I can see in the Two mothers of Jane Addams that many of the lessons in which she thinks that woman need in their formal education were lessons that her mother gave her as a child. i want to go into the history that inspired her to work for this formalized education for women. we can see that both mothers gave her different types of an education and i want to see which lessons were more important to sarah, the household work or the aesthetic. these lessons can be backed up by finding the parallel in her inquiring letters to deans of preexisting female schools. i feel that using Campbel's feminine style will also be useful in perpetuating this argument.
i am not exactly certain which author it was that we read in class but it talked about how women with an education make better wives and i want to put that into the conversation with her article in the news paper that says women should be able to manage finances in the home. i want to look at how the information was presented whether the women were able to be passionate about their stance or if they were forced to be docile.
i feel that i can use all these texts to present the argument that women domestic lives were not dependent on their education but that their acceptance into the male society was dependent on them having some sort of liberal education.
my battery is dying
Hey Charles! I was wondering if Gilman's essay dealing with the economic status of women could be helpful to you. She argues that marriage is not a good partnership since men do all the providing and women all the taking. I am not sure if you've had time to read this essay but maybe it would be interesting to see what sort of roles different authors claim women should have. For example, Gilman does not think that motherhood and taking care of the home are factors that make women economically independent. Please ignore this comment if it is unhelpful or confusing, I just thought you might be able to use some information from Gilman's essay that could help you make a compelling argument.
ReplyDeleteGood idea, Laura. It occurred to me that we only just started uncovering Gilman's syllogisms (so I suppose the syllogism handout could come in handy for this). Charles, I think you're right that in a number of our texts we see various interpretations of the types and purposes of "education" for women (in fact, that would be an interesting thing to trace throughout our four spheres ...) I'd definitely recommend Gilman's texts. I'll ask you the same questions I asked about Laura's post: What if you didn't have to know your thesis just yet? How could you ask a question for which you don't actually have the resolution? And if you didn't have to use a source as a lens, what other secondary sources could help you get at a point of dissonance? It seems like you have already noted some really important dissonance between the kinds of values you see in "Two Mothers" and those promoted in the letters.
ReplyDelete-Dr. Graban
Charles,
ReplyDeleteI'm also doing the Haldeman collection so I was really interested in what you chose to write about. I'm really interested in what you want to do with the "Two Mothers" essay in relation to the letters from the schools. I was under the impression that "industrial education" had more to do with making women more capable in areas other than housekeeping. When I read the "Two Mothers" essay, one of the points that stuck out to me was that Sarah Addams, although really good at sewing and cooking and all that, also knew a lot about the mills and farms that her husband owned. They said, "In his absence the men had instruction to consult with Mrs. Addams". This shows that she was educated about work other than that of "women's work". I guess basically what I'm saying is that you may want to look at her lifestyle and the values she had in addition to the lessons she taught.
I find your ideas about acceptance into male society really intriguing. I'm sure there's a lot you could do with ideas about what it meant to be a woman at this time and how Haldeman might have breeched the line.
-Merey