British Feminist Thought

Abstract

The fact that the term ‘feminism’ was only coined at the end of the 19th century and that there was no generally recognized founding figure in the battle for women’s rights makes it hard to delineate any widely accepted feminist tradition. Extensive interest in the ‘woman question’ across the century, however, led to widespread debate about sexual difference, gender hierarchy and the rights and duties of women. What would now be considered feminist ideas covered a wide range of issues including the meaning of sexual difference, the intellectual and practical capacities of women, the oppressive nature of marital and family life as well as the entitlement of women to education and to legal and political rights. Feminist ideas were articulated in many different forms: in literature, periodical essays, and increasingly in the second half of the century in polemical pamphlets and journals. These ideas underwent considerable change across the century as the radicalism of the late 18th and early 19th centuries gave way to a more moderate approach in the mid 19th century - and then to a reassertion of sexual radicalism as part of feminism in the later 19th century. The figure of Mary Wollstonecraft — first as a source of inspiration, then as a pariah figure and finally as one anticipating the ‘new woman’ of the 19th century is seen here as encapsulating the pattern of feminist ideas across the century.