Victorian Era

HOW FEMINISM HAS CHANGED
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How Feminism has changed for the past Fifty Years
Currently, women enjoy as many privileges as men, and all this can be attributed to a leap of faith. Feminism refers to a collection of various movements and philosophies that target establishing, defining and protecting social, politic and economic rights of women. It advocates for equality in all spheres of human activities. Apparently, feminism aims at removing the discriminatory barrier that exists in a society which is mostly dominated by men. This essay will explore the political and social boundaries of feminism for the past fifty years, such as new conceptions of women formed at the turn of the twentieth century.
During the Victorian era, women’s roles were more defined and confined to the home setting due to male dominance. Some roles were solely seen to be accomplished by a specific gender and hence breaking of such a culture was deemed criminal. However, in the 19th century, both male and females worked alongside each other in most family businesses. Women used to serve customers and keep business records and at the same time performed domestic duties. As time progressed and industrial revolution took root in many parts of the continent, men began moving for long distances to their places of work. The normal cycle of men and women working alongside each other was interrupted. Women, daughters, and wives began to stay at home to oversee the domestic choirs. For the lucky homes, they employed servants to attend to those choirs and the women would tend to put on crinoline, the huge bell-shaped skirt which made it almost impossible for them to perform any work.

The skirt would sweep over staircases as the women moved up or down. This development is the one that introduced an entirely new aspect where women were left out on most of the societal activities.
Women were considered superior to men regarding morality but physically weaker. In the face of the public, their moral taint made them suit in the domestic sphere. The protective and human nature of female creatures was and still is admirable, but men, on the other hand, were seen as the leaders of the family who offered protection. In summary, the modern world perceives equal treatment of both males and females without any partiality because both of them have equal capacity to be productive.
Bibliography
Elisabeth S. Clemens, Securing Political Returns to Social Capital: Women’s Associations in the United States, 1880s-1920s (Massachusetts: The MIT Press, 1999), 616.
Levi S. Peterson, (1891) A Mormon Woman’s Life in Utah (Utah: University of Utah Press, 1988), 3.
Mary Garden, The New Woman of the 1920s: Debating Bobbed-Hair, “Why I Bobbed My Hair,” Pictorial Review, April 1927, 3.