Compare and Contrast Women Essays

Compare and Contrast Women Essays Compare and Contrast Women Essay Compare and Contrast Women Essay Jobs a. Opportunities Didnt have much of a opportunities Have a lot more opportunities Career Option: Back in the beginning of the sass, having a career as a woman was almost unheard of. Of course, one may stumble upon a woman who was locally famous for taking care of her family through work in the absence of a male provider or husband. Women were expected to stay at home, take care of the children and let their husband bring home the pay check. Most of them were dominated by the man of the house; providing whatever the man dictated, food on the table when they name home, house cleaned, kids taken care of and anything else handled. Today women are not necessarily staying home but are out making their own money. They now have the option to work at home or to go out and have a successful career, economy permitting. Womens greatest victory over the past 100 years is probably the and is in some ways the great equalizer in the Job market. And even if a mother cant stay home to raise her kids and trade mommy stories with friends and family, she is blessed with the miracle of the Internet to keep on top of the best practices to follow in her personal and professional lives. Men are far more independent financially than 100 years ago Despite changes in the nature of work women were involved in after the war, by the end of the sass women were a bigger proportion of the workforce than in 1939. The post-war upswing, technology, and the expansion of higher education, increased expectations for women. B. Pay: Horrible Better than the past IV. Rights a. Education They b. Right to vote 100 years ago women did not have the rig ht to vote- only to sit and watch. In 1920 that right was finally granted and now women not only vote but run for Presidency. . Today c. Right to speak out to the government women could not vote or be involved in mainstream politics; most were not in unions 2. Today Liberation: In todays world, women are far more liberated then they ever were 100 years ago. They now have the right to follow their dreams, speak in meetings, seminars, hold careers and even have the choice of staying at home to raise a family or working outside the home for what they want. Women are now lawyers, doctors, surgeons, car repair techs, computer techs and even Secretaries of State or Senators. They are more or less free to do what they want without being held or pushed into a ox of what should be done or what is allowed. Their minds are allowed to be freed however they wish. D. Marriage Pregnancy and childbirth were hazardous and frequent, as dangerous as abortion, which was illegal. Contraception was almost totally unavailable. Divorce was complicated and outside the reach of the poor. Cohabitation and illegitimacy were frowned on and stigmatize 2. Today Reproduction: As times changed and women were given more rights as well as more freedom they started to reproduce at a faster rate. However, I think this was for many reasons. In the old days (100 years ago) women were raised and brought up to have rime to go outside the marriage, today, women are having intimate relations with whomever and whenever they want. V. Conclusion 1. Summary Women were denied the right to do many things 100 years ago. They were denied many freedoms and expected to comply with the demands of men and society. Women no longer have to be at-home wives but now have the option of going to work or staying home to take care of the kids. Education can be said to be the great equalizer on behalf of women in the U. S. Generally, society has less influence on the conduct of women today. AMONG THE MANY remarkable upheavals of the 20th century, the huge increase in womens employment stands out. The shift of women to paid labor has led to a widespread transformation of the traditional rules and practices of daily life, not only at workplaces, but in families. As work and family changed, there were rev erberations throughout society. The roles women play today would be unrecognizable to our forebears of 100 years ago. Still, for all the change, the revolution remains incomplete. The arithmetic is simpleif womens Jobs require 30, 40 or more hours a week, they cannot spend those same hours caring for their families. Society has not focused on the need to provide alternative types of care, particularly for children and the elderly, during the time that caregivers are employed. To finish the revolution, new institutions and new arrangements are in order. In 1900, 20% of workforce women were married. Only in minority, immigrant, or destitute families were married women likely to be engaged in paid work. Employed mothers were even rarer. Over the course of the next 100 years, though, a variety of forces drew additional females, including mothers of very young children, into the labor force. Throughout the last entry, employers particularly sought women for several rapidly growing occupations, including clerical duties, teaching, and nursing. These