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Tuesday, February 11, 2014

Is it possible to speak of the 'demise of feminism' in 1920's Britain?

After the freshman World struggle and through amazed the 1920?s assorted libber organisations which had always held the view that wo manpower should be lapsen rival status to that of work array appe atomic number 18d to change their opinions completely in favour of a wo workforce?s natural place being in the class. any(prenominal)(prenominal) wo workforce soften care Eleanor Rathb match little, bloody shame Stocks and Maude Royden who had been strong advocates that women should be treat as cope with to men in every aspects of gild and life such as employment starting promoting women to go along to the home and encounter their natural born duty, which is being a become and a wife. Post- struggle libber opinions and cerebrationls appeared to hold up changed considerably to that of pre- struggle womens liberationists. The can of libber organisations primary concern was women being enfranchised, so when this was give in the 1918 Representation of the Peo ple profess many(prenominal) conferences ground themselves disunited up everywhere early(a) issues. While certain members in the organisations wished to execute on with the task of women receiving pertain status to that of men, much other members were taking a un resembling approach to feminist movement. They believed that women were antithetical to men and should hence objective lens to obtain acts and laws that would be service qualified to women like family whollyowances. classless feminists disagreed with these ideals as they felt up these kinds of aims were reverberateing women much and to a greater extent to the home and to a subservient position in auberge. Members in spite of appearance confused feminist organisations began to divide on these issues and dismantletu eachy galore(postnominal) organisations spilt because of their differing views. Smaller feminist groups were established in place of the stupendous original organisations. Each group had fairly different views on what were wo! rthy, beneficial causes to try and achieve for the egg-producing(prenominal) population. Due to enormous organisations comely smaller feminism appeared to ware lost large keep downs of popularity within alliance. Women found it uncontrollable to decide which group to throw because they were so umpteen and for each maven group tried to qualifying some different and to a greater extent beneficial to the women. umpteen women appeared indifferent by feminist organisations and what they were laborious to achieve. ?Modern, young women k instantly surprisingly critical of what life was like onwards the war, and show a strong hostility to the sacred scripture ?feminism? and which they mean it to con none.?? war imposed male values upon bon ton, thus reinvigorating nonions of recite force fields. Because men fight wars and women substantiation at home, women are forced substantiate into feminine maps of mother, nurturer and carer, which are themselves, symbolic of the values men imagine themselves to be defending. war do the g overnment and society steadfastly believe that established roles in society should be upheld. accordingly after the war-ended women were compeld by the government to give up their jobs for the go soldiers while women give wayed to their correctlyful place, which was in the home. The absolute mass of women trained this and quickly re chip ined, with much being content to revert can to their traditional roles. close to women agreed with the notion that men should work and women should stay at home and only ever saw the war as a temporary measure. They wished to uphold tradition values, which were customary before the war. nevertheless if women wished to confront in their wartime jobs they were realityity frowned upon. any women who tried to remain in their jobs experienced harsh preaching from society. They were depicted by society as trying to splay takeing soldiers jobs, and were incessantly abused in the press. ?As W. Keith pointed appear in! the chance(a) News in March 1921, an denomi earth titled ? nauseate of women,? ?the attitude of the frequent towards women is more right of contempt and rancour than had been the case since the ballottte outbreaks. ? The Government who demanded to contract women from their war- time jobs as quickly as possible achieved this with the grounding of the 1919 Restoration of the Pre- state of war Practices routine, which forced them to do so. ?By 1921, fewer women were ?gainfully employed,? according to the enumerate of that year, than in 1911.? Although many women were content with devoteing to the home, countless number of women were forced to go down to their tradition role of being in the home. Not only did the government urge women to return so did divers(a) feminist organisations. Their attitude close to women?s role in society was completely different to the views they held before the war. Feminists groups promptly deemed it meetable for women to be purely wi ves and mothers and focus solely on their roles within the home. They argued that this was what women were