diafino
31-01-2006, 19:51
Titolo: la condizione femminile in epoca vittoriana
The last years of XIX century drew a change in the women’s condition. In England like in the other parts of the occidental countries, women’s life was dominated by strict rules but in the early XX century changed in favour of women’s emancipation.
However what was the situation in England during Queen Victoria’s reign?
During the reign of Queen Victoria ( an austere woman, mother and queen, example for all the women ) women were idealized. They had to be pure, their bodies were seen as temples and which should not be adorned with makeup or used for such pleasurable things like sex. They couldn’t vote or sue for divorce, they didn’t have own property and they didn’t use to hold job (if they weren’t poors). Women weren’t allowed to have their own money, they depended entirely on their husbands. Women were the embodiment of maternal love, peace and unselfishness. They were seen to be predisposed to devotional practices, religious sensibility and even unintelligent obedience.
There were lots of differences between men and women, especially in duties. Women were charged to ensure the ordering, the comforting and the beautiful adornment of the home while men’s duty was to assist in the maintenance, in the advance and in the defence of the state. Men had to face danger and temptation in the public sphere, the woman, the “Angel in the house”, was protected against all of this in her private sphere. Women’s life went on in the private, they weren’t exposed to the word.
Marriage was the only ambition for a girl, during Victoria’s Era. Girls used to spend their life before marriage studying “good manners”, playing piano and embroiding and their dream was their wedding day. From a legal point of view women had rights similar to the rights of children. The law regarded a married couple as one person. The husband was responsable for his wife and bound by law to protect her. She was supposed to obey him and he had the right to enforce this by a writ of habeas corpus. The personal property the wife brought into the marriage was then owned by the husband, even in case of a divorce. However, claims that wives were legally "property" of their husbands are bluntly exaggerated. Murder of a wife by her husband was punishable by death just like the murder of any other person, while destroying own property was legal. Murder of somebody else's wife was also punishable by death, while destroying property (i.e. breaking his windows) was less than a crime. Beating somebody else's wife was a serious crime, much more even serious than damaging a property. In case of disaster or other danger, women (including married women) were supposed to be saved before men, their “owner”.
The Victorian “grandeur”, with its hypocrisy and its hidden moral decay, forced the female sexuality and sensuality in brothels and banned that in the normal life. That was a reaction: a society that centralized decency, chastity and sexual severity and did something funny like cover the table legs or flooded into the brothels... In London every gentleman had for his pleasure about two whores and a half and a wife ( docile and intent upon the family ménage ) for his duty.
During Victoria’s reign women began to emancipate. In 1859 was born the Englishwoman’s Journal, one of the first European feminist newspapers. The creation of this kind of journal is joint by a creation of an association of women, soon the editorial staff began a lynch-pin of the whole feminist fight. In 1866 John Stuart Mill submitted a petition for the women’s right to vote, but this petition was refused by the first minister Gladstone. Starting from that moment the National Society for Women’s Suffrage was constituted. In 1878 women obtained an important affirmation on the civil equality ground: the married women property act recognized the women’s right to have own property and to draw up a contract. In 1905, four year after Queen Victoria’s dead suffragettes’ action began and kept on until 1917. This fight for women’s suffrage sometimes became violent, with fire, destructions and other manifestation of guerilla but finally managed to achieve its goals.
The last years of XIX century drew a change in the women’s condition. In England like in the other parts of the occidental countries, women’s life was dominated by strict rules but in the early XX century changed in favour of women’s emancipation.
However what was the situation in England during Queen Victoria’s reign?
During the reign of Queen Victoria ( an austere woman, mother and queen, example for all the women ) women were idealized. They had to be pure, their bodies were seen as temples and which should not be adorned with makeup or used for such pleasurable things like sex. They couldn’t vote or sue for divorce, they didn’t have own property and they didn’t use to hold job (if they weren’t poors). Women weren’t allowed to have their own money, they depended entirely on their husbands. Women were the embodiment of maternal love, peace and unselfishness. They were seen to be predisposed to devotional practices, religious sensibility and even unintelligent obedience.
There were lots of differences between men and women, especially in duties. Women were charged to ensure the ordering, the comforting and the beautiful adornment of the home while men’s duty was to assist in the maintenance, in the advance and in the defence of the state. Men had to face danger and temptation in the public sphere, the woman, the “Angel in the house”, was protected against all of this in her private sphere. Women’s life went on in the private, they weren’t exposed to the word.
Marriage was the only ambition for a girl, during Victoria’s Era. Girls used to spend their life before marriage studying “good manners”, playing piano and embroiding and their dream was their wedding day. From a legal point of view women had rights similar to the rights of children. The law regarded a married couple as one person. The husband was responsable for his wife and bound by law to protect her. She was supposed to obey him and he had the right to enforce this by a writ of habeas corpus. The personal property the wife brought into the marriage was then owned by the husband, even in case of a divorce. However, claims that wives were legally "property" of their husbands are bluntly exaggerated. Murder of a wife by her husband was punishable by death just like the murder of any other person, while destroying own property was legal. Murder of somebody else's wife was also punishable by death, while destroying property (i.e. breaking his windows) was less than a crime. Beating somebody else's wife was a serious crime, much more even serious than damaging a property. In case of disaster or other danger, women (including married women) were supposed to be saved before men, their “owner”.
The Victorian “grandeur”, with its hypocrisy and its hidden moral decay, forced the female sexuality and sensuality in brothels and banned that in the normal life. That was a reaction: a society that centralized decency, chastity and sexual severity and did something funny like cover the table legs or flooded into the brothels... In London every gentleman had for his pleasure about two whores and a half and a wife ( docile and intent upon the family ménage ) for his duty.
During Victoria’s reign women began to emancipate. In 1859 was born the Englishwoman’s Journal, one of the first European feminist newspapers. The creation of this kind of journal is joint by a creation of an association of women, soon the editorial staff began a lynch-pin of the whole feminist fight. In 1866 John Stuart Mill submitted a petition for the women’s right to vote, but this petition was refused by the first minister Gladstone. Starting from that moment the National Society for Women’s Suffrage was constituted. In 1878 women obtained an important affirmation on the civil equality ground: the married women property act recognized the women’s right to have own property and to draw up a contract. In 1905, four year after Queen Victoria’s dead suffragettes’ action began and kept on until 1917. This fight for women’s suffrage sometimes became violent, with fire, destructions and other manifestation of guerilla but finally managed to achieve its goals.