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The Enlightenment And Gender Roles

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The Enlightenment was a reshaping of Europe's political, philosophical and scientific model during the 17th century. This was a time of rehashing old customs and creating new ones. Many philosophical thinkers challenged the boundaries set by tradition led mostly in France and England, the most powerful countries at the time. Even though the Enlightenment created many new and unheard of rules were created but mainly one ideology stayed the same, gender roles. Even though there were many female scientists who made breakthroughs in the fields of chemistry, astronomy, biology, botany, physics and medicine they were hardly recognized and still were expected to be “in the household.” When a woman received a doctorate or even qualified for a university
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The enlightenment was an intellectual and philosophical movement which dominated the world of ideas in Europe during the 18th century. The core ideals that the philosophers had were that all men were born equal, with certain unalienable rights. The enlightenment influenced many other countries to push for a more fair government. The enlightenment also influenced the political ideas of colonists who pushed for independence in Britain. Although Jefferson, Bolivar, and L’Ouverture made several major changes to the government, these leaders did not entirely reflect the enlightenment in their leadership as evident by the treatment towards women, people of color, and the non-wealthy.

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European politics, philosophy, and science were radically changed during the 17th and 18th centuries during a period called the Enlightenment. Enlightenment thinkers throughout Europe questioned cultural norms and embraced the notion that humanity could be improved through rational change. Science had been mostly a male field of study during this age. It was extremely rare for women to enter this field, but during the Enlightenment, the idea that the minds of women can equal that of men became more popular. Many people believed that women did not have the intelligence to be involved in science, while some others believed that even if women could be held on the same intellectual level as men, it was socially unacceptable; on the other hand,

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In the 17th and 18th century the Enlightenment was a period of intellectual movement encompassing reason, individualism, and skepticism. The Scientific Revolution, which came from the enlightenment, resulted in new scientific findings, particularly in astronomy, which changed long-held beliefs about how space affects the natural world. These new revelations led people to doubt the established political and social hierarchies. The Enlightenment challenged traditional notions of hierarchy, including the king's 'divine right' to govern, the nobility's privileges, and the influence of religion on politics. Additionally, it served as an inspiration for the values of choice, equality, and independence as well as the fundamentals of human reason

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Its impressive that the world continues to evolve and that equality may need improving, but has grown on so many levels. In 2010, Daniel de Vise observed the great improvements women achieving higher degrees in his article More Women then Men Got PhDs Last Year. He reports “of the doctoral degrees awarded

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The enlightenment period, also called the age of reason, was a period between the 17th and 18th centuries in Europe that affected government and equality immensely. Religious, political, social, and economic equality became possible because of the ideas presented by these philosophers. Although the philosophers had variants with their ideas, they all pointed to equality. Documents A, B, C, and D, are perfect examples of how these philosophers had different views on equality. Total equality became possible because the philosophers argued and supported their points.

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Women tried their hardest to bridge the gap between the two sexes and to bring equality as a forefront to Enlightenment ideas, and although successful trailblazers emerged, most of their intellectual findings remain in the background of their male counterparts because of conservative and sexist beliefs. It is no secret that the Enlightenment was geared mainly around male philosophers and their new revolutionary thoughts, but there are some eighteenth-century women that were able to us

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The Enlightenment was the era that followed the Scientific Revolution, and it was heavily influenced by the revolution. It did this by “extending its ideas to new disciplines such as demography, the science of man, and anthropology; by transforming chemistry, the life sciences (biology), and the study of electricity; and by vastly developing the power of mathematics as the language of science” (Reill & Wilson). Lastly, the Scientific Revolution, along with the Enlightenment, helped to pave the way for science as is known to this

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Men were the providers and women were the caretakers. Their job was to cook, clean, take care and educate the children. After the enlightenment, the idea that a republic could only survive if people were educated and virtuous

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European political revolutions between 18th and 19th century are exemplified by the French Revolution, which opposed to absolutism and patriarchy, gave birth to the idea of individuality, and thus changed Europeans’ daily life, including fashion, sex, food, music, and gender norms. The French Revolution transformed Europeans’ daily life by replacing aristocratic lifestyles with common people’s style with emphasis on individuality. The French Revolution transformed fashion to be approaches of self-expression, rather than the signifier of group identity. Meanwhile, calling for equality and countering feudalism, it also led a fashion of common people, which differentiated them from the aristocratic expensive style.

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In the late 1800s society assigned to women a specific role to play. The role included bearing children, caring for them, and honoring their husbands. People saw women who took jobs outside of the home or who never married as deranged. Kate Chopin highlights the female duties of the time in her novel, The Awakening, through the use of foils Edna and Adele. Adele represents the model of how an ideal women of the 19th century should behave and feel.

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A woman during the Enlightenment period was not accepted in pure academics, but they could find education from somewhere else, and they could have risks for searching for education. A woman during the Enlightenment period was not accepted in pure academics. A woman was not accepted in academics mainly because men believed woman were ignorant and would not be capable of understanding what man learn. Men at this time believed that women should only attend classes on how to become a perfect housewife to their husbands. The first image of this is seen when Madame du Chatelet was excluded from the Royal Academy of Sciences.

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The Enlightenment was a time during the 17th and 18th century in Europe when the ideas of philosophers about an ideal government and human nature in society were being developed. Although women did not have equal rights as men, women did have the power to influence ideas during the Enlightenment. This is because they took on several roles as leaders, where they had chances and opportunities to act as philosophers and share their new ideas on the society of France. In Salons, high class parties during the Enlightenment that was a place for nobles, and their intellectuals to share their opinions and have conversations with one another was where both men and women were invited to participate and exchange ideas.

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During the eighteenth century, gender roles were rigid. There were things that men were expected to do, and things women were expected to do, and these expectations were very different. There were countless works written and drawn about what each gender should (and should not) do and how they should act. Three such works were George Washington’s “Rules of Civility,” an image entitled “Keep Within the Compass,” and an anonymously published poem called “The Lady’s Complaint.” In these works, we are shown both sides of the gender coin by showing positive and negative rules for both men and women.

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During the Enlightenment people changed the way they thought of culture and took a scientific approach to almost everything. People began to think critically about what lies around them and started to counter their beliefs with scientific approaches. Everything was not perfect during the Enlightenment, even though many things improved for some; people were still prejudiced towards others. Women were not acknowledged as someone who could be educated or work, while “men had many opportunities: for education, for service in government or diplomacy, for the exercise of political and economic power” (The enlightenment 2). Contrasting the writings of Rousseau and Wollstonecraft we are able to identify how each of them feels towards the treatment of women in society.

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The Enlightenment was a period during the 1600 and 1700s where authority, power, government and law was questioned by philosophers. The causes of the Enlightenment was the Thirty Years’ War, centuries of mistreatment at the hands of monarchies and the church, greater exploration of the world, and European thinkers’ interest in the world (scientific study). A large part of the Enlightenment was natural law, which was the belief that people should live their lives and organize their society on the basis of rules and precepts laid down by nature or God; the principles of the Enlightenment in the 1600s through the 1700s influenced the development of the USA by advocating religious and social freedom, freeing the people from oppression, and providing

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