Abstract
In the late nineteenth and early twentieth century, a tiny band of girls attempted to gain the same education as their brothers. They sought university education. In storming the barricades of male-only higher education, they not only aroused anxieties and predictions of imminent social collapse, but they changed the nature of girlhood. Throughout the twentieth century, that sturdy band was followed by increasing numbers of aspirants. Higher education became a normal part of growing up, a prelude to employment and independence. Yet in some parts of the world, fear of the changes wrought by educating girls still leads to restriction: Cultural and religious obstacles prevail. In this chapter, I draw out differences in the experience of girls’ higher education in several countries with markedly differing attitudes to women.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Notes
- 1.
Alfred Tennyson, The Princess (London: Edward Moxon, 1847), prologue 1:141.
- 2.
Mary Poovey, Uneven Developments: The Ideological Work of Gender in Mid-Victorian England (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1988); Jeanne Peterson, ‘The Victorian Governess: Status Incongruence in Family and Society’ in Martha Vicinus (ed.), Suffer and Be Still: Women in the Victorian Age (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1972), 3–19.
- 3.
Poovey, Uneven Developments; Peterson, ‘The Victorian Governess.’
- 4.
Peterson, ‘The Victorian Governess’.
- 5.
Poovey, Uneven Developments, 126.
- 6.
Ibid., 127.
- 7.
Queen’s College, London, ‘History’, http://www.qcl.org.uk/about-us/history.php.
- 8.
For a chronology see Carol Dyhouse, No Distinction of Sex? Women in British Universities 1870–1939 (London: UCL Press, 1995), 12.
- 9.
Barbara Miller Solomon, In the Company of Educated Women: A History of Women and Higher Education in America (New Haven, CT and London: Yale University Press, 1985).
- 10.
Carroll Smith-Rosenberg, Disorderly Conduct: Visions of Gender in Victorian America (New York: Oxford University Press, 1985), 252.
- 11.
Cited in Alison Mackinnon, Women, Love and Learning: The Double Bind (Bern: Peter Lang, 2010), 43.
- 12.
Ibid., 42.
- 13.
Jarry Jacobs, ‘Gender Inequality and Higher Education’, Annual Review of Sociology, 22 (1996), 153.
- 14.
Quoted in Solomon, In the Company, 33.
- 15.
Solomon, In the Company; Alison Mackinnon, Love and Freedom: Professional Women and the Reshaping of Personal Life (Cambridge and New York: Cambridge University Press, 1997).
- 16.
Dyhouse, No Distinction of Sex?, 13.
- 17.
Golnar Mehran, ‘“Doing and Undoing Gender”: Female Higher Education in the Islamic Republic of Iran’, International Review of Education, 55 (2009), 541–59.
- 18.
Ibid., 549.
- 19.
Ibid., 544.
- 20.
Ibid., 547.
- 21.
Fariba Sahraei, ‘Iranian University Bans on Women Causes Consternation’, BBC Persian, 22 September 2012, http://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-19665615.
- 22.
Azar Nafisi, Reading Lolita in Tehran: A Memoir in Books (New York: Random House, 2004).
- 23.
Golnar Mehran, ‘A Study of Girls’ Lack of Access to Primary Education in the Islamic Republic of Iran’ in Haideh Moghissi (ed.), Women and Islam: Critical Concepts in Sociology, Vol. 11 Social Conditions, Obstacles and Prospects (New York and London: Routledge, 2005), 263–76.
- 24.
Malala Yousafzai, ‘Diary of a Pakistani Schoolgirl’, BBC News, 19 January 2009, http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/mobile/south_asia/7834402.stm.
- 25.
Christina Lamb and Malala Yousafzai, I Am Malala: The Girl Who Stood Up for Education and Was Shot by the Taliban (New York: Little Brown and Co., 2013).
- 26.
Samira Ibrahim Islam, ‘Saudi Women: Opportunities and Challenges in Science and Technology’, Education Journal, 3, no. 2 (2014), 71–78.
