HIST 129T: Women, Sex, and Power

Directed Reading #6

A Daughter to Educate

General questions

1.      Is there a consensus among our sources about what a woman’s education should entail?  If so, what curriculum is generally proposed?  What was adamantly not to be taught?  Is there a particular ideology behind such curriculum?  If so, what do you think it was?

2.      Generally speaking, why were so many Early Modern contemporaries against teaching women Latin and Greek?  Use specific examples from the different excerpts in Aughterson’s section.

3.      Also generally speaking, who should educate women?  Use specific examples (including Chamberlayne and Vives).  What does this tell us about the overall view of women’s education?

4.      Do male-authored texts on women’s education differ from female-authored ones?  If so, how?  Give specific examples, using at the very least Jocelyn and Makin.

Chamberlayne’s “An Academy or College…”

1.      Why did Chamberlayne propose an academy for young ladies at the particular time he did?

2.      What is the purpose of the academy?  Hint, according to the author, there are two main goals.

3.      According to Chamberlayne, what other attempts have been made to “educate” women?  Why have those alternatives proven to be unworthy?

4.      What arguments does Chamberlayne use to “sell” his academy?

5.      According to the author, what will the targeted “young ladies” be taught?

Various.  "Education," in Aughterson, Kate, ed.  Renaissance Woman…

            Vives, Instruction of a Christian Woman

1.      According to Vives, why should women be educated?  How does he make his case?

2.      What learning should be taught to women?  What is the curriculum to be?

3.      Which books should a woman read?  Which should she not?

            Erasmus, Colloquy of the Abbot and the Learned Woman

1.      What is the argument of Erasmus’s Colloquy?  Based on this excerpt, what would you say was Erasmus’s own view on the education of women?

            Hyrde, Preface to Margaret Roper’s translation

1.      According to Hyrde, what are some of the reasons for which arguments against women’s learning of the ancient languages are wrong?

Mulcaster, Positions

1.      According to Mulcaster, what are the four reasons for educating girls?

2.      What are the “differing degrees” in which girls should be educated (trained)?  What does each stage entail?

3.      Lastly, what does Mulcaster present as the “right” education for girls?

            Elizabeth Jocelyn, The Mother’s Legacy

1.      Why is Jocelyn writing?  What is her aim?

2.      What did Jocelyn view as her main responsibility as a mother?  How did she hope to accomplish it?

3.      What is Jocelyn’s advice to her unborn child, if it be a girl?  What would she have this girl-child learn?

4.      What does Jocelyn’s piece tell us about her own view of her life as a woman? 

            Bathushua Makin, “An Essay to Revive the Ancient Education”

      1.      According to Makin, why should women be educated?  How does she appeal to both sexes to embrace her plan?

      2.      What kind of education does she propose?  What curriculum?

      3.      Is Makin’s argument different from those of her contemporaries?  How so?