DOCUMENT BASED QUESTION: PRE-HISTORY



DOCUMENT-BASED QUESTION: CHANGE IN WOMEN’S WORLDS

Directions

The following question is based on the accompanying documents. (The documents have been edited for the purpose of this exercise). The question is designed to test your ability to work with and understand historical documents. Write an essay that:

• Has relevant thesis and supports that thesis with evidence from the documents.

• Uses all or all but one of the documents.

• Analyzes the documents by grouping them in as many appropriate ways as possible and does not simply summarize the documents individually.

• Takes into account both the sources of the documents and the authors’ points of view.

Essay Prompt

How has the status of women changed over the course of history? What reasons would account for these changes?

Based on the following documents, discuss the general status of women in world history. What types of additional documentation would help explain conditions affecting women?

Historical Background

Frequently hidden from official, male-written accounts of history, women existed in the twilight of a male-dominated world. Often legally proscribed from any role in the public world of politics, education, intellectual activities, and business, women were forced to reside within the private worlds of the family, children, and the home. Yet changes in history were paralleled and reflected in changes affecting women’s place and status within society.

Document 1

DOCUMENT 2

DOCUMENT 3

DOCUMENT 4

DOCUMENT 5

DOCUMENT 6

DOCUMENT 7

DOCUMENT 8

DOCUMENT 9

FOOTNOTES: CHANGES IN WOMEN’S WORLDS

1. William L. Langer, ed., An Encyclopedia of World History: Ancient, Medieval, and Modern Chronologically Arranged, 5th ed. (Boston: Houghton Mifflin Co., 1971), 295-660 in passim.

Chris Cook and John Stevenson, The Longman Handbook of Modern European History 1763-1991, 2nd ed. (London and New York” Longman Inc., 1987, 1992), 1-29 in passim.

Guida M. Jackson, Women Who Ruled: A Biographical Encyclopedia (New York: Barnes and Noble Books, 1998), in passim.

2. Alfred J. Andrea and James H. Overfield, The Human Record: Sources of Global History, 3rd Edition, Volume 1: To 1700 (Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1998), 147.

3. Stuart Schwartz, Linda R. Wimmer, and Robert S. Wolff, The Global Experience: Readings in World History, volume II (New York: Longman, 1998), 270 – 272.

4. Mark B. Rosenberg, A. Douglas Kincaid, and Kathleen Logan, Americas: An Anthology (New York: Oxford University Press, 1992), 180 – 181.

5. Proverbs 31: 10 – 31, The New American Bible.

6. Bernard Lewis, ed. and trans., Islam: From the Prophet Muhammad to the Capture of Constantinople, vol. 2, Religion and Society (New York: Oxford University Press, 1974), 40.

7. Helen Hemingway Benton, ed., The Annals of America, Volume 12, 1895 – 1904: Populism, Imperialism, and Reform (Chicago: Encyclopedia Britannica, Inc., 1968), 394.

8. Oliver J. Thatcher and Edgar H. McNeal, eds., A Source Book for Medieval History (New York: Charles Scribner’s, 1907), 592 – 601 in passim.

9. M. N. Srinivas, The Remembered Village (Berkeley, California: University of California Press, 1976), 137.

-----------------------

M. N. Srinivas, Indian anthropologist, observations on an Indian village, compiled while living in Rampura during the late 1940s C.E.

“Sex difference provided an important basis for the division of labor, and this

was true for all the castes. Among the castes the kitchen was the recognized

sphere of feminine activity but the extent of participation in man’s traditional

occupation varied from caste to caste, and even household to household. The

income of a household, and the degree to which its style of life was Sanskritized,

was also significant in determining whether women participated in agricultural

work or not. Generally, women from the richest households and the highest

castes remained confined to their homes while women from the poorest

households and lowest castes worked outside for cash wages. It was the male

head of the household who carried on the traditional caste occupation, be it

agriculture, blacksmithing, trade or priesthood. And there was an unstated

assumption that his occupation was the important one.

City of Magdeburg, German Holy Roman Empire, code of city laws, 1261 C.E.

12. If a man dies leaving a wife, she shall have no share in his property except what he has given her in court, or has appointed for her dower. She must have six witnesses, male or female, to prove her dower. If the man has made no provision for her, her children shall support her as long as she does not remarry. If her husband had sheep, the widow shall take them.

18. No one, whether man or woman, shall, on his sick-bed, give away more than three shillings worth of his property without the consent of his heirs, and the woman must have the consent of her husband.

55. When a man dies his wife shall give to his heirs his sword, his horse, saddle, and his best coat of mail. She shall also give a bed, pillow, sheet, tablecloth, two dishes, and a towel. If she does not have these things, she shall not give them, but she shall give proof for each article that she does not have it.

