r
What are the implications when we group societies into hierarchical systems?
Topic 5.9 Society and the Industrial Age
Thematic Focus - Social Interactions and Organization (SIO)
The process by which societies group their members and the norms that govern the interactions between these groups and between individuals influence political, economic, and cultural institutions and organization.
Learning Objective
Explain how industrialization caused change in existing social hierarchies and standards of living.
Historical Developments
New social classes, including the middle class and the industrial working class, developed. While women and often children in working class families typically held wage-earning jobs to supplement their families’ income, middle-class women who did not have the same economic demands to satisfy were increasingly limited to roles in the household or roles focused on child development.
The rapid urbanization that accompanied global capitalism at times led to a variety of challenges, including pollution, poverty, increased crime, public health crises, housing shortages, and insufficient infrastructure to accommodate urban growth.
Reading Questions
instead of questions you will fill out this Graphic Organizer and add it to your binder but there are questions on the Cult of Domesticity at the bottom.
What are the implications when we group societies into hierarchical systems?
Topic 5.9 Society and the Industrial Age
Thematic Focus - Social Interactions and Organization (SIO)
The process by which societies group their members and the norms that govern the interactions between these groups and between individuals influence political, economic, and cultural institutions and organization.
Learning Objective
Explain how industrialization caused change in existing social hierarchies and standards of living.
Historical Developments
New social classes, including the middle class and the industrial working class, developed. While women and often children in working class families typically held wage-earning jobs to supplement their families’ income, middle-class women who did not have the same economic demands to satisfy were increasingly limited to roles in the household or roles focused on child development.
The rapid urbanization that accompanied global capitalism at times led to a variety of challenges, including pollution, poverty, increased crime, public health crises, housing shortages, and insufficient infrastructure to accommodate urban growth.
Reading Questions
instead of questions you will fill out this Graphic Organizer and add it to your binder but there are questions on the Cult of Domesticity at the bottom.
Summary of the impact of the Industrial Revolution
|
Video that shows the terrible jobs given to children in the Industrial Era
|
Introduction
The industrial revolution brought new ways of using energy, increased production in Europe, Japan, the US and other industrialized nations. It also changed the way societies were structured. Large portions of the population shifted from rural areas to urban areas. The size of cities increased rapidly as a result. The power that the landed elite had in in agricultural societies diminished. The role of entrepreneurs and investors increased. The role of women and children saw them in wage earning jobs more than before. Those jobs did not decrease the responsibilities of household chores or child rearing. Industrial Society and rapid urbanization affected each new sector of the society differently.
|
Industrial Society
LANDED ELITE- Individual land owning aristocrats
|
|
UPPER MIDDLE CLASS: Successful industrial entrepreneurs and investors (newest benefited the most from Industrial Rev)
|
|
LOWER MIDDLE CLASS: Industrial management, small business owners, professionals, (New class with some benefits)
- Income & Employment: Men generate moderate wealth through skilled labor (small business owners, doctors, lawyers, teachers, journalists). Women almost never work. A woman’s primary duty was that of homemaker and mother. Women also expected to be the “moral center” of the family, educators of respectability. Middle class families often imitate elite lifestyle.
- Political Influence: Were represented in the Lower House of Parliament (the House of Commons). Most property owning males could vote after reform Act of 1832. Middle class women had no political influence. As is usual throughout history, men assumed a very public role while women were increasingly domesticated.
- Education: Boys and girls attended inexpensive private schools or public schools as they emerged. Boys sometimes continued their education in inexpensive universities to acquire the qualifications needed for professional occupations (lawyers, doctors, etc.).
- Living Conditions: Middle class families lived in large townhouses in the urban centers or in modest homes in the suburbs that developed immediately outside of urban centers. The wealthiest members of the middle class had servants, but most did not. Most owned their homes.
|
WORKING CLASS: unskilled workers in factories (Benefited the leasts)
Working Conditions: Because the majority were unskilled workers, they only received about $8-$10 dollars a week, working at approximately 10 cents an hour. Poor workers were often housed in cramped, grossly inadequate quarters. Working conditions were difficult and exposed employees to many risks and dangers, including cramped work areas with poor ventilation, trauma from machinery, toxic exposures to heavy metals, dust, and solvents. Consequently, progress brought a whole new set of health problems that were widespread in Europe and in America.
The wages were pitiful for everyone but particularly for women and children who were paid 1/3 to half of what a man was paid. Additionally, women often faced sexual harassment and assault and had very little protection. |
Reading Questions
1. What are the four cardinal virtues of The Cult of True Womanhood? How were these values challenged during the 19th century?
2. What are some of the potential political and economic consequences of encouraging women to restrict themselves to the domestic sphere of the home?
1. What are the four cardinal virtues of The Cult of True Womanhood? How were these values challenged during the 19th century?
2. What are some of the potential political and economic consequences of encouraging women to restrict themselves to the domestic sphere of the home?
Cult of Domesticity
|
The 19th Century also saw the rise of the cult of domesticity ideology for women. Middle class women were expected to live up to the ideals created. They were expected to fulfill the Four Cardinal Roles as wives and mothers that included Piety, Purity, Submissiveness, and Domesticity in all their relations. Their domain was caregiving at home. At the same time, the man's domain was as a provider. He was also the more capable as he controlled politics, commerce and all public matters.
|
Thus the Cult of Domesticity took away women’s roles in the public sphere. Some argued that women were biologically inferiority leading to ideas that women were incapable of effectively participating in public service, commerce, or politics. In return for a husband’s protection, the true woman would take on the obligations of housekeeping, raising good children, and making her family’s home a haven of health, happiness, and virtue. All society would benefit from her performance of these sacred domestic duties.
There were some that began to challenge the Cult of Domesticity including Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony. This period of time also saw the rise of feminism and the fight for women's rights including the right to vote. For further info on that go here.
There were some that began to challenge the Cult of Domesticity including Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony. This period of time also saw the rise of feminism and the fight for women's rights including the right to vote. For further info on that go here.
The Cult of Domesticity was baked into the society but it did not apply to all women equally. Middle class women whose husbands made enough money to keep them at home were the only one's restricted to the home sphere. This ideology certainly did not apply to the many enslaved women who worked the cotton and tobacco fields of the South. Nor this this idea apply to working class women in the North. Many had dual roles as providers working in the factories but also had to cook clean and raise children at home. The idea of "True Womanhood" only extended to white women of wealthy households.