Harriet Martineau: The Queen of Sociology
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| Harriet Martineau: Self Portrait Pic credit |
On June 12th 1802, the first female sociologist was born. Harriet was the sixth out of eight children from her father. Harriet had a good relationship with her father, but she was not on the best of terms with her mother. Her mother made Harriet very insecure by insulting her appearance, which made Harriet reinforce her schooling because she felt that was the only thing her mother would like her for. She began her schooling at an boys' day school that only allowed a select few of girls in. By the age of 12, her deafness was taking over most of her hearing, which lead Harriet to continue onto the path of writing. Her brother also influenced her to start writing to find a way to write about the disparity in opportunities to men and women.
Martineau began new career in writing by publishing two articles for the Monthly Repository, while she also was submitting articles to the periodical press. During this time of her writing, she was still living at home with her family until 1829 hit. Harriet's family business failed in 1829, which lead to Harriet asking the editor of Monthly Repository about getting paid for her contributions. She was the only paid contributor and journal chief, leading to the start of becoming a social activist and commentator.
After experiencing socioeconomic struggles, she wrote a whole series of stories that related to social and economic themes to show to the world that many people experience this struggling lifestyle. Her stories were very successful and eye-opening. This series covers social/economic issues such as national debt, which helped to pass Great Britain's 1834 Poor Law Act. Once she finished her series on socioeconomic problems, she traveled over to the United States to write a book on her sociologist findings there. While she was in the US, she went to a meeting and formed a group called the Ladies' Anti-Slavery Society (1835). Eighteen women came together to discuss the reasoning as to why they wanted to help abolish slavery. Harriet agreed with all the viewpoints and publicly stated her opinions on the abolishment at the Boston meeting. She also got to public her book Society in America, which went into detail about the cruel ways of slavery and how the subordinate position of women was incompatible towards democratic ideals.
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| Society In America Pic credits |
As years pass, Harriet slowly kept getting sicker. In 1839, Martineau was diagnosed with a prolapsed uterus and an ovarian tumor. From that moment on, her ovarian tumor kept coming back once it was "treated", resulting her getting deathly sick over and over again. This lead to her last social involvements, which was about women's rights. She began to write many articles about the Contagious Disease Act of 1864 and 1869. She strongly disagreed with this because this act said that any police officer could arrest a female (especially a female sex worker) and take them without their own permission to get tested for multiple kinds of diseases. This was humiliating for these girls cause they weren't allowed to have a say for their bodies, which made Harriet fight back with speaking and writing about it.
Her actions on feminism and equality for both men and women helped push new viewpoints for the world to look into. Before she died in 1876, she was continously fighting for access to higher education for women. Harriet believed that women were just as smart as men. She proved her point by showing the world that a female could be a very successful sociologist in a male-dominated field. She also was a risk taking sociologist by researching ignored issues by the male sociologists. These issues included marriage, children, and domestic life. She successfully brought a powerful female voice to these issues and during the Mid-Victiorian era, making her a Warrior Woman.
Her actions on feminism and equality for both men and women helped push new viewpoints for the world to look into. Before she died in 1876, she was continously fighting for access to higher education for women. Harriet believed that women were just as smart as men. She proved her point by showing the world that a female could be a very successful sociologist in a male-dominated field. She also was a risk taking sociologist by researching ignored issues by the male sociologists. These issues included marriage, children, and domestic life. She successfully brought a powerful female voice to these issues and during the Mid-Victiorian era, making her a Warrior Woman.
Works Cited
- Sherwood, Martha A. "Harriet Martineau." Salem Press Biographical Encyclopedia, 2013. EBSCOhost, proxy-bloomu.klnpa.org/login?url=http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=ers&AN=88807114&site=eds-live&scope=site.
- Giddens, Anthony, et al. Essentials of Sociology. New York. W.W. Norton & Company Inc, 2017.
At a young age, she attended an all boy school. At this time of society, I cannot imagine the discrimination she must have faced. Learning to read and write during this time was not a norm for young girls. With this skill, she not only was able to work towards overcoming her own disability, she also was able to tackle inequality and comment on women's bodies. Her personal experiences strongly resonate with her accomplishments.
ReplyDeleteThis goes to show how powerful of a tool advocacy articles can be, and the fact that she had to muscle past several kinds of opposition and still had a successful career is quite inspiring. Even when she was sick, she wrote - and that is dedication for a more informed, more powerful future for women of all kinds.
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