- 27.
Jacobs, ‘Gender Inequality’, 164.
- 28.
Islam, ‘Saudi Women’, 73.
- 29.
Ibid.
- 30.
Ibid., 74.
- 31.
Ibid., 75.
- 32.
Ibid., 76.
- 33.
See also Amani Hamdan, ‘Women and Education in Saudi Arabia: Challenges and Achievements’, International Education Journal, 6, no. 1 (2005), 42–64; Maysa Jalbout, ‘Unlocking the Potential of Educated Arab Women’, Education Plus Development (blog), Brookings Institution, 12 March 2015, https://www.brookings.edu/blog/education-plus-development/2015/03/12/unlocking-the-potential-of-educated-arab-women/.
- 34.
Jalbout, ‘Unlocking the Potential’.
- 35.
Grace Mak, ‘Continuity and Change in Women’s Access to Higher Education in the People’s Republic of China 1930–1980’, in Gail Kelly and Sheila Slaughter (eds), Women’s Higher Education in Comparative Perspective (Dordrecht: Kluwer, 1991), 31–46.
- 36.
Ibid.
- 37.
Ibid.
- 38.
Didi Kirsten Catlow, ‘Women in China Face Rising University Entry Barriers’, The New York Times, 7 October 2012, http://www.nytimes.com/2012/10/08/world/asia/08iht-educlede08.html?_r=0.
- 39.
Ye Liu, ‘China’s One-Child Policy Helped Women Make a Great Leap Forward—So What Now?’, The Conversation, 4 November 2015.
- 40.
Philip G. Altbach, Liz Reisberg and Laura E. Rumbley, Trends in Global Higher Education: Tracking an Academic Revolution. Report Prepared for the UNESCO 2009 World Conference on Higher Education (Paris: UNESCO, 2009), iii.
- 41.
Altbach et al., Trends in Global Higher Education, xix.
- 42.
Emily Cadei, ‘Arab Women: Highly Educated, Underemployed’, Ozy (online magazine), 18 July 2015, http://www.ozy.com/acumen/arab-women-highly-educated-underemployed/41332.
- 43.
Sherry H. Penney, Jennifer Brown and Laura McPhie Oliveria, ‘Numbers Are Not Enough: Women in Higher Education in the 21st Century’, New England Journal of Public Policy, 22, no. 1 (2007), 167–82.
- 44.
Altbach et al., Trends in Global Higher Education, 44.
- 45.
Smith-Rosenberg, Disorderly Conduct, 250.
- 46.
Mackinnon, Love and Freedom; Solomon, In the Company.
- 47.
Smith-Rosenberg, Disorderly Conduct, 281.
- 48.
Ibid.; Mackinnon, Love and Freedom; Alison Mackinnon, ‘Revisiting the Fin de Siѐcle: The Threat of the Educated Woman’ in Alison Mackinnon, Inga Elgqvist-Saltzman and Alison Prentice (eds), Education into the 21st Century: Dangerous Terrain for Women? (London: Falmer, 1998), 8–18.
- 49.
Lily Kuo, ‘China’s Transition’, Quartz, 29 January 2014.
- 50.
See, for example, Teresa Castro Martin, ‘Women’s Education and Fertility: Results from 26 Demographic and Health Surveys’, Studies in Family Planning, 26, no. 4 (1995), 187–202
- 51.
Sawako Shirahase, ‘Women’s Increasing Higher Education and the Declining Fertility Rate in Japan’, Review of Population and Social Policy, 9 (2000), 47–63.
- 52.
Mackinnon, Love and Freedom, 92–100.
- 53.
Øystein Kravdal, ‘The Emergence of a Positive Relation Between Education and Third Birth Rates in Norway with Supportive Evidence from the United States’, Population Studies: A Journal of Demography, 46, no. 3 (1992), 459–75.
- 54.
Mayyada Abu Jaber, ‘Breaking through Glass Doors: A Gender Analysis of Womenomics in the Jordanian National Curriculum’, Working Paper (Washington, DC: Echidna Global Scholars, Brookings Institution, 2014).
