Rhetoric & Technical Communication
Rhetoric & Technical Communication
Toscano, Aaron, Ph.D., Associate Professor, Dept. of English

Resources and Daily Activities

  • Conference Presentations
    • PCA/ACA Conference Presentation 2022
    • PCAS/ACAS Presentation 2021
    • SEACS 2021 Presentation
    • South Atlantic MLA Conference 2022
  • Dr. Toscano’s Homepage
  • ENGL 2116-014: Introduction to Technical Communication
    • January 11th: More Introduction to Class
    • January 18th: Audience & Purpose
    • January 23rd: Résumés and Cover Letters
      • Duty Format for Résumés
      • Peter Profit’s Cover Letter
    • January 25th: More on Résumés and Cover Letters
    • January 9th: Introduction to the Class
    • Major Assignments
  • ENGL 4182/5182: Information Design & Digital Publishing
    • August 21st: Introduction to the Course
      • Rhetorical Principles of Information Design
    • August 28th: Introduction to Information Design
      • Prejudice and Rhetoric
      • Robin Williams’s Principles of Design
    • Classmates Webpages (Fall 2017)
    • December 4th: Presentations
    • Major Assignments for ENGL 4182/5182 (Fall 2017)
    • November 13th: More on Color
      • Designing with Color
      • Important Images
    • November 20th: Extra-Textual Elements
    • November 27th: Presentation/Portfolio Workshop
    • November 6th: In Living Color
    • October 16th: Type Fever
      • Typography
    • October 23rd: More on Type
    • October 2nd: MIDTERM FUN!!!
    • October 30th: Working with Graphics
      • Beerknurd Calendar 2018
    • September 11th: Talking about Design without Using “Thingy”
      • Theory, theory, practice
    • September 18th: The Whole Document
    • September 25th: Page Design
  • ENGL 4183/5183: Editing with Digital Technologies
    • August 24th: Introduction to the Class
    • August 31st: Rhetoric, Words, and Composing
    • Major Assignments for ENGL 4183/5183 (Fall 2022)
      • Rhetoric of Fear
    • November 16th: Voice and Other Nebulous Writing Terms
      • Finding Dominant Rhetorical Appeals
    • November 2nd: Rhetorical Effects of Punctuation
    • November 30th: Words and Word Classes
    • November 9th: Cohesive Rhythm
    • October 12th: Choosing Adjectivals
    • October 19th: Choosing Nominals
    • October 26th: Stylistic Variations
    • October 5th: Midterm Exam
    • September 14th: Verb is the Word!
    • September 21st: Coordination and Subordination
    • September 28th: Form and Function
    • September 7th: Sentence Patterns
  • ENGL 4275: Rhetoric of Technology
    • April 13th: Authorities in Science and Technology
    • April 15th: Articles on Violence in Video Games
    • April 20th: Presentations
    • April 6th: Technology in the home
    • April 8th: Writing Discussion
    • Assignments for ENGL 4275
    • February 10th: Religion of Technology Part 3 of 3
    • February 12th: Is Love a Technology?
    • February 17th: Technology and Gender
    • February 19th: Technology and Expediency
    • February 24th: Semester Review
    • February 3rd: Religion of Technology Part 1 of 3
    • February 5th: Religion of Technology Part 2 of 3
    • January 13th: Technology and Meaning, a Humanist perspective
    • January 15th: Technology and Democracy
    • January 22nd: The Politics of Technology
    • January 27th: Discussion on Writing as Thinking
    • January 29th: Technology and Postmodernism
    • January 8th: Introduction to the Course
    • March 11th: Writing and Other Fun
    • March 16th: Neuromancer (1984) Day 1 of 2
    • March 18th: Neuromancer (1984) Day 2 of 2
    • March 23rd: Inception (2010)
    • March 25th: Writing and Reflecting Discussion
    • March 30th & April 1st: Count Zero
    • March 9th: William Gibson’s Neuromancer (1984)
  • ENGL 6166: Rhetorical Theory
    • April 12th: Knoblauch. Ch. 4 and Ch. 5
    • April 19th: Jacques Derrida’s Positions
    • April 26th:  Feminisms and Rhetorics
    • April 5th: Knoblauch. Ch. 3 and More Constitutive Rhetoric
    • February 15th: Isocrates (Part 2)
