Femininity And The History Of Women S Education

This book draws on recent deconstructions around the idea of ‘femininity’ as a social, racial and class construct and explores the diversity of spaces that may be defined as educational that range from institutional contexts to family, to professional outlooks, to racial identity, to defining community and religious groupings. It explores how notions of femininity change across time and place, and within individual lives. Such changes take place at the interface of external forces and individual agency. The application of the notion of ‘femininity’ that assumes a consistent definition of the term is interrogated by the authors, leading to a discussion of the rich possibilities for new directions in research into women’s lives across time, place, and individual life histories.

This book examines the education of working-class and middle-class girls between 1800-1914. It argues that an influential middle-class ideology advocated that all women should confine their activities to the home, as housewives and mothers. It held that women from the lower classes should be given instruction only in knowledge that was domestically useful, and that middle-class women should be allowed to develop accomplishments that would allow them to attract socially desirable suitors.

This book draws on recent deconstructions around the idea of 'femininity' as a social, racial and class construct and explores the diversity of spaces that may be defined as educational that range from institutional contexts to family, to professional outlooks, to racial identity, to defining community and religious groupings. It explores how notions of femininity change across time and place, and within individual lives. Such changes take place at the interface of external forces and individual agency. The application of the notion of 'femininity' that assumes a consistent definition of the term is interrogated by the authors, leading to a discussion of the rich possibilities for new directions in research into women's lives across time, place, and individual life histories.

Traces the history of the struggle of women to achieve equality in American colleges from Colonial times to the present

This collection brings together the work of scholars exploring the history of women in education in a number of different national settings. The contributors include both established scholars who have completed major studies and younger scholars exploring new directions. All of these writers share an engagement in reflection on the process of history writing and consider the impact of recent theoretical debates on their own scholarship. Their work reflects the influence of feminist theory and poststructuralism, but also of postcolonial theory and theories of the educational state. In these essays, writers address such key issues as the nature of historical evidence, the continuing need to uncover the 'hidden histories' of women as teachers, the ways life history narratives can illuminate women's own conceptions of themselves as women and teachers, the material conditions of teaching as work for women, and the way conceptions of gender have shaped women's experiences in relation to the educational state, the family, class, sexuality and race. These feminist writers also explore the ways they are implicated in the very subject of their research - the educated woman who is also an educator.

It begins with a survey of women's education from antiquity to the Middle Ages and continues with a detailed account from the Renaissance through the Reformation, Enlightenment, and Industrial Revolution to the 20th century. The major countries covered are France, Germany, Russia, England, Italy, and the United States. Dr. Stock does two things with this hitherto neglected subject: she disinters the historical facts and development country by country and century by century, and she looks for answers to certain fundamental questions. What types of education have been available to women in the past? Under what conditions are women likely to be offered education, and why? How is women's education related to the social structure and to women's relations with men? In conclusion, Dr. Stock sums up present conditions and points out the distance yet to go.

While powerful gender inequalities remain in American society, women have made substantial gains and now largely surpass men in one crucial arena: education. Women now outperform men academically at all levels of school, and are more likely to obtain college degrees and enroll in graduate school. What accounts for this enormous reversal in the gender education gap? In The Rise of Women: The Growing Gender Gap in Education and What It Means for American Schools, Thomas DiPrete and Claudia Buchmann provide a detailed and accessible account of women’s educational advantage and suggest new strategies to improve schooling outcomes for both boys and girls. The Rise of Women opens with a masterful overview of the broader societal changes that accompanied the change in gender trends in higher education. The rise of egalitarian gender norms and a growing demand for college-educated workers allowed more women to enroll in colleges and universities nationwide. As this shift occurred, women quickly reversed the historical male advantage in education. By 2010, young women in their mid-twenties surpassed their male counterparts in earning college degrees by more than eight percentage points. The authors, however, reveal an important exception: While women have achieved parity in fields such as medicine and the law, they lag far behind men in engineering and physical science degrees. To explain these trends, The Rise of Women charts the performance of boys and girls over the course of their schooling. At each stage in the education process, they consider the gender-specific impact of factors such as families, schools, peers, race and class. Important differences emerge as early as kindergarten, where girls show higher levels of essential learning skills such as persistence and self-control. Girls also derive more intrinsic gratification from performing well on a day-to-day basis, a crucial advantage in the learning process. By contrast, boys must often navigate a conflict between their emerging masculine identity and a strong attachment to school. Families and peers play a crucial role at this juncture. The authors show the gender gap in educational attainment between children in the same families tends to be lower when the father is present and more highly educated. A strong academic climate, both among friends and at home, also tends to erode stereotypes that disconnect academic prowess and a healthy, masculine identity. Similarly, high schools with strong science curricula reduce the power of gender stereotypes concerning science and technology and encourage girls to major in scientific fields. As the value of a highly skilled workforce continues to grow, The Rise of Women argues that understanding the source and extent of the gender gap in higher education is essential to improving our schools and the economy. With its rigorous data and clear recommendations, this volume illuminates new ground for future education policies and research.

A comprehensive study of female education in nineteenth-century Australia, rich in narrative detail.