- 55.
Solomon, In the Company, 52, cited in Penney et al., ‘Numbers Are Not Enough’, 168.
- 56.
Penney et al., ‘Numbers Are Not Enough’, 169.
- 57.
See for instance Smith-Rosenberg, Disorderly Conduct, 158–265.
- 58.
Stéphan Vincent-Lancrin, ‘The Reversal of Gender Inequalities in Higher Education: An On-going Trend’ in Higher Education to 2030, Volume 1: Demography, ed. OECD (Paris: OECD, 2008), 293.
- 59.
Carole Leathwood and Barbara Read, Gender and the Changing Face of Higher Education: A Feminized Future? (London: Society for Research into Higher Education/Open University Press, 2009).
- 60.
Amy Slater and Marika Tiggemann, ‘Just One Click: A Content Analysis of Advertisements on Teen Web Sites’, Journal of Adolescent Health, 50 (2012), 339–45.
- 61.
Ibid., 344.
- 62.
Sally Mitchell, The New Girl: Girls’ Culture in England 1880–1915 (New York: Columbia University Press, 1995), 25.
Bibliography
Secondary Sources
Altbach, Philip G., Liz Reisberg, and Laura E. Rumbley, Trends in Global Higher Education: Tracking an Academic Revolution. A Report Prepared for the UNESCO 2009 World Conference on Higher Education (Paris: UNESCO, 2009)
Cadei, Emily, ‘Arab Women: Highly Educated, Underemployed’, Ozy (online magazine), 18 July 2015. http://www.ozy.com/acumen/arab-women-highly-educated-underemployed/41332
Catlow, Didi Kirsten, ‘Women in China Face Rising University Entry Barriers’, The New York Times, 7 October 2012. http://www.nytimes.com/2012/10/08/world/asia/08iht-educlede08.html?_r=0
Dyhouse, Carol, No Distinction of Sex? Women in British Universities 1870–1939 (London: UCL Press, 1995)
Hamdan, Amani, ‘Women and Education in Saudi Arabia: Challenges and Achievements’, International Education Journal, 6, no. 1 (2005), 42–64
Islam, Samira Ibrahim, ‘Saudi Women: Opportunities and Challenges in Science and Technology’, Education Journal, 3, no. 2 (2014), 71–78
Jaber, Mayyada Abu, ‘Breaking through Glass Doors: A Gender Analysis of Womenomics in the Jordanian National Curriculum’, Working Paper. Washington, DC: Echidna Global Scholars, Brookings Institution, 2014
Jacobs, Jerry, ‘Gender Inequality and Higher Education’, Annual Review of Sociology, 22 (1996), 153–85
Jalbout, Maysa, ‘Unlocking the Potential of Educated Arab Women’, Education Plus Development (blog), Brookings Institution, 12 March 2015 https://www.brookings.edu/blog/education-plus-development/2015/03/12/unlocking-the-potential-of-educated-arab-women/
Kravdal, Øystein, ‘The Emergence of a Positive Relation Between Education and Third Birth Rates in Norway with Supportive Evidence from the United States’, Population Studies: A Journal of Demography, 46, no. 3 (1992), 459–75
Kuo, Lily, ‘China’s Transition’, Quartz, 29 January 2014
Lamb, Christina and Malala Yousafzai, I Am Malala: The Girl Who Stood Up for Education and Was Shot by the Taliban (New York: Little Brown and Co., 2013)
Leathwood, Carole and Barbara Read, Gender and the Changing Face of Higher Education: A Feminized Future? (London: Society for Research into Higher Education/Open University Press, 2009)
Liu, Ye, ‘China’s One-Child Policy Helped Women Make a Great Leap Forward—So What Now?’ The Conversation, 4 November 2015
Mackinnon, Alison, Love and Freedom: Professional Women and the Reshaping of Personal Life (Cambridge and New York: Cambridge University Press, 1997)
Mackinnon, Alison, ‘Revisiting the Fin de Siѐcle: The Threat of the Educated Woman’ in Alison Mackinnon, Inga Elgqvist-Saltzman and Alison Prentice (eds.), Education into the 21st Century: Dangerous Terrain for Women? (London: Falmer, 1998), 8–18
