The Changing role and status of women in Britain since1900
The Changing role and status of women in Britain since1900
a) Source A tells us that "a very large number of women work at home", this is however unclear as to weather this means that women also work outside the home in 1909. Using my own knowledge I know that women did work outside the home in 1909 but only in some fields like teaching. With this knowledge I can say that the source is unreliable in the respect that it does not accurately describe women's place in society.
Source A also tells us that women received "very poor wages that the men pay them", using my own knowledge I can agree with this as women rarely received more than half the pay of a man for any job that she would do as well as the male. Based upon my own knowledge I can say that the source is reliable when studying the difference in pay.
Source A was written by Mrs. Clementina Black, a suffragette. As the source was written in the height of the suffragette movement it can be assumed that the piece was a propaganda piece and would be biased towards the suffragette cause.
Mrs Black was also a trade unionist, so she would want to emphasise the poor conditions to try and gain support for her cause and improve rights. This again shows bias and makes the source less reliable when studying women's role however it does show that women would be listened to, even when the focus is a major political matter as the source was written by a woman and it is closely liked to suffrage.
b) Source B tells us that women work three times harder in the home, that only one in ten men think that women make better bosses than men do and that the number of women holding senior positions are still relatively rare compared to the number of men working at high levels. From this I can infer that I many respects women's lives have not changed a lot as they still work harder at home than men do. It can also be inferred that women are not respected in the field of work like men are as they don't have as many senior jobs as men do, it is possible for women to work at these levels but not many women achieve this possibility. In the eyes of the law women are equal but in the eyes of society they are still seen as inferior to men and there tends to be a glass ceiling associated with women's careers.
c) The Suffragette actions taken before the war were more important than the work women performed during the war in gaining women the vote.
The Suffragists or the NUWSS, National Union for the Women's Suffrage Society, wanted suffrage. To gain support for suffrage they used organised non-violent protests. They held meetings in all constituencies to raise maximum awareness and held a pilgrimage to London every year, this helped to get parliaments respect and some support, in one petition alone there were 280,000 signatures. The Suffragist action lead by Milicent Fawcett gained a lot of support and awareness ...
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c) The Suffragette actions taken before the war were more important than the work women performed during the war in gaining women the vote.
The Suffragists or the NUWSS, National Union for the Women's Suffrage Society, wanted suffrage. To gain support for suffrage they used organised non-violent protests. They held meetings in all constituencies to raise maximum awareness and held a pilgrimage to London every year, this helped to get parliaments respect and some support, in one petition alone there were 280,000 signatures. The Suffragist action lead by Milicent Fawcett gained a lot of support and awareness among the general population and government. It is possible that women would have received the vote early through the action of the suffragists had it not been for the WSPU actions after 1903.
Emmeline Pankhurst, a famous British Suffragette formed the Women's Social and Political Union (WSPU) in 1903. She believed in "deeds not words". Her campaign involved attacks on property, non-payment of taxes and public demonstrations. The evening of February 13, 1907 saw the women's suffrage take a violent turn as a large crowd of suffragettes attempted to storm the Houses of Parliament to hand a petition to the government. The women had declared their own self-styled "parliament" earlier in the day, after which over100 members of the WSPU marched through the streets of Westminster to the House of Commons. Emeline Pankhurst, the founder and leader of the WSPU, had already been jailed for a pamphlet inciting women to "rush the House of Commons". It took a battalion of mounted policemen five hours to quell the demonstration. In all, 57 women were arrested, although 15 suffragettes did manage to break into the Commons building. In Holloway prison the following day, one of the captives, Pankhurst's daughter Christabel, showed no remorse and described the event as a "great day for our movement". Until the storming of Parliament, protests had been largely non-violent, a situation that changed. The Suffragette movement reduced support among the moderates because of the radical tactics and gave opponents a chance to reject the idea of women's suffrage. The violence also turned many moderate MP's, who had previously supported women's suffrage, against it. When women's suffrage was debated in Parliament in 1913it was defeated by 48 votes. Even though the suffragette actions lost a lot of support it also gained a lot of attention.
During the course of the suffrage movement, parliament changed its views many times. Before the WSPU movement, parliament realised that women voters might vote for men as well as women, increasing support amongst the moderates for the NUWSS. However suffragettes violent actions discouraged many from the idea of giving women the vote, especially when they are radical enough to attack the houses of parliament.
When war broke out the WSPU's campaign was halted and instead of women protesting they worked instead. As more and more men were required for the war effort there were less and less men to man the factories and till the fields, and for the first time women were aloud to do men's jobs. Women worked in weapons manufacturing and any other job men did, except mining and quarrying. This kept the country running and vital supplies for the front running and gained women a lot of respect that the Suffragettes lost.
In 1918 women above the age of 30 were given the vote, not the equality that the WSPU wanted but it was the start of many changes that would see them equal to men. Without the build up of support and awareness women would not have received the vote after the war work as parliament would not have had a reason to give it to them. Due to the WSPU a lot of support was lost but it showed the government that women would die to get the vote.
d) Legislation such as the Equal Pay Act and Sex Discrimination Act did not give women equality in the eyes of society.
IN both world wars women were required to perform jobs in industry whilst the men were away fighting. After the First World War women were made to give up their jobs by the trade unions who didn't want competition for men, the same thing occurred after World War II. However an important change had occurred. The Sex Disqualification Act had been passed in 1919 which meant women couldn't be barred from a job based on sex. Trade Unions now agreed that women could work alongside men. Women still tended to be paid far less than men and the middle classes still kept up with the Victorian image of a woman's place being in the home, meaning a glass ceiling had been formed as most women weren't achieving there potential.
In 1945 the Education Act meant girls could now go to secondary school and receive the same education as boys, this meant that for the first time women were as intelligent as men. In 1954 women teachers were paid the same as men for the first time so in effect in the field of education women were equal to men, however girls were discouraged from taking science and maths and rather take domestic sciences.
Women were given the vote in 1918 but did not receive the same voting rights as men until 1928. Many men in parliament had thought if women could vote they would only vote for women. However, in 1931 only 67 women stood to be an MP and only 15 were elected. Margaret Bondfield made history by being the first woman Cabinet Minister in 1929. Parliament continued to pass reforms that affected women's lives until they had the same rights as men.
In 1930 the government agreed to make contraceptive advice available to women for the first time and abortions were legalised, this meant that women could decide to have a career for the first time instead of a family. Sexual stereotypes such as "women drivers" are still very much alive today as are a lack of senior job holders amongst career women, the glass ceiling is a good example of social inequality.
In the eyes of the law, women are equal in rights through the Sex Discrimination Act and other legislation's passed since 1918. However in the eyes of society women are seen as inferior to men because of sexual stereotypes leading to a lack of high ranking women in the work place.
Jamie Barton
