The Paradox of Bureaucratization: New Views on Progressive Era Teachers and the Development of a Woman's Profession

Abstract

During the past two decades scholars from North America, Europe, and Australia have significantly altered our understanding of the lives and work of women teachers. Qualitative data regarding this female workforce, including diaries, letters, and school records have yielded a fuller and richer portrait. Some quantitative work has supplemented this research, providing more information on the social class origins of teachers and their career trajectories. The typical teacher of the mid-nineteenth century was a young, unmarried, rural woman who stepped into one of the classrooms of the expanding public schools of the northeastern and midwestern United States. A quiet but significant revolution was taking place in the urban centers of the country during the nineteenth century, however, transforming whom taught and changing teaching into a career rather than a stopgap between family and marriage.