A Vindication of the Rights of Woman: Revolutions

A Vindication of the Rights of WomanMary Wollstonecraft A Vindication of the Rights of Woman: with Strictures on Political and Moral Subjects (1792), written by the 18th-century British proto-feminist Mary Wollstonecraft, is one of the earliest works of feminist philosophy. In it, Wollstonecraft responds to those educational and political theorists of the 18th century who did not believe women should receive a rational education. She argues that women ought to have an education commensurate with their position in society, claiming that women are essential to the nation because they educate its children and because they could be "companions" to their husbands, rather than mere wives. Instead of viewing women as ornaments to society or property to be traded in marriage, Wollstonecraft maintains that they are human beings deserving of the same fundamental rights as men.Wollstonecraft was prompted to write the Rights of Woman after reading Charles Maurice de Talleyrand-Périgord's 1791 report to the French National Assembly, which stated that women should only receive a domestic education she used her commentary on this specific event to launch a broad attack against sexual double standards and to indict men for encouraging women to indulge in excessive emotion. Wollstonecraft wrote the Rights of Woman hurriedly to respond directly to ongoing events she intended to write a more thoughtful second volume but died before completing it.While Wollstonecraft does call for equality between the sexes in particular areas of life, such as morality, she does not explicitly state that men and women are equal. Her ambiguous statements regarding the equality of the sexes have since made it difficult to classify Wollstonecraft as a modern feminist, particularly since the word and the concept were unavailable to her. Although it is commonly assumed now that the Rights of Woman was unfavourably received, this is a modern misconception based on the belief that Wollstonecraft was as reviled during her lifetime as she became after the publication of William Godwin's Memoirs of the Author of A Vindication of the Rights of Woman (1798). The Rights of Woman was actually well received when it was first published in 1792. One biographer has called it "perhaps the most original book of [Wollstonecraft's] century".

"A thoughtful and useful abridgment of an essential historical, political, and philosophical text. [Barnard and Shapiro] have managed to preserve the tone and arguments of the original while shedding much of the redundancy and lengthy quotations of external sources that can be off-putting and cumbersome for today's readers." Katrin Schultheiss, George Washington University
"A very judicious selection from the Vindication. The related texts do a great job of setting Wollstonecraft's arguments within contemporary debates about women's education and, more broadly, eighteenth-century political philosophy. The editorial apparatus is also thorough and usefulespecially the notes, which are outstanding. "In short, the editors have created a fresh and stimulating new edition of Wollstonecrafts Vindication that will be infinitely useful in the classroom." Sarah Gwyneth Ross, Boston College

Dedication; Introduction; 1. The rights and involved duties of mankind considered; 2. The prevailing opinion of a sexual character discussed; 3. The same subject continued; 4. Observations on the state of degradation to which woman is reduced by various causes; 5. Animadversions on some of the writers who have rendered women objects of pity, bordering on contempt; 6. The effect which an early association of ideas has upon the character; 7. Modesty. Comprehensively considered, and not as a sexual virtue; 8. Morality undermined by sexual notions of the importance of a good reputation; 9. Of the pernicious effects which arise from the unnatural distinctions established in society; 10. Parental affection; 11. Duty to parents; 12. On national education; 13. Some instances of the folly which the ignorance of women generates; with concluding reflections on the moral improvement that a revolution in female manners may naturally be expected to produce.