The Role of Women in the Antebellum South The distinction between men and women in the Antebellum-era Southern United States can be identified in the roles that each gender was expected to fulfill as parents, spouses and citizens. While young men and women alike were encouraged to marry and immediately start a family, females were primarily given the task of caring for their children and husband. Because they were viewed as the ‘morally superior gender’, women were supposed to raise the next generation of obedient citizens, while men were free to pursue a career and get involved in politics. As a result, a movement arose to expand the rights and freedoms of women, with the ultimate goal of creating a society where equal opportunities are …show more content…
By preserving this aspect of herself, a woman was considered to be a suitable candidate for marriage. The ‘ideal’ wife was pure, submissive to their husbands and eager to serve her family, all qualities that suggested Paternalistic attitudes in society at the time. In context to the Antebellum South, Paternalism refers to the authoritative status of white men over other “subordinates or dependents in their supposed interest”, more specifically women and African Americans. It was not until these suppressed groups began working together to make their voices heard that this male dominated societal structure was effectively dismantled, and opportunities for women expanded beyond the prospects of marriage and motherhood. “In the moral, intellectual and physical cultivation of both sexes should we seek, as we can only find, the source and security of happiness and human virtue. Prejudice and fear are weak barriers against passions, which inherent in our nature and demanding only judicious training to form the ornament, and supply the best joys of our existence, are maddened into violence, varied with as pernicious indulgence.” (Doc #2) The efforts made by the feminist movement of the Antebellum-era set forth a precedent for the expansion of women’s rights in the decades following and up until present day. The patriarchal society that had controlled the nation since its birth was finally met with opposition from those who had been oppressed for so long. Through the dismissal of restrictive gender roles and expectations, the voices of women were finally allowed to influence decision making, and ultimately create changes that would promote equal opportunity for all
Prior to the ratification of the nineteenth amendment, women in America lacked a general right that was intended for all citizens. Achieving the right to vote for women was a long sought after event that proved to be a turning point in American history. Women’s suffrage is a deeply rooted movement that can be found in the minds of many men and women who fought for social reform as well as 20th century literature including Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby. In the words of History.com, 19th century America considered the only true woman to be “a pious, submissive wife and mother concerned exclusively with home and family.”
This first raises the question if these lower class white women had any role on the plantation whatsoever, other than the blockade between overseer-slave relations. Studies have shown that the work of these women exceeds the expectations of normal housework, expanding to include producing the goods that the family needs to survive. Despite doing the skills and good work acquired by these women, the planters and even sometimes the slaves would degrade these women. Often times, the owners of the plantations saw the overseers as troublesome lowlifes and their wives and children were just extra mouths to feed. There was a level of inequality between the plantation owners and the labor managers, despite the fact that both were white.
By 1850, most southern women had attended a school of higher education. These schools believed that a proper education prepared these women to be successful plantation mistresses. However, not every young woman was
Between 1861 and 1865 men were obligated to leave their homes and fight either on the union or confederate side of the United States. As a result women were forced to maintain the households while the primary breadwinners were gone. The Civil War challenged the ideology of the roles of women in the antebellum era. The roles of women in the north and south transformed tremendously and became a pivotal aspect to the war. One duty women took during the Civil War was become supporters of their male loved ones, which proved to be influential since it raised the morals of the men and gave them something to survive for.
Sally Hemings was a slave on the Monticello plantation in the late 18th century, and her experience helps us to understand that her gender aided the way she was treated versus if they went by the color of her skin (Dilkes Mullins). {Woman during this era were thought of as property, they were objectified, they were treated poorly and had no choice. Their husbands were liable for anything that they did} [Being a female during this era outweighed what one 's social status was. It did not matter what race you were, but if you were a woman, you were treated as such] (Dilkes Mullins). Ms. Hemings was a beautiful sixteen-year-old enslaved girl (Gordon-Reed, 102) who was more than just a slave on the Monticello plantation.