    • February 1st: Aristotle’s On Rhetoric Books 2 & 3
      • Aristotle’s On Rhetoric, Book 2
      • Aristotle’s On Rhetoric, Book 3
    • February 22nd: St. Augustine’s On Christian Doctrine [Rhetoric]
    • February 8th: Isocrates (Part 1)-2nd Half of Class
    • January 11th: Introduction to Class
    • January 18th: Plato’s Phaedrus
    • January 25th: Aristotle’s On Rhetoric Book 1
    • March 15th: Descartes, Rene, Discourse on Method
    • March 1st: Knoblauch. Ch. 1 and 2
    • March 22nd: Mary Wollstonecraft
    • March 29th: Second Wave Feminist Rhetoric
    • May 3rd: Knoblauch. Ch. 6, 7, and “Afterword”
    • Rhetorical Theory Assignments
  • ENGL/COMM/WRDS: The Rhetoric of Fear
    • January 10th: Introduction to the Class
    • January 17th: Scapegoats & Conspiracies
    • January 24th: The Rhetoric of Fear and Fallacies Part 1
    • Major Assignments
  • LBST 2212-124, 125, 126, & 127
    • August 21st: Introduction to Class
    • August 23rd: Humanistic Approach to Science Fiction
    • August 26th: Robots and Zombies
    • August 28th: Futurism, an Introduction
    • August 30th: R. A. Lafferty “Slow Tuesday Night” (1965)
    • December 2nd: Technological Augmentation
    • December 4th: Posthumanism
    • November 11th: Salt Fish Girl (Week 2)
    • November 13th: Salt Fish Girl (Week 2 con’t)
    • November 18th: The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy (Part 1)
      • More Questions than Answers
    • November 1st: Games Reality Plays (part II)
    • November 20th: The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy (Part 2)
    • November 6th: Salt Fish Girl (Week 1)
    • October 14th: More Autonomous Fun
    • October 16th: Autonomous Conclusion
    • October 21st: Sci Fi in the Domestic Sphere
    • October 23rd: Social Aphasia
    • October 25th: Dust in the Wind
    • October 28th: Gender Liminality and Roles
    • October 2nd: Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein
    • October 30th: Games Reality Plays (part I)
    • October 9th: Approaching Autonomous
      • Analyzing Prose in Autonomous
    • September 11th: The Time Machine
    • September 16th: The Alien Other
    • September 18th: Post-apocalyptic Worlds
    • September 20th: Dystopian Visions
    • September 23rd: World’s Beyond
    • September 25th: Gender Studies and Science Fiction
    • September 30th: Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein
    • September 4th: Science Fiction and Social Breakdown
      • More on Ellison
      • More on Forster
    • September 9th: The Time Machine
  • LBST 2213-110: Science, Technology, and Society
    • August 22nd: Science and Technology from a Humanistic Perspective
    • August 24th: Science and Technology, a Humanistic Approach
    • August 29th: Collins & Pinch’s The Golem (Science), Ch. 2
    • August 31st: Collins & Pinch’s The Golem (Science), Ch. 3 and 4
    • December 5th: Video Games and Violence, a more nuanced view
    • November 14th: Boulle, Pierre. Planet of the Apes. (1964) Ch. 27-end
    • November 16th: Shelley, Mary. Frankenstein. 1818. Preface-Ch. 8
    • November 21st: Shelley, Mary. Frankenstein. 1818. Ch. 9-Ch. 16
    • November 28th: Shelley, Mary. Frankenstein. Ch. 17-Ch. 24
    • November 30th: Violence in Video Games
    • November 7th: Boulle, Pierre. Planet of the Apes Ch. 1-17
    • November 9th: Boulle, Pierre. Planet of the Apes, Ch. 18-26
    • October 12th: Lies Economics Tells
    • October 17th: Brief Histories of Medicine, Salerno, and Galen
    • October 19th: Politicizing Science and Medicine
    • October 24th: COVID-19 Facial Covering Rhetoric
    • October 26th: Wells, H. G. Time Machine. Ch. 1-5
    • October 31st: Wells, H. G. The Time Machine Ch. 6-The End
    • October 3rd: Collins & Pinch’s The Golem at Large (Technology), Ch. 7 and Conclusion
    • September 12th: Collins & Pinch’s The Golem (Science), Ch. 7 and Conclusion
    • September 19th: Collins & Pinch’s The Golem at Large (Technology), Prefaces and Ch. 1
    • September 26th: Collins & Pinch’s The Golem at Large (Technology), Ch. 2
