality.
In Life of Frances Power Cobbe As Told by Herself, Frances Power Cobbe retold her experience at a fashionable English boarding school. Other female students and she gained an education at this institution where they were taught general education courses, foreign languages, and even to play musical instruments. This autobiographical work was monumental in female advancement during the Victorian era. From male perspectives women were only needed to take care of a household and were certainly not intended to intellectually progress on the ...
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...rty would propel women to demand legal rights and equality in all aspects of society following World War I.
The literary titles by Frances Power Cobbe, Sarah Stickney Ellis, Charlotte Bronte, Anne Bronte, John Henry Cardinal Newman, Sir Henry Newbolt, and Caroline Norton reveal society's view on women and men during the Victorian era. Throughout the Victorian era, women were treated as inferior and typically reduced to roles as mothers and wives. Some women, however, were fortunate to become governesses or schoolteachers. Nevertheless, these educated women were still at the mercy of men. Males dominated the opinions of women, and limited their influence in society. From an early age, young men were trained to be dominant figures and protectors over their home and country. Not until after World War I would women have some of these same opportunities as men.
During the Victorian Era, society had idealized expectations that all members of their culture were supposedly striving to accomplish. These conditions were partially a result of the development of middle class practices during the “industrial revolution… [which moved] men outside the home… [into] the harsh business and industrial world, [while] women were left in the relatively unvarying and sheltered environments of their homes” (Brannon 161). This division of genders created the ‘Doctrine of Two Spheres’ where men were active in the public Sphere of Influence, and women were limited to the domestic private Sphere of Influence. Both genders endured considerable pressure to conform to the idealized status of becoming either a masculine ‘English Gentleman’ or a feminine ‘True Woman’. The characteristics required women to be “passive, dependent, pure, refined, and delicate; [while] men were active, independent, coarse …strong [and intelligent]” (Brannon 162). Many children's novels utilized these gendere...
The mid-nineteenth century also referred to as the “Victorian Age, taking from the name of England's Queen Victoria who ruled for over 60 years” (Radek) revealed that women were faced with many adversities that appeared to have delayed their true aptitudes. During this time period, women were also required to conform to the divine command of men and must find a husband or she would be derided by the social order. In the same way, women were also not allowed to follow a profession.
Thesis Statement: Men and women were in different social classes, women were expected to be in charge of running the household, the hardships of motherhood. The roles that men and women were expected to live up to would be called oppressive and offensive by today’s standards, but it was a very different world than the one we have become accustomed to in our time. Men and women were seen to live in separate social class from the men where women were considered not only physically weaker, but morally superior to men. This meant that women were the best suited for the domestic role of keeping the house. Women were not allowed in the public circle and forbidden to be involved with politics and economic affairs as the men made all the
The industrialization of the nineteenth century was a tremendous social change in which Britain initially took the lead on. This meant for the middle class a new opening for change which has been continuing on for generations. Sex and gender roles have become one of the main focuses for many people in this Victorian period. Sarah Stickney Ellis was a writer who argued that it was the religious duty of women to improve society. Ellis felt domestic duties were not the only duties women should be focusing on and thus wrote a book entitled “The Women of England.” The primary document of Sarah Stickney Ellis’s “The Women of England” examines how a change in attitude is greatly needed for the way women were perceived during the nineteenth century. Today women have the freedom to have an education, and make their own career choice. She discusses a range of topics to help her female readers to cultivate their “highest attributes” as pillars of family life#. While looking at Sarah Stickney Ellis as a writer and by also looking at women of the nineteenth century, we will be able to understand the duties of women throughout this century. Throughout this paper I will discuss the duties which Ellis refers to and why she wanted a great change.
These women authors have served as an eye-opener for the readers, both men and women alike, in the past, and hopefully still in the present. (There are still cultures in the world today, where women are treated as unfairly as women were treated in the prior centuries). These women authors have impacted a male dominated society into reflecting on of the unfairness imposed upon women. Through their writings, each of these women authors who existed during that masochistic Victorian era, risked criticism and retribution. Each author ignored convention a...
Frances Cobbe described the boarding school that she attended as a young girl. The tuition cost was 25 times what Charlotte Bronte earned in 1841 (Longman p.1888). Cobbe describes the importance of women from well to do families at this time to be beautiful, and occupied with knitting and gossiping. Intelligence and accomplishments were not pursuits allowed to women.
