Women's History

Basically, any thoughts?




Marc Bloch once asked “What is history?” a noble question and one which largely remains unanswered. In order to look at some form of justification for women’s history, first we must have some idea of what women’s history is and from that definition draw a clear justification for why historians should consider it an area worthy of scholarly research. Before that though we must remind ourselves clearly of what women’s history is not.

It is important to immediately distinguish between women’s history and a feminist interpretation of history. Certainly there are a lot of areas in which these two overlap but in more specific terms they are vastly different. Feminist history looks, in general, at the individual woman in history as a means to counter arguments that arise in feminist issues of the day[1], such as in a debate over women in the military a feminist might be so bold as to throw Joan of Arc into the conversation. This, however, is a biographical precedent-hunting approach to history, not a historical approach to women’s history. Similarly, while both disciplines share the need to examine the imbalance between the sexes, feminist history tends to focus on this element more than an historian would while examining women’s history. Finally, women’s history is not a biographical examination of a small number of prominent women like Elizabeth I or Joan of Arc. This practise, echoing the “Great Men” approach to history, should be shunned by the historian in favour of more modern approaches to history.

These modern approaches are how we shall define women’s history. Women’s History, in my view, deserves a far more complete approach than has been attempted in the past. Women should be placed not just as a group within society but also as a group with its own inherent class and social differences. The history of princesses and of prostitutes is somewhat different. Still the overall cultural views of women, which are alluded to in more conventional histories examining women as a small footnote to a larger issue, require re-examination by the modern historian. While official or public attitudes of men towards women are quite easy to obtain[2] the reality of the situation probably was somewhat different.[3] The historian wishing to examine women’s history should endeavour to uncover the actual social norms rather than the idealised ones. Also the economic and social impact of women should be examined, though we shall return to this in a moment as part of a justification, so that the overall picture of history (beyond a focus simply on women’s history) can be obtained. Overall women’s history is concerned with looking at the historical influence of both individual women and women as a whole in society while also looking at how society treated women. Integrating some feminist thought; women’s history also looks at how the role of women within society (be it western, Arabic etc.) has changed over the course of time.

So armed with an idea of what women’s history should be we must now consider its value as a field of historical research. When one first comes to ponder whether the history of women should be examined or not a certain fact leaps to the mind. Assuming that the history of women has been omitted completely by conventional historians[4] then the entirety of historical research up until today has only concerned itself with the activities of one half of the world’s population. By that reasoning alone it would be vital to examine the role women have played in history. However there are far more reasons than that to examine women’s place in history. Take a major historical event, for example the First World War, and look at a basic overview while omitting women. This is the historical approach taken most often when examining the war. However when we look at the role of women we get a fuller picture. The Archduke was inspecting the troops with his wife, a commoner, who was only allowed to accompany him while he was performing his military duties. The inspection that brought Ferdinand to Serbia was, in many respects, a treat for his wife[5]. Also the British economy was kept afloat during the war thanks in no small part to the sterling efforts of hundreds and thousands of women who took up the jobs that were vacated by the newly volunteered soldiers, all men of course. This contributed directly to women being given the franchise in Britain after the war and forms a vital chapter in Suffragette history. There are many other examples of how women deserve the attention of First World War historians but sufficed to say the omission of any of the above information detracts from author’s claims on a dust-cover of offering the “definitive” history of the First World War.

Women occupy a strange place in society. Though women can obviously be black or white, rich or poor, Christian or Muslim and can often occupy the position of the majority in general, they tend to be seen as some form of minority. Women have never occupied an equal position to men in the Common Era, be it in terms of pay, access to education, access to political institutions and jobs women have always been discriminated against. As an old Russian proverb goes:
“A hen is not a bird; a woman is not a person”
This convenient distinction, which appears in the thinking of numerous cultures[6] and echoes the distinction made between blacks and whites in America, allows men to speak of all people being equal without the fear of anyone pointing out that women are people too. The development of this type of thought can be traced all the way back to Genesis where Eve is blamed for the fall of man.[7] In modern western societies where sexual equality is considered to be a given it is quite arguable that while ‘society’[8] may strive to this end, many of the ideas and biases which were used to justify earlier attitudes towards women are still present. The only way that these attitudes can be combated is by a thorough sociological and historical examination into where these attitudes came from, their history and the reasoning behind them.