    • September 28th: Collins & Pinch’s The Golem at Large (Technology), Ch. 5 and 6
    • September 7th: Collins & Pinch’s The Golem (Science), Ch. 5 and 6
  • New Media: Gender, Culture, Technology (Spring 2021)
    • April 13th: Virtually ‘Real’ Environments
    • April 20th: Rhetoric/Composition Defines New Media
    • April 27th: Sub/Cultural Politics, Hegemony, and Agency
    • April 6th: Capitalist Realism
    • February 16: Misunderstanding the Internet
    • February 23rd: Our Public Sphere and the Media
    • February 2nd: Introduction to Cultural Studies
    • January 26th: Introduction to New Media
    • Major Assignments for New Media (Spring 2021)
    • March 16th: Identity Politics
    • March 23rd: Social Construction of Gender and Sexuality
    • March 2nd: Foundational Thinkers in Cultural Studies
    • March 30th: Hyperreality
    • March 9th: Globalization & Postmodernism
    • May 4th: Wrapping Up The Semester
      • Jodi Dean “The The Illusion of Democracy” & “Communicative Capitalism”
      • Social Construction of Sexuality
  • Science Fiction in American Culture (Summer I–2020)
    • Assignments for Science Fiction in American Culture
    • Cultural Studies and Science Fiction Films
    • June 10th: Interstellar and Exploration themes
    • June 11th: Bicentennial Man
    • June 15th: I’m Only Human…Or am I?
    • June 16th: Wall-E and Environment
    • June 17th: Wall-E (2008) and Technology
    • June 18th: Interactivity in Video Games
    • June 1st: Firefly (2002) and Myth
    • June 2nd: “Johnny Mnemonic”
    • June 3rd: “New Rose Hotel”
    • June 4th: “Burning Chrome”
    • June 8th: Conformity and Monotony
    • June 9th: Cultural Constructions of Beauty
    • May 18th: Introduction to Class
    • May 19th: American Culture, an Introduction
    • May 20th: The Matrix
    • May 21st: Gender and Science Fiction
    • May 25th: Goals for I, Robot
    • May 26th: Isaac Asimov’s I, Robot
    • May 27th: Hackers and Slackers
    • May 30th: Inception
  • Teaching Portfolio
  • Topics for Analysis
    • A Practical Editing Situation
    • American Culture, an Introduction
    • Efficiency in Writing Reviews
    • Feminism, An Introduction
    • Fordism/Taylorism
    • Frankenstein Part I
    • Frankenstein Part II
    • Futurism Introduction
    • Isaac Asimov’s “A Cult of Ignorance”
    • Langdon Winner Summary: The Politics of Technology
    • Marxist Theory (cultural analysis)
    • Oral Presentations
    • Oratory and Argument Analysis
    • Our Public Sphere
    • Postmodernism Introduction
    • Protesting Confederate Place
    • Punctuation Refresher
    • QT, the Existential Robot
    • Religion of Technology Discussion
    • Rhetoric, an Introduction
      • Analyzing the Culture of Technical Writer Ads
      • Rhetoric of Technology
      • Visual Culture
      • Visual Perception
      • Visual Perception, Culture, and Rhetoric
      • Visual Rhetoric
      • Visuals for Technical Communication
      • World War I Propaganda
    • The Great I, Robot Discussion
      • I, Robot Short Essay Topics
    • The Rhetoric of Video Games: A Cultural Perspective
      • Civilization, an Analysis
    • The Sopranos
    • Why Science Fiction?
    • Zombies and Consumption Satire
  • Video Games & American Culture
    • April 14th: Phallocentrism
    • April 21st: Video Games and Neoliberalism
    • April 7th: Video Games and Conquest
    • Assignments for Video Games & American Culture
    • February 10th: Aesthetics and Culture
    • February 17th: Narrative and Catharsis
    • February 24th: Serious Games
    • February 3rd: More History of Video Games
    • January 13th: Introduction to the course
    • January 20th: Introduction to Video Game Studies
    • January 27th: Games & Culture
      • Marxism for Video Game Analysis
      • Postmodernism for Video Game Analysis
    • March 24th: Realism, Interpretation(s), and Meaning Making
    • March 31st: Feminist Perspectives and Politics
    • March 3rd: Risky Business?

