19th Century Women :: Victorian Era

Purpose Statement This paper will outline the intention of women in society during the Victorian Era and present some literal life examples from the Womens Diaries of the Westward Journey of 19th century women keep companying their roles and at times having the those roles challenged by the difficulty of the trail.19th-Century WomenWomen in the nineteenth century, for the most part, had to follow the common role presented to them by society. This role can be summed up by what historians call the cult of domesticity. The McGuffey Readers does a successful job at illustrating the womens role in society. Women that took part in the overland trail as described in Womens Diaries of the Westward Journey had to try to follow these roles temporary hookup facing many challenges that made it rattling difficult to do so. unmatchable of the most common expectations for women then is that they are responsible for doing the chore of calorie-freeup whether it is cleaning the folk, doing the laundry. The McGuffey Readers mentions the womens certificate of indebtedness to clean in a multiple places. In this handbook it gives clear directions to the woman on what she is to do when cleaning, This ceremony completed, and the residence thoroughly evacuated, the next operation is to smear the wall and ceilings with brushes dipped into a solution of lime (Gorn 111). The book explains how it is the womens job to thoroughly clean the house once a year in a manner that sounds very laborious It further states, The misfortune is, that the sole object is to make things clean (Gorn 112). In this part of the book it is very clear that it is saying that the womans duty is to clean. In Womens Diaries of the Westward Journey it illustrates this in a couple of passages. For example, unrivaled woman wrote in her diary, Oh Horrors how shall I express it it is the d established washing solar day . . . but washing must be done and procrastination wont do it for me (Schlissel 83). Althoug h this woman obviously did not like doing the washing she saw it as her job to do. In addition, the book describes this scene, The banks of a river would be lined with women who carried their kettles, their washtubs, and tons of unwashed linen (Schlissel 82). Again, it is the women who are doing the cleaning. The McGuffey Readers being the handbook that young girls would read in school taught them that it was their place to do the cleaning.