were Jobs that men usually declined, in part because they were relatively low paying and offered little chance for advancement, and in part because they were stigmatize as womens work. At the same time, more and more women completed the high school or college degrees necessary to hold these Jobs. In the last 25 years, fields have opened up that virtually had been closed to females and vast numbers were educated in law, medicine, business, and engineering. Womens earnings increased commensurate with their education, making employment even more attractive. WOMENS RIGHTS. Throughout most of history women generally have had fewer legal rights a nd career opportunities than men. Whooped and motherhood were regarded as womens most significant professions. In the 20th century, however, women in most nations won the right to vote and increased their educational and Job accomplished a reevaluation of traditional views of their role in society. Early Attitudes Toward Women Since early times women have been uniquely viewed as a creative source of human fife. Historically, however, they have been considered not only intellectually inferior to men but also a major source of temptation and evil. In Greek mythology, for example, it was a woman, Pandora, who opened the forbidden box and brought plagues and unhappiness to mankind. Early Roman law described women as children, forever inferior to men. Early Christian theology perpetuated these views. SST. Jerome, a 4th-century Latin father of the Christian church, said: Woman is the gate of the devil, the path of wickedness, the sting of the serpent, in a word a perilous object. Thomas Aquinas, he 13th-century Christian theologian, said that woman was created to be mans helpmate, but her unique role is in conception Since for other purposes men would be better assisted by other men. The attitude toward women in the East was at first more favorable. In ancient India, for example, women were not deprived of property rights or individual freedoms by marriage. But Hinduism, which evolved in India after about 500 BC, required obedience of women toward men. Women had to walk behind their husbands. Women could not own property, and widows could not remarry. In both East and West, male children were preferred over female children. Nevertheless, when they were allowed personal and intellectual freedom, women made significant achievements. During the Middle Ages nuns played a key role in the religious life of Europe. Aristocratic women enjoyed power and prestige. Whole eras were influenced by women rulers for instance, Queen Elizabeth of England in the 16th century, Catherine the Great of Russia in the 18th century, and Queen Victoria of England in the 19th century. The Weaker Sex? Women were long considered naturally weaker than men, squeamish, and unable to reform work requiring muscular or intellectual development. In most preinstall societies, for example, domestic chores were relegated to women, leaving heavier labor such as hunting and plowing to men. This ignored the fact that caring for children and doing such tasks as milking cows and washing clothes also required heavy, sustained labor. But physiological tests now suggest that women have a greater tolerance for pain, and statistics reveal that women live longer and are more resistant to many diseases. Maternity, the natural biological role of women, has traditionally been regarded as he home has largely determined the ways in which women have expressed themselves. Today, contraception and, in some areas, legalized abortion have given women greater control over the number of children they will bear. Although these developments have freed women for roles other than motherhood, the cultural pressure for women to become wives and mothers still prevents many talented women from finishing college or pursuing careers. Traditionally a middle-class girl in Western culture tended to learn from her mothers example that cooking, cleaning, and caring for children was the behavior expected of ere when she grew up. Tests made in the sass showed that the scholastic achievement of girls was higher in the early grades than in high school. The major reason given was that the girls own expectations declined because neither their families nor their teachers expected them to prepare for a future other than that of marriage and motherhood. This trend has been changing in recent decades. Formal education for girls historically has been secondary to that for boys. In colonial America girls learned to read and write at dame schools. They could attend the asters schools for boys when there was room, usually during the summer when most of the boys were working. By the end of the 19th century, however, the number of women students had increased greatly. Higher education particularly was broadened by the rise of womens colleges and the admission of women to regular colleges and universities. In 1870 an estimated one fifth of resident college and university students were women. By 1900 the proportion had increased to more than one third. Women obtained 19 percent of