Contact Me

Office: Fretwell 255F
Email: atoscano@uncc.edu
ENGL 6166: Rhetorical Theory » March 22nd: Mary Wollstonecraft

March 22nd: Mary Wollstonecraft

We’re back in the saddle again Tuesday night!!! More horse metaphors to come, so see you in class.

  • Mary Wollstonecraft, proto-feminist?
  • Coalition of Feminist Scholars in the History of Rhetoric and Composition
  • WWI Propaganda Posters (maybe…)
  • Nirvana’s “Been a Son”
  • Last Extremists (15 min)

Wollstonecraft’s A Vindication of the Rights of Women

Because this is a longer reading, we can’t get to everything. As I learned in another class, all the planning in the world can still cause a discussion to be less than…well-planned. I’m tying to select quotations that will be representative of the various chapters of the book. The absolute main point I want to get across, though, and it’s related to your Canvas post for this week, is that Wollstonecraft was revolutionary. The idea that women could demand rights or simply argue for men to take notice of women’s concerns was unheard of circa the 90s…the 1790s. This text, although questionably feminist, is one of the foundations of feminist thought in Western civilization and was vitally important for Anglo-American Women’s Suffrage. Let’s see where this leads…

Letter to M. Talleyrand-Perigord (a rather important figure in French history) Talleyrand wrote a report to the French National Assembly (1791) that argued women only needed a domestic education. Wollstonecraft’s essay is her response.

  • p. 2: “if she be not prepared by education to become the companion of man, she will stop the progress of knowledge and virtue.”
  • p. 3: “the more understanding women acquire, the more they will be attached to their duty–comprehending it.”
  • p. 3: ” women cannot, by force, be confined to domestic concerns; for they will however ignorant, intermeddle with more weighty affairs, neglecting private duties only to disturb, by cunning tricks, the orderly plans of reason which rise above their comprehension.”
  • p. 4: “men will seek for pleasure in variety, and faithless husbands will make faithless wives”
  • p. 4: ” if women are not permitted to enjoy legitimate rights, they will render both men and themselves vicious, to obtain illicit privileges.”

INTRODUCTION

  • p. 6: “men…have been more anxious to make them alluring mistresses than rational wives.”
  • p. 7: “men endeavour to sink us still lower, merely to render us alluring objects for a moment; and women, intoxicated by the adoration which men, under the influence of their senses, pay them, do not seek to obtain a durable interest in their hearts, or to become the friends of the fellow creatures who find amusement in their society.”

See below for a discussion from Gloria Steinem’s “Why Younger Women are More Conservative” (1979).

