여성작가의 글쓰기와 사회의식—여성교육과 유니테리언 네트워크

Abstract

Unitarian educational philosophy was egalitarian, optimistic and humanistic in the later eighteenth century. They did not accept that women were an inferior species of mankind, believing that both sexes were equal in talents and mental qualities. One of Unitarians, John Aikin wanted young women to be educated to use their own good sense to judge literature. Joseph Priestley believed the female intellect to be equal to the male's, if properly educated. Within these Unitarian families women played a huge, if often publicly unacknowledged, role by networking. Higher concepts of womanhood than norm and deeper education were given to females, but there were still marked gendered differences of role. By 1815 within the Unitarian network there was an active acceptance of women's intellectual capacity which was unusual for the time. Anna Barbauld, John Aikin's sister, who was not denying women any rational study, was establishing a new role model for woman, especially in her achievement of writing for education. Mary Wollstonecraft was much influenced by the general Unitarian emphasis on reason and the need for all to develop their mental and moral abilities through education, and by their respect for women's intellectual powers. Lucy Aikin, niece of Anna Barbauld, preached the intellectual equality of the sexes, promoting a rational education for both sexes. Lucy Aikin argued that history showed that whenever women had been allowed to share in the best efforts of men “no talent, no virtue is masculine alone, no fault or folly exclusively feminine.” While she was stretching the boundaries of what was usually accepted that women could do, she lived at home quietly among her family. Thus even when Unitarian women did extend the boundaries of female achievement, they did so within the limits of writing and teaching.