all undergraduate college degrees around the beginning of the 20th century. By 1984 the figure had sharply increased to 49 percent. Women also increased their numbers in graduate study. By the mid-sass women were earning 49 percent of all masters degrees and about 33 percent of all doctoral degrees. In 1985 about 53 percent of all college students were women, more than one quarter of whom were above age 29. The Legal Status of Women The myth of the natural inferiority of women greatly influenced the status of women in law. Under the common law of England, an unmarried woman could own property, make a contract, or sue and be sued. But a married woman, defined as being one tit her husband, gave up her name, and virtually all her property came under her husbands control. During the early history of the United States, a man virtually owned his wife and children as he did his material possessions. If a poor man chose to send his children to the poorhouse, the mother was legally defenseless to object. Some communities, however, modified the common law to allow women to act as lawyers in the courts, to Equity law, which developed in England, emphasized the principle of equal rights rather than tradition. Equity law had a liberalizing effect upon the legal rights of omen in the United States. For instance, a woman could sue her husband. Mississippi in 1839, followed by New York in 1848 and Massachusetts in 1854, passed laws allowing married women to own property separate from their husbands. In divorce law, however, generally the divorced husband kept legal control of both children and property. In the 19th century, women began working outside their homes in large numbers, notably in textile mills and garment shops. In poorly ventilated, crowded rooms women (and children) worked for as long as 12 hours a day. Great Britain passed a en-hour-day law for women and children in 1847, but in the United States it was not until the sass that the states began to pass legislation limiting working hours and improving working conditions of women and children. Eventually, however, some of these labor laws were seen as restricting the rights of working women. For instance, laws prohibiting women from working more than an eight-hour day or from working at night effectively prevented women from holding many Jobs, particularly supervisory positions, that might require overtime work. Laws in some states prohibited women from lifting weights above a certain amount varying room as little as 15 pounds (7 kilograms) again barring women from many Jobs. During the sass several federal laws improving the economic status of women were passed. The Equal Pay Act of 1963 required equal wages for men and women doing equal work. The Civil Rights Act of 1964 prohibited discrimination against women by any company with 25 or more employees. A Presidential Executive Order in 1967 prohibited bias against women in hiring by federal government contractors. But discrimination in other fields persisted. Many retail stores would not issue independent credit cards to married women. Divorced or single women often found it difficult to obtain credit to purchase a house or a car. Laws concerned with welfare, crime, prostitution, and abortion also displayed a bias against women. In possible violation of a womans right to privacy, for example, a mother receiving government welfare payments was subject to frequent investigations in order to verify her welfare claim. Sex discrimination in the definition of crimes existed in some areas of the United States. A woman who shot and killed her husband would be accused of homicide, but the shooting of a wife by her husband could be termed a passion hooting. Only in 1968, for another example, did the Pennsylvania courts void a state law which required that any woman convicted of a felony be sentenced to the maximum punishment prescribed by law. Often women prostitutes were prosecuted although their male customers were allowed to go free. In most states abortion was legal only if the mothers life was Judged to be physically endangered. In 1973, however, the United States Supreme Court ruled that states could not restrict a Until well into the 20th century, women in Western European countries lived under any of the same legal disabilities as women in the United States. For example, until 1935, married women in England did not have the full right to own property and to enter into contracts on a par with unmarried women. Only after 1920 was legislation passed to provide working women with employment opportunities and pay equal to men. Not until the early sass was a law passed that equalized pay scales for men and women in the British civil service. Women at Work In colonial America, women who earned their own living usually became seamstresses or kept boardinghouses. But some women worked in professions and jobs available mostly to men. There were women doctors, lawyers, preachers, teachers, writers, and singers. By the early 19th century, however, acceptable occupations for working women were limited to factory labor or domestic