CHAPTER 1. THE RIGHTS AND INVOLVED DUTIES OF MANKIND CONSIDERED

  • p. 12: “The desire of dazzling by riches…have all contributed to overwhelm the mass of mankind, and make liberty a convenient handle for mock patriotism.”
  • p. 15: “all power inebriates weak man; and its abuse proves, that the more equality there is established among men, the more virtue and happiness will reign in society.”
  • p. 17: “It is of great importance to observe, that the character of every man is, in some degree, formed by his profession. A man of sense may only have a cast of countenance that wears off as you trace his individuality, whilst the weak, common man, has scarcely ever any character, but what belongs to the body; at least, all his opinions have been so steeped in the vat consecrated by authority, that the faint spirit which the grape of his own vine yields cannot be distinguished.”
    • “Society, therefore, as it becomes more enlightened, should be very careful not to establish bodies of men who must necessarily be made foolish or vicious by the very constitution of their profession.”

CHAPTER 2. THE PREVAILING OPINION OF A SEXUAL CHARACTER DISCUSSED

  • p. 18: ” Women are told from their infancy, and taught by the example of their mothers, that a little knowledge of human weakness, justly termed cunning, softness of temper, outward obedience, and a scrupulous attention to a puerile kind of propriety, will obtain for them the protection of man; and should they be beautiful, every thing else is needless, for at least twenty years of their lives.”
  • p. 19: “Men, indeed, appear to me to act in a very unphilosophical manner, when they try to secure the good conduct of women by attempting to keep them always in a state of childhood.”
  • p.24: “The sensualist, indeed, has been the most dangerous of tyrants, and women have been duped by their lovers, as princes by their ministers, whilst dreaming that they reigned over them.”
  • pp. 25-26: Woman came from man? Let’s consider her mentioning Moses here…
  • p. 29: “Nature, or to speak with strict propriety God, has made all things right; but man has sought him out many inventions to mar the work….Love, from its very nature, must be transitory….The most holy band of society is friendship. It has been well said, by a shrewd satirist, ‘that rare as true love is, true friendship is still rarer.'”

CHAPTER 3. THE SAME SUBJECT CONTINUED

  • p. 38: “I will allow that bodily strength seems to give man a natural superiority over woman; and this is the only solid basis on which the superiority of the sex can be built. But I still insist, that not only the virtue, but the knowledge of the two sexes should be the same in nature.”
  • p. 40: “The divine right of husbands, like the divine right of kings, may, it is to be hoped, in this enlightened age, be contested without danger.”
    • Consider this in terms of the French Revolution.

CHAPTER 4. OBSERVATIONS ON THE STATE OF DEGRADATION TO WHICH WOMAN IS REDUCED BY VARIOUS CAUSES

  • p. 52: “Women…are degraded by the same propensity to enjoy the present moment; and, at last, despise the freedom which they have not sufficient virtue to struggle to attain.”
  • p. 54: “the history of woman; it is sufficient to allow, that she has always been either a slave or a despot, and to remark, that each of these situations equally retards the progress of reason.”
  • p. 55: “Pleasure is the business of a woman’s life, according to the present modification of society….the sovereignty of beauty, they have, to maintain their power, resigned their natural rights, which the exercise of reason, might have procured them, and chosen rather to be short-lived queens than labour to attain the sober pleasures that arise from equality.”
  • p. 56: “‘in the noon of beauty’s power.'”
  • p. 57: “Mankind, including every description, wish to be loved and respected for something; and the common herd will always take the nearest road to the completion of their wishes.”

CHAPTER 5. ANIMADVERSIONS ON SOME OF THE WRITERS WHO HAVE RENDERED WOMEN OBJECTS OF PITY, BORDERING ON CONTEMPT

Wollstonecraft quotes quite a bit from Rousseau in this chapter, and it’s sometimes difficult to follow what she says and what she quotes, so be aware of what you’re reading and (mis)quoting.

