Jane Austen Research Paper

WOMEN IN SOCIETY: PRIDE AND PREJUDICE | LETTERS TO ALICE | Women in Jane Austen’s time were expected to find a husband, reproduce and take care of the husband. They were mothers and housekeepers and were only taught basic reading and writing skills. Most women were discouraged when they attempted to achieve more education as they were barred from universities. Women were excluded from most professions except for writing and teaching, and they had no right to own a business or to hold property once married. Women received less education than boys because it was considered more important for them to learn ‘accomplishments’ like embroidery and music rather than academic subjects. Women would have learnt the piano, sketched, read books, engaged
| This is very different to what was experienced by Alice and her Aunt Fay in Letters to Alice. It has become more accepted and therefore easier for women to work. New laws and opportunities were introduced which made it easier for women to have a family and a career. More than half of all women worked in the 1980’s and they were mostly employed in the service sectors: admin, retail, teaching, banking and finance. However, women still weren’t paid the same rate of pay as men in the same areas and it was still very uncommon for women to participate in many outdoor or laborious occupations. In Letters to Alice, Aunt Fay suggests that women who are successful will not need to depend on men as they have done in the past, saying that “Success kicks away the stool of masochism, on which female existence so often depends”. (Letters to Alice, Page 95). Education for women had also improved with it now acceptable for women to further their education and go to university. Governments encouraged teachers to give girls extra help to study those subjects which were predominately male subjects like maths and science. As a result of furthering their education women gained more skills which meant that they were able to
The marriage of the Bennet’s is shown as a bad match between an intelligent man and a stupid woman. They married out of physical attraction and nothing more. Jane and Bingley have a good relationship but their marriage is not as good as the Darcy’s because they are lacking in intelligence. They are said to be “so complying, that nothing will ever be resolved on: so easy that every servant will cheat you: and so generous, that you will always exceed your income”Marriage was often viewed as an economic transaction because it “was not only a matter of mutual affection and social compatibility, but also an institution through which the landed gentry maintained and increased its financial position.” A man was granted access to his wife’s body which was assured by the law and the vows a woman made at her marriage. This meant that every man had the right to force his wife into sexual intercourse and childbirth. All of a woman’s property was given to the man upon marriage and the system of entailment is depicted as unjust to women because it is shown to force women into such situations where they must pursue husbands and make marriages