Anti-Suffrage Postcards Women's Roles
1 media/AntiSuffrage3_thumb.jpg 2020-06-26T16:43:13-07:00 Jenn Brandt ca8b9ff85976cc2eb08bae779aeef1e3713ced6c 37593 2 Suffragists were often contradictorily portrayed as either "loose" women or as unattractive shrews. Given the strict social roles of the time, women were often discouraged from speaking up for their rights through strict social controls on their appearance and bodies. plain 2020-07-01T16:12:45-07:00 20200527 192342+0000 20200527 192342+0000 100 yeas of Women's Vote Jenn Brandt ca8b9ff85976cc2eb08bae779aeef1e3713ced6cThis page is referenced by:
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Women's Roles in the 19th Century
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During the 19th century, most states adopted the British common law system of "coverature," where women were legally "covered" by their husbands, their rights subsumed with his. This led to the concept of "chattel marriages," which left most women as the "property" of their husbands, unable to maintain ownership of wages, wealth, or even themselves. During this time, women could not sign a contract, serve on a jury, or participate freely and equally in public life. Instead, a "cult of domesticity" was in place, where the ideal of "true womanhood" segregated women to the private sphere of the home as models of purity and domesticity as wives and mothers.
This image of ideal womanhood was supported by newspapers, periodicals, and other forms of popular press, as well as by religious, education, and other social systems. These stereotypes were a strong basis for the anti-suffrage movement, which argued, among other things, that a women's place was in the home, that women were too emotional and/or fragile for political participation, and that politics would corrupt women.
These images from Catalina Island, CA (1910) show that, while not discussed in today's terms, there were many women who were more comfortable outside the gender norms of the time and adopted more non-binary dress and gender roles.