  • p. 85: “The being who patiently endures injustice, and silently bears insults, will soon become unjust, or unable to discern right from wrong….men have better tempers than women, because they are occupied by pursuits that interest the head as well as the heart.”
  • p. 89: “As they are not in a capacity to judge for themselves, they ought to abide by the decision of their fathers and husbands as confidently as by that of the church.”
    • The above quotation follows this footnote: “What is to be the consequence, if the mother’s and husband’s opinion should chance not to agree? An ignorant person cannot be reasoned out of an error, and when persuaded to give up one prejudice for another the mind is unsettled. Indeed, the husband may not have any religion to teach her though in such a situation she will be in great want of a support to her virtue, independent of worldly considerations.”
    • What might another one of our figures say about attempting rational arguments with supposed “lesser” minds?
    • Isocrates does claim, “Surely it is irrational to praise those who engage in a lesser activity rather than a higher activity” (pp. 251).
  • p. 97: “[girls] are told…that they are only like angels when they are young and beautiful; consequently, it is their persons, not their virtues, that procure them this homage.”

CHAPTER 6. THE EFFECT WHICH AN EARLY ASSOCIATION OF IDEAS HAS UPON THE CHARACTER

  • p. 121: “till women are led to exercise their understandings, they should not be satirized for their attachment to rakes; nor even for being rakes at heart, when it appears to be the inevitable consequence of their education.”
  • p. 122: “In the choice of a husband they should not be led astray by the qualities of a lover—for a lover the husband, even supposing him to be wise and virtuous, cannot long remain.”
    • Hmmm…dare we go there?

CHAPTER 7. MODESTY. COMPREHENSIVELY CONSIDERED, AND NOT AS A SEXUAL VIRTUE

  • p. 125: “The shameless behaviour of the prostitutes who infest the streets of London, raising alternate emotions of pity and disgust….become more audaciously lewd than men….But these poor ignorant wretches never had any modesty to lose, when they consigned themselves to infamy.”
    • I’ve read this several times, and I’m not quite sure if she’s actually pitying prostitutes of if she’s recognizing that they might have been forced into the life because of circumstances.
    • Either way, I get the feeling she wouldn’t be moved by the hooker-with-a-heart-of-gold trope.
  • p. 126: “The woman who has dedicated a considerable portion of her time to pursuits purely intellectual, and whose affections have been exercised by humane plans of usefulness, must have more purity of mind, as a natural consequence, than the ignorant beings whose time and thoughts have been occupied by gay pleasures or schemes to conquer hearts.”
  • p. 132: “if men and women took half as much pains to dress habitually neat, as they do to ornament, or rather disfigure, their persons, much would be done towards the attainment of purity of mind.”
    • What might she think about today’s fashion industry?
  • p. 134: Reject “ignorance and vanity! ye must acquire that soberness of mind, which the exercise of duties, and the pursuit of knowledge, alone inspire, or ye will still remain in a doubtful dependent situation, and only be loved whilst ye are fair!”

CHAPTER 8. MORALITY UNDERMINED BY SEXUAL NOTIONS OF THE IMPORTANCE OF A GOOD REPUTATION

  • p. 135: “The greater number of people take their opinions on trust, to avoid the trouble of exercising their own minds.”
    • She even foreshadow’s Asimov’s discussion of the cult of ignorance.
    • Fortunately, technology today brings us all the knowledge of the world at our fingertips; therefore, we’re all better informed.
  • p. 137: “Weak minds are always fond of resting in the ceremonials of duty, but morality offers much simpler motives.”
    • Quoting Rousseau: “…but a woman, in behaving well, performs but half her duty; as what is thought of her, is as important to her as what she really is.”
    • I believe Rousseau means that the other half of duty is being a model of virtue and not just a follower (which is all men must do).

