Justin Piteleski

3/26/05

History 100

Stereotypes Diminishing

Stereotyping is something that is so critical for defining historical patterns. A person releases judgement onto another by their attention to reoccuring traits over time, which tries to help someone measure the characteristics of a certain kind of human being. Unfortunately sterotypes are a key to falsified judgement. There are infinite examples of stereotyping that are used in our everyday world. One huge example of that is how we stereotype genders, and one of the most classified of the two are females. History has shown that we have underestimated the abilities of our females in this world by false judgement dating back to the start of Western Civilization, and therefore, women for the longest time have had to struggle, leaving them to have to keep pressing for equality in a world that is slowly understanding their importance. By looking back to the early progression of Western Civilization we can easily see that even with the limited opportunities that they had, women were already moving towards change.

A strong family is bound by a strong woman, and in the start of Western Civilization, dating back to the Hellenistic time period, it took great requirements in order for a female to do so. They were married at very young ages in order to carry out a larger family with more time for multiple pregnancies. These occuring at ages that we couldn't imagine even today, starting with early teenagers. This meant that a woman had to go through a quick change to maturity at a very young age. When the thought of giving birth arose, women were also looked upon to be pure. Purity was an idealogical trait for a woman back then, because it was thought that a purer woman would give birth to finer children. 1. "Aptitude for bearing and giving birth to many fine children." Leon Battista Alberti said this in On the Family. Also back in those times, it was a great deal of risk for a women to even have children as 10% of females in that time period died giving birth.

Loyalty to the husband was also an important factor. Women's loyalty was highly regarded by men in order for choosing a spouse. 2. As this quote explains from The Secret History by Procopius of Caesareas.' "Putting her whole body at his disposal." Throughout this time period we see the importance of this as we study some of the different ages. An example of this is the Franks, who for the crime of adultery a woman was either strangled or burned alive as a consequence. Loyalty continued throughout even more through this early period. Another strong example through text is, 3. The Funeral Eulogy of Turia, where a man reflects many of the noble things that his wife was willing to do for him, including proposing to letting him have children with another woman to fulfill his name, helping him politcally when he was brought into exile, and as explained in his words, helped him make many life altering decisions. With this loyalty given, was loyalty earned as well, and through the eulogy is prime evidence that the men during these periods were very grateful for the love of their spouses.

When one tries to put a label on women we put them directly in the household, and on this so common label we disembody the importance of this. Women who lived from the Hellenistic age onto the French Revolution were still the core of a functionable household. A women's priority was to protect the dwellings where families resided everyday. The female gender has been trying to get out of this role recently, and move themselves into the economic equality that we need to keep improving upon even today. However throughout the Antiquity to the Renaissance, sociable traits have shown that work for women was to stay in the home, and was taken very seriously. As time goes on throughout this time period we notice that this does not change, but women through their strengths that people had witnessed, were granted privilages surrounding the home. Such as, owning land, selling land, trading land, and even loaning land. 2. "He should act as do wiseheads of families before they acquire some property." Leon Battista Alberti said this in On the Family.

Even through this time of change when Western Civilization was uprising through the time periods of The Antiquity to the Renaissance, changes started occuring for women, as they are now rapidly doing in our modern era. They were starting to get a hold of the social structure of their time. They were able to enter themselves into politics, despite by the relation of the husband. They were also paving marks economically as well, as their ownership of land was improving, and they were given jobs working in fields, and they were able to participate in management along the economic front. Along with working, women found themselves finally starting to recieve an education, although it wasn't as good as an education for a male, it was still a foundation of what was to become. These new opportunities were some of the original stepping stones for womens liberation.

Even at the present time, women don't receive the outright respect that they deserve. Hopefully history has proved that stereotyping is only a mere myth for women as they are bending what people come to believe as impossibilities at every opportunity. As we look back at early Western Civilization, it should be common knowledge that at the boundaries that women already had to go through then, they have the capabilities even now to keep improving, going from having little or no impact in society, from being the cornerstone of much of the greatness which makes our world possible.