Образ женщины в эпоху Реформации: эволюция взглядов

Abstract

The paper addresses gender aspect of the history and culture of the Reformation era, highlighting new as well as traditional accents in the perceiving and comprehending the image of woman in countries of protestant culture. The author touches upon understudied issue of evolution in viewing of women and women`s self-perception during one of the key eras for the establishing of the modern Europe. The chosen problematics deserves closer attention in a number of concerns — in terms of history, culture studies and theology — and is noteworthy for a close and subtle interaction between Reformation and women as its important actors. Just as the Reformation affected the condition and comprehension of the woman`s image, women influenced the very course of historic events of this period and its ideological content. Against the backdrop of numerous names of prominent reformers, much more represented in academic studies, we see the clear necessity of a research to detect active female participants of the Reforms and to shed light on their activities to fully appreciate women as actual reformeresses and their contribution into reinvention of the women`s status in society and private life. The author carries out analysis of the women`s position from different social strata and their functions in the field of politics, labor, family life, religious and creative activity and comes to the conclusions about their status amelioration in one cases and about new challenges they had to be dealing with. To this end the paper looks at the estimations reformers gave to the women`s role, which is important for determining certain characteristic features of Reformation — retrograde alongside progressive ones.