Deeds Not Words
The Fight For Women's
Suffrage 1900-1918
Lesson One: The Social
and Political Position of
Women in 1900.
Sweet Side
Non-Sweet
Side
• You can have this
lesson to chat amongst
yourselves.
• You have to sit in
silence and do the
following task.
•You can create your
own laws that the NonSweet side have to
obey.
•Write the following line
until the lesson ends:
I must always do what
the sweet side tell me
to do.
Keywords
When you see this key, and a
word in bold, write down the
key word, and its definition
from the PowerPoint into your
student workbook.
Example
Keywords: Special terms relating to the topic.
What we will learn today:
1.
What Britain was like for women at the start of the
20th century.
2.
The restrictions placed on women's lives in society
and at home.
3.
Understand why women started to protest.
The Social and Political position
of Women in 1900.
Social Position:
What women could and could not do within society whether it
be at work, home or in the community. There were restrictions
on women's everyday lives that were not on men's. For
example until 1857, women were not allowed to divorce their
husbands even if they were being subjected to domestic
violence.
Political Position:
This means the right for women to vote. Voting is one way in
which to have your say in the way your country is run and
women were forbidden to vote at parliamentary elections
until 1918 and 1928.
Social, Political, Parliamentary Election
Key Words
Social : includes all aspects of daily life, e.g. work, school,
home and in the community.
Political: the activities involved in running the country, e.g.
The government who have control of the NHS, Schools and
the Police Service.
Parliamentary elections: votes by the general public to
decide who runs the country. e.g. in 2010, the Conservatives
and Liberal Party formed a coalition Government and David
Cameron was made Prime Minister.
Civil Rights
Task One.
THINK: PAIR: SHARE
You have one minute to...
THINK about what this term means on your own, and write
down your ideas in your student workbook.
You have one minute to...
PAIR up and discuss together what you think this term
means and come up with a definition.
SHARE your definitions with the class.
Civil Rights
Collins Dictionary Definition
Personal rights of individual
citizens, of equality in social,
economic and political rights.
Equality: to be treated the same regardless of
age, sex, ethnicity, or sexuality
1900 Views of women
Many in Victorian society believed that men
and women had very different roles.
Separate Spheres
At the start of the 20th century men and women
had very different lives.
Business &
Trade
Politics & Power
Money &
Finance
Law
&Order
Household
Cooking
Cleaning
Care of Children
Women's position in society
Women and Employment
Work opportunities for women were improving at the start of the 20th
century. It was becoming socially acceptable for women to become
nurses, teachers and have jobs in clerical work.
BUT
• Marriage bars in employment meant that once a woman got married
they could not keep their job.
• Limited access to education meant that women's job were often seen
as low skilled and paid less than men even if it was the same job.
• Most working women were poorly paid, and worked in poor conditions.
Women and Marriage Rights
Marriage and Divorce Act, 1857:
A woman could divorce her husband if he beat her or committed adultery.
BUT
• A divorced woman was shunned by society and treated as an outcast.
With these obstacles, many women were forced to stay in unhappy
marriages.
• Divorce was costly and most women could not afford to pay.
• Due to restriction in employment women could not afford to look after their
families without a male breadwinner.
• Women were unlikely to keep their children once divorced.
Women, Property and Education
Married Woman's Property Act 1882:
This law enabled married women to own property and earnings. Before
this date everything a woman owned went to her husband upon marriage.
Education
Women had little access to higher education with only a few universities
allowing women to attend. Most women were therefore not educated past
the age of 11.
A break through in education?
Elizabeth Garrett Anderson became the first lady to qualify as a doctor
(GP).
BUT
She then faced huge obstacles making progress in her profession. Men
would not go to her simply because she was a woman. Women who
needed to see a doctor often stayed with what was known and remained
with their male GP.
Women's position in politics
Women's reform groups
Co-operative Women's Guild 1884
Campaigned for women workers rights, divorce reform and better
schools and pensions.
Ladies Association for the Repeal of the Contagious Diseases Act.
Campaigned for the rights of prostitutes. The police had the power
to force any woman suspected of being a prostitute to have an
examination to see if they were carrying sexually-transmitted
diseases. Men who used prostitutes were not subject to the same
treatment.
• Reform groups were seen as a threat, and unnatural for women
to join and draw attention to themselves publically.
• Many articles were written opposing women's reform groups.
Campaign: A series of co-ordinated activities for some purpose.
Voting Rights
• In 1900 the country was run by men. Women had no say on issues
they felt related to them, such as divorce rights, better working
conditions, and access to education.
• Women wanted the vote to gain more power in society. With the vote
women and men could support the Party which addressed the
issues they wanted changing.
• The Liberal Party was the most likely one to bring in female
suffrage, but they felt that many middle class women would vote for
the Conservative Party.
Liberal Party: One of the political parties in Britain. The party was in
power in 1900 and its leader was Sir Henry Campbell Bannerman.
Primary Source Task
• Get in to groups.
• Each group has to answer the following questions on
the one source in your student workbook:
1)
2)
3)
4)
When was it written?
Who wrote/created the source?
Why was it created/written?
What does it say?
• You will then present your groups answers to the
class.
Suffrage: The right to vote in local and parliamentary elections.
Lesson Pictionary
Parliamentary Elections
1882
Married Women's Property Act
The Liberal Party
Campaign