Women's Role in Sociopolitical History
Women's Role in Sociopolitical History
Historical influences against women have shaped the role of women in most societies today. Biblical writings that influenced Christianity, Judaism, and other religions, blame women for destroying the innocence of mankind, symbolic by Eve’s eating the Fruit of Wisdom. Ancient Greek beliefs suggested that mans’ strength gave the man the right to rule, thus men were the only ones capable of becoming “guardians” and protector of state, which ultimately gave them political rights. These early writings, which were written mostly by men, helped influence other writers responsible for shaping a countries’ ideology about male dominance and a women’s role in society as housewives and child bearer and thus women were given less opportunities in education for their primary role as housewives didn’t require much knowledge.
The national political arena is dominated by men but allows women some select access; the international political arena is a sphere for men only, or for those rare women who can successfully play at being men, or at least not shake masculine presumptions (Enloe 13). In a Cold war interpretation: a patriarchal world is dangerous when masculine men and feminine women are expected to react in opposite but complementary ways. A real man will become the protector in such a world. He will suppress his own fears, brace himself and step forward to defend the weak, women and children. In the same dangerous world, women will turn gratefully and expectantly to their fathers and husbands, real or surrogate (Enloe 13). In conventional commentaries men who yield influence in international politics are analyzed in terms of their national identities, their class origins and their paid work (Enloe 13). Rarely are they analyzed as men who have been taught how to be manly, how to size up the trustworthiness or competence of other men in terms of their manliness (Enloe 13). Jean Jacques Rousseau, a French writer in 1762 said, “There is a difference in the moral relation of the two sexes. ‘One ought to be active and strong, the other passive and weak’. Woman was made to please man and man pleases by the sole fact of his strength” (Lives and Voices 249). His influence along with other writers influenced much of the ideologies of male dominance worldwide.
In terms of economic progression, women play major...