WOLLSTONECRAFT - A Vindication of the Rights of Woman - Introduction and Chapters 2 and 3
Keep in mind the six key Enlightenment ideals I mentioned in my lecture. Note: Early in Chapter Two she quotes from Milton's "Paradise Lost". In the first of two contrasting quotations of Milton, Adam is speaking to Eve. In the second Adam is speaking to God. She is arguing that women are not children, they ought to think and rely only on God. She rejects the contention that God is man's law and man is woman's law in first Milton quote. She agrees with second Milton quote that true fellowship requires equality. In Vindication Wollstonecraft refers occasionally to Rousseau. Rousseau was a French philosopher. Some of his arguments were used to justify the French revolution. In Emile he argued that women and men had different characters and should be raised differently. The young counterpart to the hero Emile, Sophie, should be raised to be innocent, soft and gentle, a graceful support to Emile. Note also that Wollstonecraft's style involves irony and humor. Sometimes you will have to ask whether she means to be taken literally.
Reading and Discussion Guide Questions:
1. Why are Reason and Education a central pivot of Wollstonecraft's argument argument?
2. According to Wollstonecraft, how has the Tyranny of Man been justified? Do women have different virtues than men have? Why is it important to her argument that both women and men have immortal souls and the ability to reason?
3. Why does Wollstonecraft describe women as using softness, cunning, and beauty to manipulate men when this seems like an anti-female stereotype? In what ways is her analysis culturally and class determined?
4. What is the point of her comparison of women and kings? Of women and soldiers? How does she deploy these analogies in service of her argument? What are their strengths and weaknesses?
5. Why does she reject the notion that the man is the oak and the woman is the ivy?
6. What are the roles of love and marriage in the life of women according to Wollstonecraft? What does she mean when she says that friendship or indifference inevitably succeed love?
7. Wollstonecraft rejects the notion of different characters and sets of virtues for men and women. Why does she do so? Could emphasizing similarity rather than difference ever be problematic from certain feminist perspectives?
8. What do you see as the strengths and weaknesses of Wollstonecraft’s argument in these excerpts from the Vindication--both in terms of her own historical context and a twenty-first century context. Who do you think her audience is? Jot down as well what you found most striking about these excerpts and any questions that occurred to you as you read.
9. After we read Snitow, you may want to reflect on the following question: On which side of Snitow's divide does Wollstonecraft primarily lie? How might a feminist from the other side of the divide critique Wollstonecraft's argument? Was her argument the most tactically effective one that could be made in her time period? Does the "divide" reappear even within Wollstonecraft's argument?