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Sex And Education: A Reply To Dr. E.H. Clarke's "Sex In Education"

Creator: Julia Ward Howe (author)
Date: 1874
Publisher: Roberts Brothers, Boston
Source: Available at selected libraries

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The accounts of the training of German girls given in the last chapter bear out these views. To be sure, most of the German girls leave school young, at about fifteen, and have lessons at home. We know nothing of the regularity, strictness, or requirements of these lessons or lectures; but we do know the work is regular, and not periodical, for girls in average health, and the health is taken care of. There is an established kind of tradition, as there is in many families in this country, in regard to the regimen for girls. Cold and exposure are avoided; schoolgirls never ride and never go to parties; and, even when school-days are over, girls do not go to parties during the time when Dr. Clarke thinks they ought not to go to school. Dr. Hagen writes: "The health of the German girls is commonly good, except in the higher classes in the great capitals, where the same obnoxious agencies are to be found in Germany as in the whole world. But here also there is a very strong exception, or, better, a difference between America and Germany, as German girls are never accustomed to the free manners and modes of life of American girls. As a rule, in Germany the "mother directs the manner of living of the daughter entirely." The italics are ours. Dr. Clarke adds to this that "pleasant recreation for children of both sexes, and abundance of it, is provided for them all over Germany, -- is regarded as necessity for them, -- is made a part of their daily life; but then it is open air, oxygen-surrounding, blood- making, health-giving, innocent recreation, -- not gas, furnaces, low necks, spinal trails, -- the civilized representatives of caudal appendages, -- and late hours."

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We repeat that Dr. Clarke does not oppose the education of women: he only opposes the present method of education. He says distinctly: Let us remember that physiology confirms the hope of the race by asserting that the loftiest heights of intellectual and spiritual vision and force are free to each sex, and accessible by each; but adds that each must climb in its own way, and accept its own limitations, and, when this is done, promises that each will find the doing of it not to weaken or diminish, but to develop power. His book is written with force and with genuine earnestness and feeling, is full of valuable instruction, and is 'both useful and suggestive to those who will agree with the author, -- to those who oppose him, and to those like ourselves who sympathize fully with his aim, but who think that he has laid the emphasis of blame wrongly. -- Boston Daily Advertiser.

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IX.

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BY M. B. JACKSON.

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IN this little book, which has attracted much attention, there are many excellent things; and we thank Dr. Clarke for having written it, not so much for what it contains as for the attention it has drawn to the subject of which it treats. Coming as it does from a physician, who stands so high in the profession, and who is so much esteemed in social life, it naturally attracts the attention of many who are thinking upon the subject of co-education. But we regret to find that one who should be informed of the views of the prominent advocates of co-education should permit himself to talk of their wishing to make women as nearly as possible like men, and of women as wishing to become like men, and despising those differences in themselves which distinguish the sexes, when in fact these are the opprobriums of their opponents instead of arguments to defeat the cause. On page 18 he says:

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"It is said that Elina Carnaro, the accomplished professor of six languages, whose statue adorns and honors Padua, was educated like a boy. This means that she was initiated into and mastered the studies that were considered to be the peculiar dower of men. It does not mean that her life was a man's life, her way of study a man's way of study, or that in acquiring six languages she ignored her own organization"

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How the Doctor got this interpretation of what is meant by Elina Carnaro's being educated like a boy he does not inform us, but no woman would have thought that her life was a man's life, her way of study a man's way of study, or that in acquiring six languages she would ignore her own organization. What women are now struggling for is not to be like men, not to get their education by the same mental processes as men, but to have the same opportunities to use in a woman's way, and to make the most of them in the methods their own intellect dictates, not to have men lay out the course of study for them, and oblige them to follow their direction, instead of their own natural methods. They desire to be allowed to choose the college or university that suits their wishes, and to enter any educational institution as freely as men choose and enter theirs. Dr. Clarke takes it for granted that, if boys and girls are educated together, the girls must follow the boys' method of getting their lessons, must study as many hours as the boys, but must have none of the physical exercises and plays that boys have to strengthen their muscles, and, by drawing off the nerve force from the brain, let it rest and be refreshed in the same degree that the boys' brains are. He ignores the fact that boys, too, have a period of development, and often require tender care during that period, as well as girls. While boys are encouraged to be out of doors, and to engage in active sports, without the slightest intimation that there is any impropriety in it, girls are constantly checked if their inclination leads them to desire active out-of-door sports. They are told that they are hoydens, that it is not proper for girls to play tag, or coast, or run races, or to engage in any of the activities that would render them physically strong and so they, having much more sensibility and more love of admiration than boys, give up all amusements that are denounced as unladylike, and take to crocheting or fancy needlework, which in itself is sufficient to debilitate them, and take the color from their cheeks, without the strain of study imposed upon them in the schools.

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