Mackinnon, Alison, Women, Love and Learning: The Double Bind (Bern: Peter Lang, 2010)
Mak, Grace, ‘Continuity and Change in Women’s Access to Higher Education in the People’s Republic of China 1930–1980’ in Gail Kelly and Sheila Slaughter (eds.), Women’s Higher Education in Comparative Perspective (Dordrecht: Kluwer, 1991), 31–46
Martin, Teresa Castro, ‘Women’s Education and Fertility: Results from 26 Demographic and Health Surveys’, Studies in Family Planning, 26, no. 4 (1995), 187–202
Mehran, Golnar, ‘A Study of Girls’ Lack of Access to Primary Education in the Islamic Republic of Iran’ in Haideh Moghissi (ed.), Women and Islam: Critical Concepts in Sociology, Vol. 11 Social Conditions, Obstacles and Prospects. (New York and London: Routledge, 2005), 263–76
Mehran, Golnar, ‘“Doing and Undoing Gender”: Female Higher Education in the Islamic Republic of Iran’, International Review of Education, 55 (2009), 541–59
Mitchell, Sally, The New Girl: Girls’ Culture in England 1880–1915 (New York: Columbia University Press, 1995)
Nafisi, Azar, Reading Lolita in Tehran: A Memoir in Books (New York: Random House, 2004)
Penney, Sherry H., Jennifer Brown, and Laura McPhie Oliveria, ‘Numbers are Not Enough: Women in Higher Education in the 21st Century’, New England Journal of Public Policy, 22, no. 1 (2007), 167–82
Peterson, Jeanne, ‘The Victorian Governess: Status Incongruence in Family and Society’ in Martha Vicinus (ed.), Suffer and Be Still: Women in the Victorian Age, (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1972), 3–19
Poovey, Mary, Uneven Developments: The Ideological Work of Gender in Mid-Victorian England (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1988)
Queen’s College, London, ‘History’. http://www.qcl.org.uk/about-us/history.php
Sahraei, Fariba, ‘Iranian University Bans on Women Causes Consternation’, BBC Persian, 22 September 2012. http://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-19665615
Shirahase, Sawako, ‘Women’s Increasing Higher Education and the Declining Fertility Rate in Japan’, Review of Population and Social Policy, 9 (2000), 47–63
Slater, Amy, and Marika Tiggemann, ‘Just One Click: A Content Analysis of Advertisements on Teen Web Sites’, Journal of Adolescent Health, 50 (2012), 339–45
Smith-Rosenberg, Carroll, Disorderly Conduct: Visions of Gender in Victorian America (New York: Oxford University Press, 1985)
Solomon, Barbara Miller, In the Company of Educated Women: A History of Women and Higher Education in America (New Haven, CT and London: Yale University Press, 1985)
Tennyson, Alfred, The Princess (London: Edward Moxon, 1847)
Vincent-Lancrin, Stéphan, ‘The Reversal of Gender Inequalities in Higher Education: An On-going Trend’, Higher Education to 2030, Volume 1: Demography. Edited by OECD, 265–98 (Paris: OECD, 2008)
Yousafzai, Malala, ‘Diary of a Pakistani Schoolgirl’, BBC News, 19 January 2009. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/mobile/south_asia/7834402.stm
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2018 The Author(s)
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Mackinnon, A. (2018). ‘And Sweet Girl-Graduates’? From Girl to Woman Through Higher Education. In: O'Dowd, M., Purvis, J. (eds) A History of the Girl. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-69278-4_11
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-69278-4_11
Published:
Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, Cham
Print ISBN: 978-3-319-69277-7
Online ISBN: 978-3-319-69278-4
eBook Packages: HistoryHistory (R0)