Educational Rights of Women: A Vindication of the Rights of Woman (Mary Wollstonecraft)
A Vindication of the Rights of Woman, written by the 18th-century British proto-feminist Mary Wollstonecraft, is one of the earliest works of feminist theory. In it Wollstonecraft responds to those educational and political theorists of the 18th century who did not believe women should have an education. She argues that women ought to have an education commensurate with their position in society, claiming that women are essential to the nation because they educate its children and because they could be companions to their husbands, rather than mere wives. Instead of viewing women as ornaments to society or property to be traded in marriage, Wollstonecraft maintains that they are human beings, deserving the same fundamental rights as men.
Wollstonecraft was prompted to write the Rights of Woman after reading Charles Maurice de’s report to the French National Assembly, which stated that women should only receive a domestic education. Wollstonecraft argues that women should be educated in a rational manner to give them the opportunity to contribute to society. In the 18th century, it was often assumed by educational philosophers that women were incapable of rational or abstract thought. Women, it was believed, were too susceptible to sensibility and too fragile to be able to think clearly. Wollstonecraft, along with other female reformers maintained that women were indeed capable of rational thought and deserved to be educated.
Wollstonecraft contends that society will degenerate without educated women, particularly because mothers are the primary educators of young children. She attributes the problem of uneducated women to men and “a false system of education, gathered from the books written on this subject by men who consider females rather as women than human creatures”. Women are capable of rationality; it only appears that they are not, because men have refused to educate them and encouraged them to be frivolous. While stressing it, she also entertains that women might not be able to attain the same degree of knowledge that men do.
Wollstonecraft was prompted to write the Rights of Woman after reading Charles Maurice de’s report to the French National Assembly, which stated that women should only receive a domestic education. Wollstonecraft argues that women should be educated in a rational manner to give them the opportunity to contribute to society. In the 18th century, it was often assumed by educational philosophers that women were incapable of rational or abstract thought. Women, it was believed, were too susceptible to sensibility and too fragile to be able to think clearly. Wollstonecraft, along with other female reformers maintained that women were indeed capable of rational thought and deserved to be educated.
Wollstonecraft contends that society will degenerate without educated women, particularly because mothers are the primary educators of young children. She attributes the problem of uneducated women to men and “a false system of education, gathered from the books written on this subject by men who consider females rather as women than human creatures”. Women are capable of rationality; it only appears that they are not, because men have refused to educate them and encouraged them to be frivolous. While stressing it, she also entertains that women might not be able to attain the same degree of knowledge that men do.
Wollstonecraft attacks conduct book writers as well as educational philosophers such as Jean-Jacques Rousseau who argues that a woman does not need a rational education. In addition to her broad philosophical arguments, Wollstonecraft lays out a specific plan for national education to children. she proposes that children be sent to day schools as well as given some education at home “to inspire a love of home and domestic pleasures”, and that such schools be free for children “ five to nine years of age."
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