work. Women were excluded from the professions, except for writing and teaching. The medical profession is an example of changed attitudes in the 19th and 20th centuries about what was regarded as suitable work for women. Prior to the sass there were almost no medical schools, and virtually any enterprising person could practice medicine. Indeed, obstetrics was the domain of women. Beginning in the 19th century, the required educational preparation, particularly for the practice of medicine, increased. This tended to prevent many young women, who married early and bore many children, from entering professional careers. Although home nursing was considered a proper female occupation, nursing in hospitals was done almost exclusively by men. Specific discrimination against women also began to appear. For example, the American Medical Association, founded in 1846, barred women from membership. Barred also from attending mens medical colleges, omen enrolled in their own for instance, the Female Medical College of Pennsylvania, which was established in 1850. By the sass, however, women were attending many leading medical schools, and in 191 5 the American Medical Association began to admit women members. In 1890, women constituted about 5 percent of the total doctors in the United States. During the sass the proportion was about 17 percent. At the same time the percentage of women doctors was about 19 percent in West Germany and 20 percent in France. In Israel, however, about 32 percent of the total number of doctors and dentists were women. Women also had not greatly improved their status in other professions. In 1930 about 2 percent of all American lawyers and Judges were women in 1989, about 22 percent. In 1930 there were almost no women engineers in the United States. In 1989 the In contrast, the teaching profession was a large field of employment for women. In the late sass more than twice as many women as men taught in elementary and high schools. In higher education, however, women held only about one third of the teaching positions, concentrated in such fields as education, social service, home economics, nursing, and library science. A small proportion of women college and university teachers were in the physical sciences, engineering, agriculture, and law. The great majority of women who work are still employed in clerical positions, factory work, retail sales, and service Jobs. Secretaries, bookkeepers, and typists account for a large portion of women clerical workers. Women in factories often work as machine operators, assemblers, and inspectors. Many women in service Jobs work as waitresses, cooks, hospital attendants, cleaning women, and hairdressers. During wartime women have served in the armed forces. In the United States during World War II almost 300,000 women served in the Army and Navy, performing such noncombatant Jobs as secretaries, typists, and nurses. Many European women fought in the underground resistance movements during World War II. In Israel women are drafted into the armed forces along with men and receive combat training. Women constituted more than 45 percent of employed persons in the United States in 1989, but they had only a small share of the decision-making Jobs. Although the number of women working as managers, officials, and other administrators has been increasing, in 1989 they were outnumbered about 1. 5 to 1 by men. Despite the Equal Pay Act of 1963, women in 1970 were paid about 45 percent less than men for the same Jobs; in 1988, about 32 percent less. Professional women did not get the important assignments and promotions given to their male colleagues. Many cases before the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission in 1970 were registered by women charging sex discrimination in Jobs. Working women often faced discrimination on the mistaken belief that, because they were married or would most likely get married, they would not be permanent workers. But married women generally continued on their Jobs for many years and ere not a transient, temporary, or undependable work force. From 1960 to the early sass the influx of married women workers accounted for almost half of the increase in the total labor force, and working wives were staying on their Jobs longer before starting families. The number of elderly working also increased markedly. Since 1960 more and more women with children have been in the work force. This change is especially dramatic for married women with children under age 6: 12 percent worked in 1950, 45 percent in 1980, and 57 percent in 1987. Just over half the mothers with children under age 3 were in the labor force in 1987. Black women with children are more likely to work than are white or Hispanic women who have children. Over half of all black families with children are maintained by the mother Despite their increased presence in the work force, most women still have primary responsibility for housework and family care. In the late sass men with an employed wife spent only about 1. 