Leta S. Hollingworth was an American psychologist who focused most of her research on giftedness, educational psychology, psychology of women, and the variability hypothesis. She conducted numerous studies to reject the variability hypothesis that deemed women for destined for mediocrity and did her dissertation on how women were not mentally incapacitated during menstruation (Held, 2010). Hollingworth wrote six articles on the social factors that contributed to the social status of women. (1) One being “Social Devices for Impelling Women to Bear and Rear Children,” this article focused on the eight social constructs that motivated and pressured women to have and raise children. Of the eight, seven were first proposed by E. A. Ross in his book …show more content…
(1) The eight social devices were personal ideals, public opinion, law, belief, education, art, illusions, and bugaboos. There were three popular bugaboos which were first termed by Hollingworth (1916) as false ideas or beliefs held by society that were created by medical men. The first was that if pregnancy was delayed until the age of 30, it was more painful and hard. Thus prompting women to have babies at an earlier age. The second stated that women who do bear children live longer opposed to women who don’t. The third stated that a child that was raised alone was more likely to become “selfish, egotistic, and an undesirable citizen” (Hollingworth, 1916). Which propelled women to have more than one child so their child would not become any of those things. (1) These eight social devices had been used as a means to confine women to the roles of child bearer and mother by manipulating them to not aspire to anything more. When a woman went against her designated role they were considered abnormal, selfish, and were destined to encounter the wrath of God in the hereafter. (2) When this article was first published, in …show more content…
(8) As for the differences between both articles, Hollingworth (1916) focused more on the social constructs that are devised to promote pregnancy and gave specific examples. Whereas, Brenning et al. (2015) focused on how motivation to get pregnant is correlated with psychological adjustment. Also, Hollingworth’s (1916) article was more of a social analysis while Brenning et al.’s (2015) article was a longitudinal study with a method, participants, measures, etc. (7) Although, both Hollingworth and Brenning et al. also explored how internal (emotions) and external (other people) factors can have an impact on one’s decision to bear a
The first article presented only the author’s point of view and refused to say the words “birth-control” or even “contraceptives.” Sadly, it only focused on how “evil” the people were who were sending out the literature, not how these women, many of whom were likely married, simply did not want any more children and needed medication and information on how to prevent pregnancy. The second article, however, addressed the issue with a more factual approach. It seemed to accept the idea that women have the right to birth control and sex education, even if the author only discussed married people. These articles are evidence of how, in one hundred years, the nation can change its entire stance on an issue.
Until very recent history, women struggled to survive in a “man’s world.” Whether it was art, literature, music, politics, or law, women faced a vast obstacle – their gender. The society was not ready to accept that women could be as competitive, as smart, as powerful, as ambitious and as passionate as men. Most women agreed to degrade their intellect and suppress their ambition, because that seemed to be easy at the
In 1961, Kurt Vonnegut was concerned about overpopulation in the world. With his short story, “Welcome to the Monkey House”, he displays how a society attempts to control overpopulation by having only one legal form of birth control. The one legal form of birth control is a pill for males and females that made people numb from the waist down. The birth control was described as, “The pills were ethical because they didn’t interfere with a person’s ability to reproduce, which would have been unnatural and immoral. All the pills did was take every bit of pleasure out of sex.”
Motherhood who needs it? Is it women, men, society or everyone in general who needs motherhood? In “Motherhood: who needs it?” Betsy Rollin argues that people are having children for all the wrong reasons. Instead of having them because they want to they have them because they feel that it is expected upon them as a woman.
As one of her eleven siblings in a poor family, Margaret couldn’t help but to feel inferior and long for a rich and comfortable lifestyle. When Sanger’s mother died at the age of forty, Margaret believed that her mother’s premature death was a consequence of excessive childbirth. Along with this mindset, as a young girl, Margaret formed a mindset that poverty, illness, and strife were all fates for large families, whereas small families enjoyed wealth, leisure, and positive parental relationships (Croft). It came to no surprise that Sanger, with such a harsh childhood, grew up to become one of the biggest, if not the biggest, advocates for birth control. Soon after her mother’s death, Margaret decided to become a nurse.
