Summary Of A Vindication Of The Right Of Women By Mary Wollstonecraft

The gender roles and relations for the majority of European history were determined by men superiority over women in all classes of society. For thousands of years, women lived only within the domestic realm, where their only duties were cooking, washing, cleaning and child raising. While men were obliged to provide shelter, food and other necessities to women. Thus, traditional gender roles imposed unequal economic, political and legal rights. From the eighteenth century, the traditional gender roles started to improve towards more gender equal society, particularly through the medium of literature. During the age of enlightenment, women started to participate in the public sphere by taking an advantage of new intellectual trends - the salon,
Moreover, most enlightenment philosophers like Jean-Jacques Rousseau had a patriarchal vision of women’s role in the society. In his book Emile: or in Education, he insisted that women should take an active part only in the family by raising their children, but they should not participate in a public realm of the life. Still, the enlightenment thinkers idea that all men should have an equal rights despite their class raised the question of women rights as well. Thus, Mary Wollstonecraft’ s in “A Vindication of the Right of Women” extended the critical analysis of her male fellow enlightenment philosophers to the women position. She argues that the “divine right of husbands” should be treated in the same way as the “divine right of the kings”. She constantly disputes the point of view of Rousseau, which limits the role of women by revealing the inconsistency of their arguments. Wollstonecraft, for example , argued that simply allowing women to have a proper education would enable them to contribute to the improvement of society, especially through their influence on children.
On the other hand, in 1791 the French constitution denied women rights to vote. In that respect, Olympia de Guiz prepared for the National Assembly the Declaration of the Rights of Women and a Citizen, which demanded recognition of full social and political equality of
And a number of women were writing to that effect. For instance, existentialist philosopher Simone de Beauvoir insisted that women are socially assumed to be less than man and defined as a womb, an ovary. Her work “The Second Sex” was the starting point for redefining the word of «feminine» and «masculine». Moving away from feudal values (military skills) and towards bourgeoises values (thought, understanding how the world worked). By stressing the value of ordinary work for men, it was easier for all to see that women were already doing ordinary work. By stressing mental work instead of muscular military skills, it was easier to see that women had an ability to do mental work. By stressing the importance of the senses and the possessions, it was easier to see that both sexes had them and that women had an important role in their proper