4 hours a week more on household tasks than those whose wife was a full-time homemaker. A crucial issue for many women is maternity leave, or time off from their Jobs after giving birth. By federal law a full-time worker is entitled to time off and a Job when he returns, but few states by the early sass required that the leave be paid. Many countries, including Mexico, India, Germany, Brazil, and Australia require companies to grant 12-week maternity leaves at full pay. Women in Politics American women have had the right to vote since 1920, but their political roles have been minimal. Not until 1984 did a major party choose a woman Geraldine Forearm of New York to run for vice-president (see Forearm). Jeannine Rankin of Montana, elected in 1917, was the first woman member of the United States House of Representatives. In 1968 Shirley Chisholm of New York was he first black woman elected to the House of Representatives (see Chisholm). Hattie Caraway of Arkansas first appointed in 1932 was, in 1933, the first woman elected to the United States Senate. Senator Margaret Chase Smith served Maine for 24 years (1949-73). Others were Maurine Number of Oregon, Nancy London Assessable of Kansas, Paula Hawkins of Florida, and Barbara Muskie of Maryland. Wives of former governors became the first women governors Miriam A. Ferguson of Texas (1925-27 and 1933-35) and Nellie Taylor ROSS of Wyoming (1925-27) (see ROSS, Nellie Taylor). In 1974 Ella T. Grass of Connecticut won a governorship on her own merits. In 1971 Patience Swell Letting was elected mayor of Oklahoma City, at that time the largest city in the nation with a woman mayor. By 1979 two major cities were headed by women: Chicago, by Jane Byrne, and San Francisco, by Dianne Finest. Sharon Pratt Dixon was elected mayor of Washington, D. C. , in 1990. Frances Perkins was the first woman Cabinet member as secretary of labor under President Franklin D. Roosevelt. Ovate Cull Hobby was secretary of health, education, and welfare in the Dwight D. Eisenhower Cabinet. Carla A. Hills was secretary of sousing and urban development in Gerald R. Fords Cabinet. Jimmy Carter chose two women for his original Cabinet Juanita M. Krebs as secretary of commerce and Patricia Roberts Harris as secretary of housing and urban development. Harris was the first African American woman in a presidential Cabinet. When the separate Department of Education was created, Carter named Shirley Mount Hypotheses to human services, and Elizabeth Dole, secretary of transportation. Under George Bush, Dole became secretary of labor; she was succeeded by Representative Lynn Martin. Bush chose Antonio Novel, a Hispanic, for surgeon general in 1990. Reagan set a precedent with his appointment in 1981 of Sandra Day OConnor as the first woman on the United States Supreme Court (see OConnor). The next year Bertha Wilson was named to the Canadian Supreme Court. In 1984 Jeanne Suave became Canadas first female governor-general (see Suave). In international affairs, Eleanor Roosevelt was appointed to the United Nations in 1945 and served as chairman of its Commission on Human Rights (see Roosevelt, Eleanor). Eugenia Anderson was sent to Denmark in 1949 as the first woman ambassador from the United States. Jeanne Kirkpatrick was named ambassador to the United Nations in 1981. Three women held their countries highest elective offices by 1970. Charisma Bandannas was prime minister of Ceylon (now Sir Lankan) from 1960 to 1965 and from 1970 to 1977 (see Bandannas). Nadir Gandhi was prime minister of India from 1966 to 1977 and from 1980 until her assassination in 1984 (see Gandhi, Nadir). Gold Meir was prime minister of Israel from 1969 to 1974 (see Meir). The first woman head of state in the Americas was Juan Persons widow, Isabel, president of Argentina in 1974-76 (see Person). Elisabeth Downtime was premier of the Central African Republic in 1975-76. Margaret Thatcher, who first became prime minister of Great Britain in 1979, was the only person in the 20th century to be reelected to that office for a third consecutive term (see Thatcher). Also in 1979, Simons Well of France became the first president of the European Parliament. In the early sass Vigils Familiarization was elected president of Iceland; Grog Harlem Borderland, prime minister of Norway; and Milk Placing, premier of Yugoslavia. In 1986 Carbon Aquinas became president of the Philippines (see Aquinas). From 1988 to 1990 Biennial Bout was prime minister of Pakistan the first woman to head a Muslim nation (see Bout). In 1990 Mary Robinson was elected president of Ireland and Violate Camphor, of Nicaragua. Australias first female premier was Carmen Lawrence of Western Australia (1990), and Canadas was Rite Johnston of British Columbia (1991). In 1991 Chalked Aziza became the prime minister of Bangladesh and Socialist Edith Sorenson was named Frances first female premier. Pollards first female prime minister, Hanna Cassocks, was elected in 1992. Feminist Philosophies At the end of the 18th century, individual liberty was being hotly debated. In 1789, during the French Revolution, Olympia De Gouges published a Declaration of the