The Emerging Female Citizen: Gender and Enlightenment in Spain
Theresa AnnSmith
Abstract
Eighteenth-century Spanish women were not idle bystanders during one of Europe's most dynamic eras. As this book demonstrates, Spanish intellectuals, calling for Spain to modernize its political, social, and economic institutions, brought the question of women's place to the forefront, as did women themselves. In explaining how both discourse and women's actions worked together to define women's roles in the nation, this book not only illustrates the rising visibility of women, but also reveals the complex processes that led to women's relatively swift exit from most public institutions in the ... More
Eighteenth-century Spanish women were not idle bystanders during one of Europe's most dynamic eras. As this book demonstrates, Spanish intellectuals, calling for Spain to modernize its political, social, and economic institutions, brought the question of women's place to the forefront, as did women themselves. In explaining how both discourse and women's actions worked together to define women's roles in the nation, this book not only illustrates the rising visibility of women, but also reveals the complex processes that led to women's relatively swift exit from most public institutions in the early 1800s. As artists, writers, and reformers, Spanish women took up pens, joined academies and economic societies, formed tertulias—similar to French salons—and became active in the burgeoning public discourse of Enlightenment. In analyzing the meaning of women's presence in diverse centers of Enlightenment, the book offers a new interpretation of the dynamics among political discourse, social action, and gender ideologies.
Keywords:
Spain,
women,
public institutions,
academies,
economic societies,
tertulias,
Enlightenment,
social action,
gender ideologies,
modernization
Bibliographic Information
| Print publication date: 2006 |
Print ISBN-13: 9780520245839 |
| Published to California Scholarship Online: March 2012 |
DOI:10.1525/california/9780520245839.001.0001 |
