Changes for European Women

AP Review

Mr. Cady

Lynnwood High School

Renaissance• Gained education, but

limited in public affairs

• Young upperclass women marry older upperclass men

• Lower classes wait to marry, but pregnancy resulted in marriage until around 1750

• Some upperclass women contributed to Humanism:

• Christine de Pizan, Laura Cereta, Isabella d'Este

Reformation•Women & girls taught to read Bible•Protestants allow clergy to marry•Anabaptists allow women to preach•New orders for Catholics nuns: Ursulines (education), St. Teresa of Avila & Carmelites•Accusations of Witchcraft rise

New Monarch RulersIsabella I (Sp.)

Catherine de Medici (Fr.)

Mary I & Elizabeth I (Eng.)

Enlightenment• Madame Geoffrin & Madame Necker – salon hostesses

• Enlightened thinkers & Scientists looked down on women and marginalized their abilities but…

• Accusations of Witchcraft die out due to rise of Science and Enlightenment

Enlightened Absolutists

Maria Theresa (Aust.)Catherine the Great

(Rus.)

French Revolution• Marie Antoinette – Austrian

princess & Fr. Queen• Women's March on Versailles• Olympe de Gouges – Dec. of Rights

of Women• Mary Wollstonecraft – Vindication

of Rights • Gains are limited during Fr. Rev.

and reversed by Napoleon

1st Half of 19th Century• Illegitimacy boom from 1750-1850, Foundling Homes

• Jane Austen, Bronte Sisters, Mary Shelly, George SandNovelists commenting on social limits for women

• Flora Tristan – Feminist & Socialist• (John Stuart Mill) – Defender of women’s rights

• Marriages still often arranged but concept of marrying for love more common

2nd Half of 19th Century• Queen Victoria rules for 50 years! Victorian Ideal, separate spheres, strict moral code for women

• Ibsen's A Doll's House critical of marriage role

• Florence Nightingale – Crimean War & Red Cross

• Marie Curie – Scientist, Radioactivity• Emmeline Pankhurst – achieve right to own property, divorce, but no women’s suffrage

The New Woman circa 1921

1st Half of 20th Century• WWI women support war effort (Total

War)• Russian Rev. – women granted legal

equalityCommunist women work, esp. as doctors

• Suffrage Granted Post WWI to rest of European women

• Fascists encouraged large families• WWII women again support war effort• Postwar Baby boom

2nd Half of 20th Century• Simone de Beauvoir & Betty Friedan – FeminismChildcare, Birth Control, Divorce, Abortion

• Married women regularly enter workforce, Baby Bust

• Margaret Thatcher – Conservative Brit. PM (Iron Lady)