Karl Markis: Women During the Scientific Revolution

Women have been historically treated as second-class citizens, restricted to obstinate chores such as house maintenance and manual labor. Men have deemed them as faint-hearted and feeble, unable to participate in academia and destined to raise children in the comforts and safety of home. This pessimistic, yet true perception of women was prevalent during the Scientific Revolution, though a few changes developed.

Women did not involve themselves in the Scientific Revolution because they “had largely been excluded from university learning during both the middle ages and the early modern period” (Danville). The overwhelming majority of Europeans did not have the wealth or initiative to pursue formal education. Citizens’ quality of life was poor compared to modern standards; they struggled to raise funds for food and shelter, and education naturally stood at the bottom of people’s priorities.

Proactive women from noble families who had the luxury of accessing formal education could and did make contributions to the Scientific Revolution, but they lacked an outlet to promote their ideas and be heard. Academic circles were solely comprised of men who would never dream of giving women the chance to prove themselves. Society in large did not want to hear an educated female’s thought provoking ideas towards subjects largely dominated by men. Ultimately, there was no audience for the women to preach ideas to.

Society was so against women expressing their views on religion and science that the concept of witchcraft became thoroughly practiced to explain why a household wife would ever attempt to break of the barriers society has placed on them. Some European religious fanatics claimed women were “credulous, and since the chief aim of the devil is to corrupt faith, therefore he attacks them. Women are naturally more impressionable, and more ready to receive the influence of a disembodied spirit” (iastate.edu). The great witch craze that ensued from late Renaissance to mid Scientific Revolution lead to thousands of women being executed.

Sweeping generalizations cannot be made about women playing absolutely no role in the intellectual flourish of the Scientific Revolution. They may have used their husbands as outlets to voice their opinions, which is an idea that cannot be proven because men unabashedly took credit for everything, even if the information wasn’t their own. The lingering question of just how women participated in the Scientific Revolution remains unanswered, as we can only interpret that time in history from the male-dominated historians and texts that prevailed.

Sources:

Hatch, Robert. The Scientific Revolution. web.clas.ufl.edu. October 23, 2008. <http://web.clas.ufl.edu/ users/rhatch/pages/03-Sci-Rev/SCI-REV-Teaching/03sr-definition-concept.htm>.

Scientific Revolution. public.iastate.edu. October 23, 2008. <http:// www.public.iastate.edu/~hist.380/revolution.html>.