Class Notes on Mary Wollstonecraft

- "Vindication on the Rights of Women":

Wollstonecraft's father was an alcoholic who beat the family.

She took over the care of the family at a young age; she ended up starting a school, and worked as a governess for a while.

Well-educated, mostly self-educated.

At a certain time, she decided to write for a living - a politically radical publisher and bookstore owner supported her.

She wrote one of the first responses to a conservative piece by Edmund Burke where he attacked the French Revolution - "Reflections on the French Revolution", 1789. She published "Vindication of the Rights of Men" anonymously at first, in December 1789 - speaks as if it's written by a man, says Burke writes "effeminately".

"Manly", to her, is synonymous with "virtuous". She argued that it was irrational to distinguish among classes of men - defended liberty, republicanism/democracy.

1792, she published "The Vindication of the Rights of Woman". "Woman" - as an individual, or a category? I think she writes for woman as a category - one including all women, even women she does not know, living in places she's never heard of, and with whom she may not agree on a lot of issues. Most societies have gender inequality in common, with women having fewer acknowledged and supported rights than men.

Writes about "woman" as a class of persons who have been treated the same way by men. "Men" refers to a number of classes, or all human beings.

"Man", as a term used to refer to all people, makes women outside the norm and turns men into the umbrella term for humanity. (<-- one argument against using phrases such as, "All men are created equal", where the word "men" is used to mean all people, women included. As a subtext, it unconsciously communicates that men are (topic of sentence) than women).

Wollstonecraft talks about sexism as systematic, or structural. Society, as a system, through education, trains women not to be virtuous or rational, but sentimental and illogical. In the introduction she says that the weaknesses drilled into women make them tyrants and cunning individuals instead of learning virtue.

Proponent of a Meritocracy - through your merits, talents, achievements are made. Every job involving "subordination is highly injurious to morality". Does this go beyond the traditional workplace - what about teacher/student relations? I can't help but return to a very pragmatic, scientific reading of this idea: people are a species of animals. They are a social species who need other people around to survive. That makes them a group animal. Group animals always have ranks; someone is always subordinate to another, because this system creates an order everyone can adhere to. It's a complex system, but it's one that's easy to indoctrinate people into - just have a baby and raise it in that group. Most mammals are this way.

Does the education system injure morality? (Maybe not in terms of professors and students, but the finances create long-term difficulties).

- p39, writes that several great writers degrade one half the population - they write women this way to make them alluring, sensual.

- p41, "Standing armies..." - talks about soldiers as having lives of gallantry - "taught to please, live to please". Says women and soldiers blindly submit to authority, and both have lives of fun before they learn about virtues. Soldiers ---> women, because of how they're disciplined, educated. THIS PROVES THAT WOMEN ARE NOT NATURALLY INFERIOR.

- p42, Man's ideal for women is "sensual" - all sexual appeal, no lasting substance of character. "What nonsense!"

- Says women aggravate their own situation - they pride themselves on the power they have because of trained weaknesses, deluded by men's romantic, sentimental feelings for them.

- "It is time to effect a revolution in female manners" - time to work and labor. She feels that women take advantage of social inequities because it is easier, and she wants to put a stop to that.

Wollstonecraft herself very strict, virtuous, and rational - believed in absolute transparency, and taking people at their word. Virtue, to her, means total honesty and integrity; a republican definition of the word.

*This makes me think very differently of Western art, especially the female nude.