Education for women in the 1800s was far different from what we know today. During her life, a girl was taught more necessary skills around the home than the information out of school books. A woman’s formal education was limited because her job opportunities were limited—and vice versa. Society could not conceive of a woman entering a profession such as medicine or the law and therefore did not offer her the chance to do so. It was much more important to be considered 'accomplished' than thoroughly educated. Elizabeth Bennet indicated to her sisters that she would continue to learn through reading, describing education for herself as being unstructured but accessible. If a woman desired to further he education past what her classes would teach her, she would have to do so independently, and that is what most women did.
During the Victorian Period men and women's roles became more sharply defined than any time in history. Before the nineteenth century women could work alongside the men. In the nineteenth century, “The Victorian Period”, men went to work and women stayed home and their servants done all domestic duties. (bl.uk) The Victorian Period treat men as defenders and creators while treating women as cultured and mysterious. In The Importance of Being Earnest by Oscar Wilde portrays men as being sleazy and liars and women as an ignorant and a maid.
This critical reflection will focus on Black women in the elite and middle class of Victorian America by using “Black Ideals of Womanhood in the Late Victorian Era” by Shirley J. Carlson and “To erect above the ruined auction-block ... Institutions of learning’: ‘race-women’, industrial education, and the artifacts of nation-making in the Jim Crow South” by Angel David Nieves. Both works discuss the roles of Black women in Victorian society as educated and poise while fighting for racial uplift. They also discuss how those roles were different from their white counterparts and how the white community reacted to the fight for the racial uplift. Overall, both works were very interesting, but could have gone into more detail about certain things.
In the 19th century, also known as the Victorian Era, men and women’s roles in society were not very clearly defined. Women were perceived as physically inferior to men but intellectually superior. This is what triggered the idea that women are
The narrator and John were both victims of the Patriarchal expectations of the Victorian era which dictated that expectations of gender roles of men, and women because male power was curtailed greatly, ultimately resulting in men ruling over women in power and control, women were defined physically and intellectually as the 'weaker' sex, in all ways subordinate to male authority.
Lord Tennyson’s “The Woman’s Cause is Man’s” in itself is a manifestation of such issues going on during the Victorian period. As described by Henderson and Sharpe, “The Woman’s Cause is Man’s” is an excerpt from Tennyson’s “The Princess, in which the feminist heroine gives up her feminst ideals and beliefs to settle down and get married (p. 1203). This is a mirror image in itself of the challenge to woman’s roles within Victorian Society. The traditional roles of women as wife and mother were vigorously debated, yet still conformed to, since even “[powerful] proponents
Before beginning with a discussion of the text, it is necessary to have a proper understanding of gender roles in the Victorian era. Victorian society was exceedingly patriarchal and oppressive toward women. “Traditionally, women were defined physically and intellectually as the 'weaker' sex, in all ways subordinate to male authority” (Marsh 4). The widespread ideology of the period was that men and women belonged to “separate spheres”: women to the domestic sphere and men to the public sphere. “Women were allotted a subsidiary
There were still differences based on what social class they were in but most of their priorities were the same. Women were . . . “supposed to live a highly restrictive life with their life centered around their husband and subsequently their children (Victorian Women).” This was the case no matter what social class the women were considered to be a part of. The women in the higher class spent lots of time at social gatherings helping young women of their class become proper. These women were often very well educated and they were expected to instruct the servants. Next was the middle class, “The women belonging to this class were expected to take education, help in the family business and try to get married into the nobility (Victorian Women).” Though they were very close to the upper class they were also different in many ways. Next was the working class, they were the lowest of classes but the women were still in many ways the same as the other classes. The working class women were required to work sometimes in labor which was not very suitable for them. Even though they had to work they were still expected to take care of the children and husbands. So, they were the class of women that was the hardest at work and they still got no
Feminism and gender difference contribute a major role in the works of authors from the 18th and 19th century. During that point in history, women were essentially treated as second class citizens without the ability to do anything less they faced judgement and ostracization from members of society. Women were not allowed to vote, own property nor be accepted into prominent leading positions. Instead, many were required to stay in the home and care for the family. Women lacked the freedom and independence they not only wanted but needed due to a society run patriarchal views that hindered the growth of women. Women were tied down to marriage and childbearing with the expectation of blindly following their husband without challenging their authority.