In the early 19th century, a wave of social reform movements swept across the nation, seeking to cleanse society of social evils. During the early 19th century, women joined the workforce in mills giving them a taste of independence and allowing them to defy the Cult of Domesticity. Women also joined antebellum reform movements such as abolition and temperance allowing them to expand their influence outside of the private sphere and realize the similarity between the strife of African slaves and their own struggles. Women in this time period desired to not only better their society but also themselves and sought to do this by reforming education for women and in order to gain more opportunities. The women in the movement sought to provide
Throughout our country’s history individuals have come together to fight for a better life in the future. Advocates for human rights such as Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Frederick Douglass, and Langston Hughes have been motivating readers everywhere. Motivation to change comes from feeling such as oppression, misery, and both freedom and liberty together. To begin with, Elizabeth Cady Stanton in 1848 summoned the first Women’s Rights conference with her speech “Declaration of Sentiments” to campaign that women have been oppressed by being denied basic human rights such as the right to vote, own property, and be equal under the law. For example, “The history of mankind is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations on the part of man towards women, having in direct object the establishment of an absolute tyranny over her.
The next chapter highlights the gendered division of labor and the difficulty to keep a family as a slave. Chapter six and seven moves on to the eighteenth century and shows how women have improved in areas such as more political participation and increasing social class of
Specifically, southern white women used this period to elevate their social status so that they could climb the social tower to gain power and compare to men. Southern women wanted to get out of the ideal that women should only be housewives, so they used slaves to relieve themselves of house chores, which brought them away from just being housewives. This elevated them socially because instead of being ridden with housework, they were give leisure time and time to focus on their husbands and wives. Slaves were thought to benefit because slave owners would take care of the slaves and that they would be better off being a slave than running around Africa. Slave owners would give slaves food, shelter, and clothing, take care of their children, and teach them christianity (Jones, 102).
Before there were laws protecting women and children they suffered a lot of unfair treatment. In 1832 Alexis De Tocqueville expressed how she felt about the democratic family in the United States. She described the American family as “haven of cooperation”. Her reasoning for this was, “because women in the United States did not look upon “conjugal authority” as a “usurpation of their rights, but attracted a sort of pride to the voluntary surrender of their own will,” Stanton’s generation of women reformers began to articulate the personal and professional sacrifices married women had to make for their subordination as wives.” In 1825 William Thompson families and citizens were aware of “white slave code”.
While reading about American history the thing that I found most appealing was the limited rights that women had during this era. Although women gave the early settlers longer life expectancy and brought hope to their future, women still were not considered equal to a man. Women were discriminated against and didn’t play an important role in early American history. Generally, women had fewer legal rights and career opportunity than men because they were considered weak and not able to perform certain tasks. Different women came from different ethnic backgrounds and were all created equal in the eyes of men.
For women in the Southern Colonies had very few legal rights such as not being able to vote or preach. Most women had difficult jobs most of the women 's jobs were being homemakers. Life for the women were hard and unforgiving. Life for the colonial women had to work on farms.
After the women’s right movement began, the hope that women would be treated equal and that they would have the right to vote began to come true. The only problem was that their society was a male dominated world, and men believe that a woman's goal in life was to become a perfect housewife. Before the women’s right movement, women could had never imagine a world where they would be treated equal and that they could vote and that they could one day change the
The life of Women in the late 1800s. Life for women in the 1800s began to change as they pushed for more rights and equality. Still, men were seen as better than women, this way of thinking pushed women to break out from the limitations imposed on their sex. In the early 1800s women had virtually no rights and ultimately were not seen as people but they rather seen as items of possession, it wasn’t until the late 1800s that women started to gain more rights. The Civil War actually opened opportunities for women to gain more rights, because with many of the men gone to war women were left with the responsibilities that men usually fulfilled during that time period.
Misogyny is the dislike of, contempt for, or prejudice of women; Washington Irving has been accused of misogyny because of the treatment of women in his stories and their content. Washington Irving was a writer during the 1800’s, and some of his most popular works include “Rip Van Winkle” and “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow.” Within these tales and other works of Irving’s, aspects of misogyny is discernible, though there is debate about whether the author himself was a misogynist. I believe that the misogyny that is shown throughout a select few of Irving’s works is due in part to the time period, not entirely Irving, himself.