56. After giving the above articles the widow shall take her dower and all that belongs to her; that is, all the sheep, geese, chests, yarn, beds, pillows, cushions, table linen, bed linen, towels, cups, candlesticks, linen, women’s clothing, finger rings, bracelets, headdresses, psalters, and all prayer-books, chairs, drawers, bureaus, carpets, curtains, etc., and there are many other trinkets which belong to her, such as brushes, scissors, and mirrors. But uncut cloth, and unworked gold and silver do not belong to her.

Hebrew Book of Proverbs 31: 10 – 31, compiled around the 6th century B.C.E.

“When one finds a worthy wife, her value is beyond pearls. Her husband,

entrusting his heart to her, has an unfailing prize. She brings him good, and not

evil, all the days of her life. She obtains wool and flax and makes cloth with

skillful hands. Like merchant ships, she secures her provisions from afar. She

rises while it is still night, and distributes food to her household. She picks out a

field to purchase; out of her earnings she plants a vineyard. She is girt about

with strength, and sturdy are her arms. She enjoys the success of her dealings;

at night her lamp is undimmed. She puts her hands to the distaff and her fingers

ply the spindle. She reaches out her hands to the poor, and extends her arms to

the needy. She makes her own coverlets; fine linen and purple are her clothing.

Her husband is prominent at the city gates as he sits with the elders of the land.

She makes her garments and sells them and stocks the merchants with belts.

She is clothed with strength and dignity and she laughs at the days to come. She

opens her mouth in wisdom, and on her tongue is kindly counsel.”

Al-Mawardi, 11th century C.E. Muslim jurist, from his discourse “On Judges”

“Nobody may be appointed to the office of judge who does not comply fully with

the conditions required to make his appointment valid and his decisions

effective. The first condition is that he must be a man. This condition consists of

two qualities, puberty and masculinity. As for the child below puberty, he

cannot be held accountable, nor can his utterances have effect against himself.

As for women, they are unsuited to positions of authority, although judicial

verdicts may be based on what they say. Abu Hanifa said that a woman can act

as judge in matters on which it would be lawful for her to testify, but she may

not act as judge in matters on which it would not be lawful for her to testify. Ibn

Jarir al-Tabari, giving a divergent view, allows a woman to act as judge in all

cases, but no account should be taken of an opinion which is refuted by both the

consensus of the community and the word of God. “Men have authority over

women because of what God has conferred on the one in preference to the

other,” [Quran 4:38], meaning by this, intelligence and discernment. He does

not, therefore, permit women to hold authority over men.”

Ida Husted Harper, article for the American magazine, Independent, 1901 C.E.

“The moment we accept that women must enter wage-earning occupations only

when compelled to do so by poverty, that moment we degrade labor and lower

the status of all women. As long as a woman advertised her dire necessity by

going outside the home to work, she could not avoid a feeling of humiliation.

The fact that only a few insignificant jobs with meager wages were permitted

added further to the disgrace. However, in the rapid evolution of the last

century, practically all occupations were thrown open and into these poured

women of education and social standing belonging to families of ample means,

barriers at once began to fall and the stigma to fail. The great organizations of

women, which have been formed, admit wage earners, and frequently women

engaged in business are elected to the offices. Those who insist that women of

the family should confine their labors to the household wholly ignore the fact,

that in the past most of women’s duties have been carried on outside the house.

Those who note that a century ago no women were in our factories, and now 45

percent of the employed are women, omit to state that most of the work now

done in factories has been taken directly away from women of the household.”

Thema Khumalo, Zimbabwean guerrilla describing her role in the revolution and civil war against the white regime in Rhodesia, 1965 – 1980

“We woman also fought the war and I still feel proud of this. Even our children

are proud of us because they saw that women were not the cowards they had

thought we were. Instead they discovered that women are very strong. The

women provided everything the freedom fighters needed. The women were very

courageous and strong and fought to the end. We became used to people dying

at the time and so we were ready for anything. We accepted death and even

became reconciled to the idea. We became almost immune to it because a lot of

our children and neighbors died. But somehow we resolved never to go

backwards but to go forwards until we had won our country. And so we fought

side by side with the men, falling down, getting injured and getting up again.

Mothers, women are the people who fought this war and I feel proud of it. If our

affairs were now to be decided on how each of us fought, I can tell you that all

the homes would now belong to women. Before the war women were not seen,

but now we have been noticed. Some women are even members of Parliament

and have posts in the government.”

