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      Historicising the Feminist: A Study of Mary Wollstonecraft's Political and Discursive Contexts

      McDougall, Charlotte
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      McDougall, C. (2006). Historicising the Feminist: A Study of Mary Wollstonecraft’s Political and Discursive Contexts (Thesis, Master of Arts (MA)). The University of Waikato, Hamilton, New Zealand. Retrieved from https://hdl.handle.net/10289/2355
      Permanent Research Commons link: https://hdl.handle.net/10289/2355
      Abstract
      This thesis has investigated the life and publications of Mary Wollstonecraft. The

      thesis is divided in to three chapters the first chapter explores the political and social

      context of late Eighteenth century England in which Wollstonecraft lived the majority of

      her life. It then moves on to discuss the 'Revolution Controversy' and Wollstonecraft's

      contribution to that debate. Giving specific attention to A Vindication of the Rights of

      Man as it is Wollstonecraft's first political publication, and was the first published

      response to Edmund Burke's Reflections on the Revolution in France. Without first

      publishing A Vindication of the Rights of Man, Wollstonecraft could not have published

      her most famous work.

      Next the second chapter investigates Eighteenth century education, and how

      Wollstonecraft ideas on changing the nature of education would help reform society in

      her eyes. Education was recognized as having special significance by many

      Enlightenment philosophers, this thesis looks at the contribution of John Locke and Jean

      Jacques Rousseau to educational theory, and they ways in which Wollstonecraft

      responded to their ideas. In the final chapter the inclusive nature of Wollstonecraft's

      gender theory is considered. Wollstonecraft is widely recognised as publishing what

      became for many the founding document of modern western feminism. What is given

      less recognition is that Wollstonecraft was in fact interested in broad social reform,

      similar to many other Enlightenment philosophers, Wollstonecraft's social theory

      included changing education and socialisation for both women and men. Society could

      not be reformed without changing social and educational practices with regard to both

      II

      men and women. Wollstonecraft furthered the contemporary debate on the rights of man

      to include the rights of woman. Wollstonecraft criticised the unnatural distinctions of

      gender and class, setting out in both Vindications the negative consequences for the

      character of both men and women. Another less recognised aspect of Wollstonecraft's

      philosophy which this thesis has highlighted is the vital role that religion played, and its

      implications for her ideas. This aspect of Wollstonecraft's thought has tended to be over

      looked by many Wollstonecraft scholars, who try to place Wollstonecraft in some kind of

      political and social continuum which I think misses the revolutionary and far sighted

      nature of Wollstonecraft's philosophy. In taking a historicist approach or understanding

      to Wollstonecraft, by reading Wollstonecraft in the terms of the political and social

      environment of the late eighteenth century, it becomes easier to understand the radical

      nature of Wollstonecraft's ideas, and the personal hardships she faced as both a woman

      and a member of the lower middle class.
      Date
      2006
      Type
      Thesis
      Degree Name
      Master of Arts (MA)
      Publisher
      The University of Waikato
      Rights
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