CHAPTER 9. OF THE PERNICIOUS EFFECTS WHICH ARISE FROM THE UNNATURAL DISTINCTIONS ESTABLISHED IN SOCIETY

  • p. 145: “For man is so constituted that he can only attain a proper use of his faculties by exercising them, and will not exercise them unless necessity, of some kind, first set the wheels in motion.”
  • p. 145: “It is vain to expect virtue from women till they are, in some degree, independent of men; nay, it is vain to expect that strength of natural affection, which would make them good wives and good mothers.”
  • p. 152: “Women, in particular, all want to be ladies. Which is simply to have nothing to do, but listlessly to go they scarcely care where, for they cannot tell what.”
    • Maybe she never heard about “nasty women.”

CHAPTER 10. PARENTAL AFFECTION

  • p. 157: “Natural affection, as it is termed, I believe to be a very weak tie, affections must grow out of the habitual exercise of a mutual sympathy; and what sympathy does a mother exercise who sends her babe to a nurse, and only takes it from a nurse to send it to a school?”

CHAPTER 11. DUTY TO PARENTS

  • p. 159: “the absurd duty, too often inculcated, of obeying a parent only on account of his being a parent, shackles the mind, and prepares it for a slavish submission to any power but reason.”

CHAPTER 12. ON NATIONAL EDUCATION

  • p. 164: “At school, boys become gluttons and slovens, and, instead of cultivating domestic affections, very early rush into the libertinism which destroys the constitution before it is formed; hardening the heart as it weakens the understanding.”

CHAPTER 13. SOME INSTANCES OF THE FOLLY WHICH THE IGNORANCE OF WOMEN GENERATES; WITH CONCLUDING REFLECTIONS ON THE MORAL IMPROVEMENT THAT A REVOLUTION IN FEMALE MANNERS MAY NATURALLY BE EXPECTED TO PRODUCE

  • p. 185: “Women, because they have not been led to consider the knowledge of their duty as the one thing necessary to know, or, to live in the present moment by the discharge of it, are very anxious to peep into futurity, to learn what they have to expect to render life interesting, and to break the vacuum of ignorance.”
  • p. 194: “An immoderate fondness for dress, for pleasure and for sway, are the passions of savages; the passions that occupy those uncivilized beings who have not yet extended the dominion of the mind, or even learned to think with the energy necessary to concatenate that abstract train of thought which produces principles. And that women, from their education and the present state of civilized life, are in the same condition, cannot, I think, be controverted.”
    • Wollstonecraft clearly has a bias towards an elite Western lifestyle.

Gloria Steinem’s “Why Younger Women are More Conservative”

Gloria Steinem focuses her attention in this essay on young women. She tells us that young women are more conservative–more likely to go along with the status quo–because they are “in the stage most valued by male-dominant cultures” (230). While you’re free to disagree with her argument, let’s try to consider “the rhetoric of young, conventionally beautiful women” in American culture.

Some specific points about Steinem’s article:

  • p. 230: “As students, women are probably treated with more equality than we ever will be again. For one thing, we’re consumers.”
  • p. 230: Young women “have [their] full potential as workers, wives, sex partners, and childbearers.”
  • p. 232: Women “worrying about some aspect of combining marriage, children, and a career” while college students.
  • p. 232: Women “are still brainwashed into assuming that [they] are dependent on men for [their] basic identities.”
  • p. 233: “Society tries hard to convert women into ‘man junkies’; that is, into people who are addicted to male-approval and presence.”
  • p. 233: Young women may “refrain from identifying themselves as ‘feminist.'”
  • pp. 235-236: “We have to uproot the sexual caste system that is the most pervasive power structure in society, and this means transforming the patriarchal values of those who run the institutions, whether they are politically the “right” or the “left,” the fathers or the sons.

That last quote is important because Steinem isn’t reducing her argument to a trite Democratic vs Republican argument. Patriarchy pervades both.

Next Week

You have a lighter reading load next week, so we may return to Wollstonecraft’s book. I have Kristan Poirot’s “Domesticating the Liberated Woman” on Canvas, so please read that. Also, I have the Gloria Steinem article above on Canvas in case you want to read it. It’s a quick read but not required.

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