Sor Juana Ines de la Cruz, Roman Catholic nun, late 1600s C.E., Mexico; a letter in response to a bishop who criticized her writing as inappropriate for a nun

“Afterward, when I already knew how to read and write, along with all the

sewing skills and needlework that women learn, I discovered that in the city of

Mexico there was a university and I deluged my mother to send me to Mexico

City so that I might study and take courses. She refused; nevertheless, I found a

way to read many different books. [Later] I became a nun because, given my

disinclination to marriage, it was the least unreasonable and most becoming

choice I could make to assure my ardently desired salvation and to have no

fixed occupation which might curtail my freedom to study. I went on with the

studious pursuit of reading and more reading, study and more study. Even if

these studies were to be viewed as to one’s credit (as I see they are indeed

celebrated in men), none would be due me, since I pursue them involuntarily. If

they are seen as reprehensible, for the same reason I do not think I should be

blamed. Dr. Arce, in virtue and cultivation a worthy professor, decides that to

lecture publicly in the classroom and to preach in a pulpit are not legitimate

activities for women, but that studying, writing, and teaching privately are most

edifying and useful. The interpretation of Holy Scripture should be forbidden

not only to women considered so inept, but to men, who merely by virtue of

being men consider themselves sages.”

WOMEN HEADS OF STATE AND GOVERNMENT

|EUROPEAN RULERS |

|1450 - 1815 |1815 - 2000 |

| |# |# YEARS | |# |# |

|COUNTRY |RULERS |RULED |COUNTRY |RULERS |YEARS |

| |(TYPES) | | |(TYPES) |RULED |

|Spain |1 Queen |30 |Portugal |1 Queen |11 |

|Austria |1 Empress |40 |Spain |2 Queens |36 |

|England |3 Queens |57 |Netherlands |3 Queens |110 |

|UKGB |1 Queen |12 |Denmark |1 Queen |28 |

|Scotland |1 Queen |25 |Ireland |2 Presidents |10 |

|Portugal |1 Queen |39 |Iceland |1 President |16 |

|France |4 Regents |31 |UKGB |2 Queens |112 |

|Sweden |1 Queen |23 |UKGB |1 Prime Min. |11 |

|Russia |1 Regent |7 |Norway |1 Prime Min. |10 |

|Russia |4 Empresses |67 |Eur. Union |1 President |8 |

| | | |Luxembourg |2 Duchesses |71 |

|18 leaders for 331 years |17 leaders for 423 years |

|AFRICAN, ASIAN, PACIFIC, AND AMERICAN RULERS |

|1450 - 1815 |1815 - 2000 |

| |# |# YEARS | |# |# |

|COUNTRY |RULERS |RULED |COUNTRY |RULERS |YEARS |

| |(TYPES) | | |(TYPES) |RULED |

|Japan |2 Empresses |20 |Brazil |1 Regent |13 |

|India |2 Empresses |22 |China |1 Empress |35 |

|Ethiopia |1 Regent |39 |Hawaii |1 Queen |4 |

|Cambodia |1 Queen |12 |Korea |1 Empress |13 |

|Ashante |1 Queen |50 |Philippines |1 President |6 |

| | | |Sri Lanka |2 Prime Min. |18 |

| | | |Pakistan |1 Prime Min. |2 |

| | | |Nicaragua |1 President |6 |

| | | |India |1 Prime Min. |15 |

| | | |Israel |1 Prime Min. |5 |

| | | |Haiti |1 Prime Min. |1 |

| | | |Argentina |1 President |2 |

| | | |Ethiopia |2 Empresses |21 |

| | | |Dominica |1 Prime Min. |15 |

|7 leaders for 143 years |16 leaders for 156 years |

Ban Zhao, foremost female Confucian scholar of her age and official court historian to Emperor Han Hedi, from her Lessons for Women, c. 110 C.E.

“On the third day after the birth of a girl the ancients observed three customs:

first to place the baby below the bed; second to give her a piece of broken

pottery with which to play; and third to announce her birth to her ancestors as

an offering. Now to lay the baby below the bed plainly indicated that she is

lowly and weak, and should regard it as her primary duty to humble herself

before others. To give her pieces of pottery signified that she should practice

labor and consider it her primary duty to be industrious. To announce her birth

before her ancestors clearly meant that she ought to esteem as her primary duty

the continuation of the observance of worship in the home [produce male heirs

as only a male can conduct the ceremonies to the ancestors]. These customs

epitomize a women’s ordinary way of life and the teachings of the traditional

ceremonial rights and regulations. Let a woman modestly yield to others; let her

respect others; let her put others first; herself last. Should she do something

good, let her not mention it; should she do something bad, let her not deny it.

Let a woman retire late to bed, but rise early to duties. Let a woman be correct

in manner and upright in character in order to serve her husband.”

................
................

In order to avoid copyright disputes, this page is only a partial summary.

Google Online Preview   Download