This quote from the text, “Seen the new kid yet?”(51), gives a correlation of dependent children seeking others for help, to how women were given no power
In her pilgrimage to fight for women’s rights, activist Margaret Sanger created a speech on a severely controversial topic not only during her time period, but during our present time period as well. While many firmly disagreed with her and still do, she did bring to light a major disparity between sexes and social classes. By vocalizing her qualms with the rights of women, mainly in the middle and lower classes, to decide for themselves if they wish to have children or not. By voicing her opinions in an extremely misogynistic era she made herself a totem in women’s history. Women do have a right to decide for themselves if they wish to have children or not.
At the cusp of the twentieth century, social thinkers turned increasingly to examining the dynamics of gender in society, the psychology of the human mind, and the social implication of evolution. In Sigmund Freud’s Civilization and Its Discontents, the famed psychoanalyst delineates his theories about the development of human society in relation to his theory of human sexuality. Similarly, feminist author Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s Women and Economics examines the effects that society has on the development and advancement of women. Both authors deal with the questions of individual happiness, human civilization, and human sexuality to some extent. However, their vastly divergent theories and consequent conjectures can be explained according
When a woman chooses to keep her baby, it may not be her decision; it may be her moral duty to the society influenced by her family’s pressure and religious belief. However, if she considers the broad social factors that will shape and influence her views, and that will allow her to make individual choices such as whether to keep her baby or not, she is applying what C. Wright Mills’ called the Social Imagination. James Henslin (2013) stated that C. Wright Mills’s sociological imagination gives us the ability “to understand how our personal troubles (the problems we experience) are connected to the broader conditions of our society” (p. 2). It allows us to question the “norms” and gives us the ability to see things from different perspectives
Trying to prevent neglected children and back-alley abortions, Margaret Sanger gave the moving speech, “The Children’s Era,” in 1925 to spread information on the benefits and need for birth control and women's rights. Margaret Sanger--activist, educator, writer, and nurse--opened the first birth control clinic in the United States and established organizations that evolved into the Planned Parenthood Federation of America. During most of the 1900’s, birth control and abortions were illegal in the United States, causing women to give birth unwillingly to a child they must be fully responsible for. This caused illness and possible death for women attempting self-induced abortion. Sanger uses literary devices such as repetition and analogies
The argument over a woman’s right to choose over the life of an unborn baby has been a prevalent issue in America for many years. As a birth control activist, Margaret Sanger is recognized for her devotion to the pro-choice side of the debate as she has worked to provide sex education and legalize birth control. As part of her pro-choice movement, Sanger delivered a speech at the Sixth International Neo-Malthusian and Birth Control Conference in March of 1925. This speech is called “The Children’s Era,” in which she explains how she wants the twentieth century to become the “century of the child.” Margaret Sanger uses pathos throughout her speech as she brings up many of the negative possibilities that unplanned parenthood can bring for both children and parents.
Women with Post-Partum Depression are often degraded as mothers, women who work are often judged, and women who choose not to have children at all are criticized. While woman’s rights have indeed come a long way from the expectation of a 19th-century woman, there is still inequality. A Doll House is still relevant today because many women face the same issues he presented, and until the genders are truly equal, it will stay
Such considerations fundamentally shape human life and family relationships. A women needs to be aware of the various psychological and social factors that contribute to the decision such as “that human parents, both male and female, tend to care passionately about their offspring, and that family relationships are among the deepest and strongest in our lives—and, significantly, among the longest lasting.” These key intrinsic goods- in this case factors such as human life, parenthood, and family relationships- are ultimately worthwhile are not to be taken without due
Throughout the history of the United States, let alone the world, women have faced a lack of economic independence that caused them to become dependent on their fathers or husbands. According to sociologist and author Charlotte Perkins Gilman, active around the turn of the 20th century, this lack of economic independence amongst women has a direct relationship with gender inequality. As per her theory regarding this relationship, Gilman identifies three factors that help to cause gender inequality: gender socialization, sociobiology, and a Marxist emphasis. That is, girls are taught to be different from boys beginning at a young age, there biological differences between women and men, and women are prone to more submissive roles within families
Mary Wollstonecraft an early feminist philosopher, writes about the ideals of equality and freedom both in her political rebuttal essay “Rights of Men” and her follow-up essay “Vindication of Women” in response to philosopher Jean-Jacques Rousseau. Writing the “Vindication of the Rights of Men”, has led her to explore and express her opinions about the inequality of women during the Romantic period. As the opposition to post-revolutionary sentiment, extending rights as a just act to include the upper middle class of men, over maintaining the traditional rights given to men of nobility. Wollstonecraft interjects that women are also a vital importance to society and also deserve allowances of rights.