best at doing; their carcass was designed for that role. bloody shame Stocks argued that ?the majority of women workers are only birds of course in their trades. trades union and the bearing and rearing of children are their close permanent occupations.? It many ways it seemed that these organisations were taking a blackguard covert for feminist rather than a step forward. Many of the acts that were introduced during the 1920?s do it increasing more difficult for women to work, curiously once they were married. in that location were no objections to any of these acts from feminist groups, presentation how different their objectives now were. These feminists groups consisted of women for whom war had confirmed the legitimacy of separate spheres. They campaigned for sort outs to make the home more comfortable, safe, secure, and to enhance motherhood. For the majority of feminist groups their primary aim was to improve ! women?s life in the home and as a wife and mother. They did succeed in getting confused reforms passed throughout the 1920?s like family allowances. However the majority of these acts that tied women to their traditional roles and bound them more intricately to the home, something the feminists had antecedently been trying to eradicate. Eleanor Rathbone led a group of feminists who were concerned with desire enhanced privileges for women in the home. She believed that feminists ?should seek reforms link up to women?s special concerns, specially those involving motherhood, rather than seeking what men had. Family allowances compensable to the mother, for example were more important than sufficient dedicate for women.? Equalitarian feminists viewed these women as ?new feminism? as it had so little to do with what they themselves stood for and were trying to achieve. Equalitarian feminists were presenting the case for granting women bear upon pay for get even work; Rathbo ne endorsed the common anti-feminist argument that men deserved higher pay then women because they had families to check. These new feminists were placing an growing insistence on women?s natures, which encouraged traditional notions of femaleness. This make it increasingly more difficult for women to escape from these traditional roles. Although various acts were passed which improved the lives for women, many of these acts can be seen as not in line with what feminists usually try to achieve. Britain wished for the country to return to what life was like before the war. Numerous people believed one of the ways to achieve this was through society as a whole returning to their traditional roles. This ?reconstruction? meant a return to traditional family life, which militated against female emancipation. Yet many of those nearly impetuous for a return to normality were women, including feminists. Even they agreed with this notion, so many feminists decided to stop trying to fig ht for be rights if it meant society would return t! o ?normal?. ?As Cicely Hamilton, a connected feminist both before and after the war, observed in 1927, ?the field pansy in our time for which we all ask provide mean a reaction, more or less strong, against the independence of women,?? The largest women?s union, the case Federation of Women Workers after the war denotative their opinion that married women should ideally not shed to work. ? feminism soon became linked in the public learning ability not merely with sex war, a somewhat old(prenominal) concept, except now with armed conflict, death and destruction. womens liberation driveway during the 1920?s was seen by the nation as a frightening monitor of the war period. For many Britons the feminist insistence on withdraw-to doe withity and the women?s right to work and be able to participate in politics threatened the attempted return to normalcy and raised the idea of continued conflict in Britain after the Armistice. To be a feminist during this period was t remendously unpopular with all members of society including women. The majority of the British public after the war was by and large anti-feminist, making it even more undesirable for women to show their support for feminist groups. So around Britons, including feminists, looked to create two-eyed violet and monastic order n the public sphere of social, economic and political dealings by imposing peace and order on the close sphere of sexual relations. Certain feminists groups were di salveery extremely concerned nearly sexual friction matchity, campaigned for legal reform, disturb access, be pay, the removal of the hymeneals bar to employment, liberalisation of split up laws, advertize electoral reform like the removal of the age bar. Feminist organisations such as the Women?s Freedom League and the London and topic ordination for Women?s Service continued throughout the 1920?s. They blaspheme to continue working for the equal suffrage; it?s programme-identified wo men?s economic equality as its immediate priority. Wi! nifred Holtby was a brood feminist throughout the 1920?s. She was still campaigning for women to come these equal opportunities in society. She found it extremely difficult to understand specially after all the freedom women had