In order to understand the conflict in Northern Ireland you must understand its history. In order to understand the conflict in the Middle East between Israel and the Palestinians, you must understand its history. In order to understand the position of women we must understand its history. Today one of the most pervasive battles waged on a day to day basis is the so-called “Battle of the Sexes”. In a culture still coming to terms with the huge shift in the roles of women it is vital to re-examine all of history in an effort to place women in a true historical context. The Annales school of history, so influential in the development of modern historiography, espouses an approach to history which does not just focus on the large scale historical events (French Revolution, World Wars, politics, etc.) but rather an approach which looks at history in a more complete way, taking in factors like geography (Marc Bloch’s own favourite), sociology and, recently in particular, economics. The logical extension of this is to examine the role of women in history and to see their input. Even linguistics offers us an insight into women’s part in history.[9] Studies in New York have shown that women are the vanguard of linguistic change, seeing language as a means of achieving upward social mobility while on the whole men tend to look to social cohesion by using “lower” or less well refined forms of a language[10]. When historians examine the decline of languages in former colonies such as the Irish language they can look at this research and conclude that it was probably the mothers who instigated this language shift in Ireland. Were they to omit the woman’s role in this particular instance then an incomplete version of history would be the result. History is written by the victors, as they say, and now that women are no longer the victims of a patriarchal society[11] it is high time that the history of humankind, and not mankind, be evaluated so that a more complete picture of history can be painted.



[1] Joan Wallach Scott, Feminism and History, Oxford 1996
[2] For example, comments by church officials etc.
[3] How come nobody believes JFK was shot by Lee Harvey Oswald but everyone thinks that the dominated husband is a twentieth century invention? Also note that while in works by writers such as Shakespeare many female characters exercise massive influence over their husbands (Lady Macbeth) rarely, if ever, is this public knowledge within those works.
[4] I know this is blatantly untrue but it is a hypothetical
[5] A.J.P Taylor, An Illustrated History of the First World War, Penguin 1999
[6] A History of Their Own, ed. Bonnie S. Anderson & Judith P. Zinsser, Penguin, 1988
[7] I have always wondered why nobody pointed out that the serpent was male. She was tempted, but it was a he that did the tempting.
[8] I hate the term society as it seems to signify a cohesive group with shared moral values and goals. Society is actually made up of raving bigots and infuriating relativists and everything in between. The standards generally referred to as “social standards” are usually middle class holier-than-thou attitudes, but I digress.

[10] Labov, 1989
[11] At least a lot less than in previous times

walrusgumble

great post!

i agree more should be looked into, particularily the social side, eg the ordinary joe soap or in this case mary soap (brutal sorry)

as a young male, with a deep interest in history, particularily irish history (not just the wars but also social aspect like church v state) i have only assessed women in history in very small analysis like in areas such as women during world war II in britain; people such as mary robinson (human rights aspect in particular cases such as norris and magee); huge role of women played in ireland during the period of 1916-1923 and then the slap in the face they recieved with certain aspects of "Dev's" bunreacht na héireann 1937 and of course in the troubles (bernadette mcaliskey mp)

more should be done on looking at why women dont get involved in public life, is it really because of family commitments? look at the attitude some people had win mary robinson went in for elections? did she really get in because of her gender? (albeit mr lenihan's mature recollection) do people fear women in politics? (maggie thatcher and or in some areas hilliary clinton - prob not because of gender)

why are women more stignamitised if they commit adultry etc as oppose to men? why were some people frightened/treatened of the "ladette" culture experienced by some women during the mid 90's?

The 1937 "bitch slap" as you call it is a misinterpretation of the truth. Read Yvonne Scannell's article on Women in the Constitution for a more balanced view and a very good argument that it was the judiciary and not Dev who left women adrift in Irish society.

walrusgumble

Deleted User wrote: »

The 1937 "bitch slap" as you call it is a misinterpretation of the truth. Read Yvonne Scannell's article on Women in the Constitution for a more balanced view and a very good argument that it was the judiciary and not Dev who left women adrift in Irish society.

sound i will, thanks for the tip. my comment was influenced from my history and constitutional law (obviously not that good if i missed that article and obiter from judges in the big cases of the 1970's & issues concerning employment and the 1935 contraceptive act - the again our lecturer was a woman and appeared to be ant dev) lessons. what i thought (or failed to examine further) was that certain aspects implying woman's place in the home - "comely maidens" that caused contraversy. women like mary mcsweeney, letters of protest from women suffrages, irish women's working unions etc.

where can that article be obtained?

i remember once suggesting in class (when commenting on these issues) that maybe, considering the reality of labour and the shortage of such and the actually amount of farm work done by women particularily when the men went to work on the buildings in britain in the 1950's, dev meant well by stating that mothers would not be forced out to work if they had families as they have an important role in society - which such expression was more a recognition of their great value etc as oppose to a policy issue. any way i will check that.

donaghs

Definitely women have been a neglected aspect of history until recently. However, every almost every modern university in Europe and America has people dedicated to issues like Women's History. Whether in departments like history, english lit, or sociology. Or specialised departments like the "Women's Education Research and Resource Centre" in UCD. In relation to Irish history, a huge amount has now been written in recent decades on the minutia of women in Irish history.