How Did World War 1 Change The Role Of Women

World War One was the first war fought globally, with all the major developed nations participating. The United States, Britain, Germany, France, Russia, Italy and other countries in Europe were pulled into one of the most violent and demanding wars in history. Millions of men would fight and die with terrible new kinds of weapons and warfare developing. When men went off to fight women picked up the slack and worked in farms, factories, and infirmaries. World War One helped advance the Women’s Suffrage movement internationally, and irreversibly changed their once traditional role in modern society. Perhaps the best example of women’s changing roles would be in Britain and the US from just before 1915 to 1920. Before talking about women’s roles in World War One, it is critical to understand where they were before it started. While the industrial revolution

The main change to come from the industrial revolution was the splitting of home and work duties. Textile work like cotton spinning, knitting, and clothmaking was done in the home and interspersed with other duties, the profit of which went to the male head of the household. The industrial revolution changed these duties so that textiles and other work was done in factories on a mass scale (Braybon, 1989, p. 15). Many women worked in factories, and while this did give them significant financial freedom, it also presented them with sweatshop conditions and unfair wages. One of the more horrific examples of the conditions that these women worked in would be the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory