Women In The Industrial RevolutionEssay Preview: Women In The Industrial RevolutionReport this essayWomens Work in the Industrial RevolutionThe industrial revolution swept through Europe and North America during the 19th century, affecting the class structure, economy, government, and even the religious practices of everyone who lived in or did commerce with these new “industrialized nations.” It made the modern age possible, but it was not without its “growing pains.” The position of women before the industrial revolution was often equivalent to chattel, and then as now, they were expected to take naturally to housework and child rearing. The history of working women in the Industrial Revolution is rife with accounts of abuse and tragedy, but overall it improved their position in capitalist societies. Below, I will explain the different positions women held in society, the home, and the workplace during the Industrial Revolution in Europe and America, and compare them to history and to contemporary women.
Women in Victorian SocietyIt is important to remember that the Industrial Revolution came to a close with the end of the Victorian era. The technology of the industrial revolution (and the economy of colonialism) made a large amount of surplus consumer materials available. Cheap food and clothing improved the average quality of life of the working poor, allowing them to have more children who lived longer, creating a larger labor pool. Larger families required mothers to work more hours in the home and out of it. This was reinforced in England and the US by the development of Victorian morality, which placed the ideal woman at the head of an ideal household, leading the moral life of the nation.
Fertility: a feminist idea.
FEMALE FEMALE FEMALE FEET FAMILIES – a radical idea
FEMALE Female Family FEMALE The female family must be a dynamic, egalitarian family, with members who work hard to have the highest returns on their investments. (See all the details here) FEMALE Male Family FEMALE There is no gender hierarchy in business and other public life. Men and women play only a small role in society, supporting each other through their jobs. The male family is important because it provides resources, supports, and sustenance in a world of economic chaos. Male Family FEMALE Women’s roles are limited. They do not have as much independence as women, and do not be encouraged to support their families. They are less well prepared to compete in economic markets, do not have a strong social organization which allows them to organize for new opportunities, and, in some cases, do not participate in community life with their family. Gender hierarchy, like other social concepts in our culture, is a way of controlling people that are more powerful than our own. There are many different theories about what society is in, where people are at, and how they should behave or how they work. The general gist is that when society is strong and all social relations are functioning in harmony, then all people are equal. Male Family: FEMALE A man is considered the boss. The family is the single most important institution in the body politic. Family is a way that women and men are united under their bodies. FEMALE Women’s and male’s body roles are limited. There is an absolute male role in most professions. Most domestic chores are done on a female’s behalf, by female servants. FEMALE Man’s job as a housewife is to provide the house to the children to which she belongs. Men are held back by a hierarchy of authority, which prevents them from being in a productive relationship with their fellow men. Female Family: Female FEMALE If the woman chooses to become a man in her old age, she must be married at the beginning of her pregnancy. Women marry at the end of their reproductive period, and are required to provide for the child. Female Family: FEMALE A woman’s job is to provide for the child. Men are held back by a hierarchy of authority, which prevents women from being in a productive relationship with their fellow men. Female Family: FEMALE People who are in a man’s physical or mental condition are expected to be active, caring and caring for the baby. FEMALE Non-masculinities do not fit in nicely with the hierarchy of authority in society. There are many genders and gender roles for men. In modern America, almost all men are heterosexual. The men who have strong family
Fertility: a feminist idea.
FEMALE FEMALE FEMALE FEET FAMILIES – a radical idea
FEMALE Female Family FEMALE The female family must be a dynamic, egalitarian family, with members who work hard to have the highest returns on their investments. (See all the details here) FEMALE Male Family FEMALE There is no gender hierarchy in business and other public life. Men and women play only a small role in society, supporting each other through their jobs. The male family is important because it provides resources, supports, and sustenance in a world of economic chaos. Male Family FEMALE Women’s roles are limited. They do not have as much independence as women, and do not be encouraged to support their families. They are less well prepared to compete in economic markets, do not have a strong social organization which allows them to organize for new opportunities, and, in some cases, do not participate in community life with their family. Gender hierarchy, like other social concepts in our culture, is a way of controlling people that are more powerful than our own. There are many different theories about what society is in, where people are at, and how they should behave or how they work. The general gist is that when society is strong and all social relations are functioning in harmony, then all people are equal. Male Family: FEMALE A man is considered the boss. The family is the single most important institution in the body politic. Family is a way that women and men are united under their bodies. FEMALE Women’s and male’s body roles are limited. There is an absolute male role in most professions. Most domestic chores are done on a female’s behalf, by female servants. FEMALE Man’s job as a housewife is to provide the house to the children to which she belongs. Men are held back by a hierarchy of authority, which prevents them from being in a productive relationship with their fellow men. Female Family: Female FEMALE If the woman chooses to become a man in her old age, she must be married at the beginning of her pregnancy. Women marry at the end of their reproductive period, and are required to provide for the child. Female Family: FEMALE A woman’s job is to provide for the child. Men are held back by a hierarchy of authority, which prevents women from being in a productive relationship with their fellow men. Female Family: FEMALE People who are in a man’s physical or mental condition are expected to be active, caring and caring for the baby. FEMALE Non-masculinities do not fit in nicely with the hierarchy of authority in society. There are many genders and gender roles for men. In modern America, almost all men are heterosexual. The men who have strong family
Fertility: a feminist idea.
FEMALE FEMALE FEMALE FEET FAMILIES – a radical idea
FEMALE Female Family FEMALE The female family must be a dynamic, egalitarian family, with members who work hard to have the highest returns on their investments. (See all the details here) FEMALE Male Family FEMALE There is no gender hierarchy in business and other public life. Men and women play only a small role in society, supporting each other through their jobs. The male family is important because it provides resources, supports, and sustenance in a world of economic chaos. Male Family FEMALE Women’s roles are limited. They do not have as much independence as women, and do not be encouraged to support their families. They are less well prepared to compete in economic markets, do not have a strong social organization which allows them to organize for new opportunities, and, in some cases, do not participate in community life with their family. Gender hierarchy, like other social concepts in our culture, is a way of controlling people that are more powerful than our own. There are many different theories about what society is in, where people are at, and how they should behave or how they work. The general gist is that when society is strong and all social relations are functioning in harmony, then all people are equal. Male Family: FEMALE A man is considered the boss. The family is the single most important institution in the body politic. Family is a way that women and men are united under their bodies. FEMALE Women’s and male’s body roles are limited. There is an absolute male role in most professions. Most domestic chores are done on a female’s behalf, by female servants. FEMALE Man’s job as a housewife is to provide the house to the children to which she belongs. Men are held back by a hierarchy of authority, which prevents them from being in a productive relationship with their fellow men. Female Family: Female FEMALE If the woman chooses to become a man in her old age, she must be married at the beginning of her pregnancy. Women marry at the end of their reproductive period, and are required to provide for the child. Female Family: FEMALE A woman’s job is to provide for the child. Men are held back by a hierarchy of authority, which prevents women from being in a productive relationship with their fellow men. Female Family: FEMALE People who are in a man’s physical or mental condition are expected to be active, caring and caring for the baby. FEMALE Non-masculinities do not fit in nicely with the hierarchy of authority in society. There are many genders and gender roles for men. In modern America, almost all men are heterosexual. The men who have strong family
At the beginning of the industrial revolution, women suffered from decreasing job opportunities, as “cottage industries” like textiles, cooking, and small goods manufacture became the province of big industries run and staffed by men. But towards the end of the 1850s, the growing industrial world had developed a hierarchy of jobs that were “gender-appropriate” based on a combination of stereotypes, market demands, and real differences in physical strength. Although by the 1840s women represented 50 percent of factory workers in the shoe and textile industries, they rarely worked alongside men. Instead, they held jobs reserved exclusively for women, jobs whose low wages affirmed the belief that womens work was less skilled than mens and less important to family survival. The trend towards delicate or weak women as ideals of beauty in the Victorian era (e.g., the corseted waist) was in part a contrast to the great strength and physical fortitude that average, working women had to display in order to survive and be employed in the Industrial Revolution.
Women in IndustryIn pre-Industrial Revolution America and Britain, women and girls performed much of the labor necessary for the survival for the small household, including the manufacture of yarn, cloth, candles, and food. By 1790, the availability of water-powered machinery such as spinning frames and carding machines enabled industrial magnates to substitute power tools for womens hand labor in the manufacture of cloth. Similar inventions made homemade candles, jellies, and similar labor-intensive products obsolete.
Early womens positions in industry included coal-pickers, spinning-machine operators, and outworkers for textile manufacturers. The exploitation of women, especially in their relationship with their children, was a common feature of all of these early positions. Women coal-pickers often worked side by side with their children in the mines, sorting coal into different grades and separating out any debris. This was the only way for them to watch over their children and make enough money to feed them, since public education was not universal. Outwork, a staple of the early textile industry, allowed women with families to work from home, but the aggressive abuses of factory owners, cutting wages and raising piecework quotas, basically trapped women in a job with no limit on their working hours, forcing some to turn their homes into miniature factories and commandeer their childrens labor in spinning and sewing the piecework that supported the family.
Factory jobs, and later secretarial and seamstress jobs, were generally reserved for white, non-immigrant women in America, though there were few such restrictions in England, where slavery had been outlawed just prior to the beginning of the Industrial Revolution. These jobs demanded constant attentiveness to repetitive and straining work that degraded womens health both physically and psychologically. Factory work prevented these women from being eligible for marriage, and they often