The feminist revival has recently resulted in a wave of critical historical interest over the lives of 19th century British women. The influential work of Kathryn Gleadle and Susan Okin, for example, has sought to bring to light those women who had re...
The feminist revival has recently resulted in a wave of critical historical interest over the lives of 19th century British women. The influential work of Kathryn Gleadle and Susan Okin, for example, has sought to bring to light those women who had remained hidden from history yet who were of vital significance to both cultural protest and early feminism. This paper examines British women’s subordination and the ideology of "separate spheres" in connection with the ideas of Mary Wollstonecraft and John Stuart Mill. My focus centers on women's gender history that had the potential to disrupt the essential meaning of mainstream history's ideology of "separate spheres." The ideology of "separate spheres" was a conventional idea which did not necessarily reflect the reality of women's experience. Examined through the visionary ideas of Wollstonecraft and Mill, women's subordination was challenged in the new social and cultural contexts in the 19th century. (Dongseo University)