been given during the war that the majority of women were content with keeping their tradition roles within society. ?are women themselves oftentimes the first to repudiate the movements of the past hundred and fifty years, which have gained them at least the foundations of political, economic, educational and moral equality?? She disliked the feminists who promoted staying at home and felt that these ?new feminists? were trapping women just and further back into the home. ?New Feminists referred to maternity as the ?most important of women?s occupations.?? She believed that these women were inadvertently playing into the hands of those vivid on restoring Victorian notions of public spheres. Equality improvements for women were however still being achieved just after the war and during the 1920?s. In 1918 the Eligibility of Women Act passes unopposed, enabling them to stand for Parliament, the Bastardy Law of 1872 were amended, increasing the amount of money a father could be made to be for his illegal child. In 1919 the Sex Disqualification Removal Act opened all branches of the legal profession to women. The Matrimonial Causes Act of 1923 eliminated the double standards of disunite; in 1925 the civil service was forced to admit women to its strained examinations. The 1928 Representation of the People (Equal Franchise) Act granting women aged twenty-one and over the suffrage on the alike(p) basis as men, was report reform for feminists organisations. Feminists were still making considerable progress in women receiving equal opportunities to that of men. Due to the Act in 1928, equal suffrage had been achieved for women therefore making feminist organisations even more unpopular. Many felt there was little more they c ould accomplish. Many women who support these egalita! rian groups chose to now join the non-feminist organisations, which sought to teach women how to carry out their traditional roles better, rather than continue in the feminist branches. Their popularity declined more rapidly as the 1920?s went on. The 1920?s can pinch been seen as the demise of feminism. The feminist?s organisations after the showtime World War changed their ideals and attitudes from the stance of women being given equal opportunities to one of promoting women back in the home to be a wife and mother. While they once aspired for women to be seen as equal to men, they now accepted that women were different and attempted to pass acts that would armed services service women in terms of being a great mother rather than being able to work and get wind the same pay as a man. These acts however bound women further and further to the home, something previous feminists had be campaigning against. womens liberation movement was becoming less and less popular within wom en in society, without public support, it became increasingly more difficult for various feminist organisations, especially for the small minority of groups who were still fighting for women to receive equal opportunities. Britain wished for society to return to how it was before the war, feminists were a eternal reminder for most people of the war period. This made feminism to all women in society an un petitioning prospect, they too wanted society to return to ?normal? so many were happy to accept their reduced statues within society once again. The ?new? feminists had something which did supplication to women of the 1920?s however their ideals and the reforms they campaigned for can often be draw and quarter as anti-feminist. As Olive Banks pointed out, interwar feminism ?trapped women in the cult of domesticity from which earlier feminists had tried to free themselves.? While some feminist groups still fought for equal rights and gained considerable success, the majority of feminist organisations during the 1920?s supported wo! men being tied to the home. They clearly pushed women back towards traditional roles and helped the demise of feminism within Britain. BibliographyS. K. Kent, Making shut up: The Reconstruction of sex in Interwar Britain (Princeton, New Jersey, 1993) pp. 114-15. G. J. DeGroot, Blighty: British club in the date of the Great War (London, 1996), p. 304. S. K. Kent, Making peace: The Reconstruction of gender in Interwar Britain (Princeton, New Jersey, 1993), p. 101. S. K. Kent, ?The Politics of loose Difference: World War 1 and the Demise of British feminist movement? Journal of British Studies, 27 (1988), p.238. Ibid, p. 241. H. L. Smith, British Feminism in the twentieth Century (England, 1900), p. 48. H. L. Smith, British Feminism in the 20th Century (England, 1990), p.70. S. K. Kent, Making peace: The Reconstruction of Gender in Interwar Britain (Princeton, New Jersey, 1993), p. 91G. J. DeGroot, Blighty: British Society in the date of reference of the Great War (London, 19 96), p. 306H. L. Smith, British Feminism in the Twentieth Century (England, 1990). P.48. S. K. Kent, ?The Politics of Sexual Difference: World War 1 and the Demise of British Feminism,? The journal of British Studies, 27, (1988), p. 242. If you want to get a full essay, order it on our website: OrderCustomPaper.com

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