Women in the Society Essay

Women’s Liberation and Gender Equality in the 19th and 20th Centuries

Women have been fighting for a very long time to be freed from parts of gender differences that were culturally determined rather than inborn. Feminism’s wave of liberation of women from societal shackles peaked in the middle of the twentieth century, but its roots go deep into the nineteenth. The Subjection of Women, an essay by the English philosopher, civil servant, and political economist John Stuart Mill, was first published in 1869. In it, he vigorously disputed the notion that women were inferior to males in some respects. (Mill).

The Influence of John Stuart Mill

Mill condemned the concept of making authoritative statements that are not backed by evidence and went ahead to brand them as speculative philosophies. For instance, he argued that men would not be in a position to know what women are capable of just because they deny them an opportunity to try (Mill). He believed in the spirit of a free market for all, an ideology that would capacitate the society to discover true natural gender relation. He demonstrated this concept while he was a member of parliament by fighting for equal voting rights for women, a move that was considered controversial at the time (Mill).

The Influence of Virginia Woolf

Woolf upheld the model developed by Mill to allow for a fair playing ground for women in the nineteenth century in the twentieth century. She was a lecturer at Newnham and Girton women’s colleges at Cambridge University (Walpole 187). In one of her essays, A Room of One’s Own, she argues that women who were interested in art creation lacked the necessary financial freedom as well as the supportive policies such as access to poetic licenses to push their works to the level that men were (Walpole 190). She also believed in the empowerment of women through education, against a familiar backdrop of her era that only boys deserved to go to school, a notion that was adopted by her father.

Mary Cassatt: Overcoming Adversities as a Female Artist

In the light of the atrocities women had to go through between the nineteenth and the twentieth centuries as highlighted by Mill and Woolf, an American female painter and printmaker, Mary Cassatt, acknowledges the hardships women had to go through. She existed at a time when the dreams and aspirations of women ranked lowest in the society. Cassatt traveled a lot when she was a child and exposed herself to great artworks by master artists and got inspired to be a painter as a result (Zausner 177).

The Struggles of Female Artists: Mary Cassatt and Georgia O’Keeffe

At the age of 15, Cassatt began to take art studies seriously, a time when only 15% of all art students were female (Zausner 177). This aspect supports Woolf’s argument that education was considered to be a field for the boys. Regardless of her great determination to pursue art education, she was disappointed by how it was done in the United States and decided to go Paris and do her studies under private tutors (Zausner 179). The movement came up by the fact that she was not able to experience the spirit of a free market as described by Mill.

The deficiency of the free market atmosphere was demonstrated when Cassatt came back to America from France after the Franco-Prussian war broke out in 1870 (Zausner 180). She led a miserable life despite being in possession of a tremendous promising painting career. Nobody would buy her paintings. Her father did not even approve her chosen profession. He only catered for her living expenses but did not do so for her art supplies (Zausner 181). She lacked the financial power to support her artwork, a common problem that affected many female artists as stated by Woolf, thus lacked her room. Irrespective of her struggles in an industry that was male-dominated, she managed to fight for the space of women, a war that had begun with Mill. In 1906, she received the French Legion of Honor award (Zausner 182).

Georgia O’Keeffe developed her artistic career in a gender-biased environment. She spent most of her career fighting against the assiduous gender split avant-guard world of arts (Hughes). At the time, men were seen as better artists, or at least more viable. Despite her current recognition as one of the most prominent modernist artists of her colleagues, during her era, there was little she could do to dissipate the status quo (Hughes). Reflecting on the work of Mill, women at the time of O’Keeffe were not given a free, equal space to demonstrate what they could do.

Overcoming Gender Barriers in the Art World

People held on to the speculative psychology as suggested by Mill that pieces of art done by men were superior to those of women as well as more profitable. The narrative was, however, a strong statement that was not supported by any evidence. In fact, recognition of O’Keeffe as a significant icon in the world of modernist art watered down the whole theory of men being better artists compared to their female counterparts (Hughes). It further upheld Mill’s philosophy of genuinely natural gender relations once women are offered the same opportunities that are exposed to men.

The status quo was so influential that O’Keeffe even assumed some masculine traits. She was forced to change her dress code and begun dressing like a man (Hughes). She wore tailored suits that had male aesthetics, a bowler hat, brogues, and tennis shoes. Women lacked a room of their own to focus on their work as outlined by Woolf. They took more time negotiating around gender-based barriers, like O’Keeffe did while adopting a masculine appearance in her dressing, to try and match her male counterparts (Hughes). Art turned into a business where women paid more attention to the promotion of their gender rather than their skill. Women always found themselves playing a catch-up game against men who took most of their time thinking about their work. Men got the free space to innovate and advance, and this probably explains why art was considered a masculine industry.

Conclusion: Fighting for Equal Opportunities

The experiences by Cassatt and O’Keeffe demonstrated the strenuous environment women who ventured into arts were subjected to in a bid to popularize their work. Cassatt’s career as an artist began with sharp criticism from her dad he went ahead to deny her the necessary financial support to keep her dream alive (Zausner 179). O’Keeffe tried to sail through the turbulent waters of establishing herself as a female painter at a time when everyone perceived the sector to be men driven (Hughes). They highlighted the plight of women in the society that drew the attention of people like Mill and Woolf who through their respective essays advocated for a fair play between the genders.

Mill believed in equal rights for women in all aspects including education and voting. Woolf argued that women also deserved a room to conduct their activities. However, she placed more emphasis on the field of operations of female artists who she believed had suffered neglect for an extended period. In an affirmation to the doctrines of Mill and Woolf, Cassatt and O’Keeffe were able to emerge victorious demonstrating that women could achieve their goals given a fair condition.

Works Cited

Hughes, Kathryn. “Georgia O’Keeffe, up close and impersonal.” The Telegraph, 29 June 2008, www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/art/3555485/Georgia-OKeeffe-up-close-and-impersonal.html.

Mill, John Stuart. Subjection of women. Scholar Select, 2016.

Walpole, Hugh. ”Remembering Virginia Woolf.” Virginia Woolf, 1995, pp. 187–191.

Zausner, T. ”Mary Cassatt 1844–1926.” Encyclopedia of Creativity, 2011, pp. 177–182.