WGS101H5 Lecture Notes - Lecture 3: Marxist Feminism, Liberal Feminism, Friedrich Engels
Document Summary
Liberal feminism stresses freedom and equality for women with men and stressed personhood. If men should be free and equal, why shouldn"t women? . To be a person, you had to be knowledgeable and educated. They didn"t believe that all women were equal (due to racism) Women were not persons because they could not vote or own property. She fought for female dependence frailty and helplessness. She argued women marry for economic reasons not romanticism. Other women began to build on this and located patriarchy as source of women oppression. Initially liberal feminist believe women"s lives could be transformed if they were given access to education, voting, and property rights. It focused on white middle-classed women and women that were heterosexual. By 19th century, liberal feminists blamed economic dependence on men for oppression. Conclusion: women"s primary responsibility for home and family prevented them from accessing paid employment on equal footing.