EDWARD'S LECTURE NOTES:
More notes at http://tanguay.info/learntracker
C O U R S E
The Modern World: Global History since 1760
Prof. Philip Zelikow, University of Virginia
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C O U R S E L E C T U R E 1910s/1920s: Modern Women Notes taken on September 2, 2013 by Edward Tanguay |
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19th century
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traditional roles
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almost all women were in traditional roles
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womens' role may have been just as important as mens' but from a legal point of view, women were subordinate
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lack of rights to vote
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lack of rights to own property
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China
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foot bindings were for women a mandatory custom for upper class women
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from childhood crushing their feet
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they could not walk like men
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19th century some reaction against it from missionaries and Chinese
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political rights
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why in the 19th century and not in the 18th?
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late 19th century: liberal ideas reaching a zenith in Europe and United States by 1860s/1870s
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former slave movement
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many people who were active for getting rights for slaves also were pro-rights for women
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not just a matter of principal but to protect themselves
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why in the 19th century, what's changing?
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big cities, urbanization, construction of saloons
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on a farm, a husband didn't have a saloon to go to, now he did, many man wrecking families, women needed to protected themselves
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women wanted to ban or restrict the sale of alcohol
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protect their working conditions from industrial abuse
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origins of modern feminism
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1910s, 1920s
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emancipation
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birth control
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in addition to political rights, they are talking more and more about emancipation
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from being locked into traditional roles
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they want an independent lifestyle
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the right to control if they get pregnant and have children
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Margaret Sanger (1879-1966)
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American birth control activist
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nurse
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popularized the term "birth control"
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helped legalize contraception
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1916: opened the first birth control clinic
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was put on trial for talking about the subject of birth control
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equal opportunity
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society has changed, women find themselves in new roles, they are trying to adjust the social expectation of women to match
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American modern girl, i.e. flapper
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modern girls are showing up in other countries as well
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Chinese adapting Western styles in traditional Chinese ways
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cities that are bridge points of East and West, where these styles are communicated
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Tokyo
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Shanghai
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Saigon
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Djakarta
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women in these places are trying out new life styles, clothing styles, and activism
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modern girls are very much about consumerism: perfumes, cars, cigarettes, fashions
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Soviet Union had campaigns in reaction against this new consumerism girl
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Soviet communism promoted itself as being about womens' liberation as well, but not in the sense of liberated Western women who were very much about consumerism: perfumes, cars, cigarettes, fashions. Soviet women were liberated in the sense of being allowed to work in factories alongside their male comrades.