I know I may be taking time out of your day but the AP tests are in 2 weeks and I need input from people outside of my school. If you have a spare minute or two it would be great if you could take a look at my essay and correct any errors. ^^
Thanks.
I have not included the documents because that would be the equivalent of typing my essay twice ><, I’m just looking for organizational and rubrical (is that even a word?) errors mainly.
Question: Using the documents, compare and contrast the attitudes of women found in various cultures from about 1800 B.C.E. until the early 200s, C.E. Are there indications of change over time? What kinds of additional documents would be most helpful in furthering your analysis?
[I have not included the documents because that would be the equivalent of typing my essay twice ><, I’m just looking for organizational and rubric errors mainly.]
[[Also, I was kind of confused as to whether it would be better to include Document numbers or not, but I decided not to - there were 5 total (I know there will be more on an actual essay).]]
During the time period of 1800 BC to 200 CE, attitudes toward women gradually improved from property to a mere dispriveleged class. More guidelines emerged for both men and women alike as opposed to earlier times where men were almost always certainly in the right. Both the Bible and the Code of Hammurabi are earlier documents which purport women as mere objects in society, though a failsafe is included with the Code of Hammurabi giving women a chance at moral ascendancy. An excerpt from Ban Zhou's "Lessons for Women" is similar to the Laws of Manu in the Rig Vedas in that more general guidelines are set for men and women holding both genders to somewhat moral standards in their time. In Plutarch's publication of "Women's Life in Greece and Rome", he uses a far less harsh tone, saying that, " ... in a good and wise household ... every activity is carried on by husband and wife in agreement with each other." Accumulations of small victories for women's rights can be seen in this time period.
Striking generalizations about women as unintelligent property of men can be clearly seen in the Bible and the Code of Hammurabi. Women are taken and sent away like baseball cards in the 1960s. Society during this time period makes it almost impossible for the woman to be in the right. Being published during the earlier time periods (1800 BC to 700 CE), discrimination like such is hard to imagine. A respite for women's rights is found in the Code of Hammurabi, however. It allows a women a chance at presenting and winning a case against her husband. An additional private letter from a woman during this time period would greatly assist the mystery of how women felt about limits placed on their lives in a time like this when it was completely acceptable to treat women as nothing more than property.
From 100 BC to 200 CE evidence of improvements in women's lives are seen in The Laws of Many from the Rig Vedas and Lessons for Women by Ban Zhou. In The Laws of Manu a set of guidelines are established regarding limits placed on men and women regarding time away from home, dysfunctional households, and improper behavior such as addiction and drunkenness. Most important is the fact that rules were applied to both women and men. The Laws of Manu are certainly biased given that it was written by men, but they are more fair than earlier writings. Ban Zhou was a female Confucian historian during the reign of Emperor Han Hedi during 100 CE. In that time Ban Zhou published an instruction manual regarding feminine behavior titled Lessons for Women. The writing is still not as fair as people today would like it, given the recurring women serving and men controlling theme, but Zhou does a good job of trying to mediate responsibility between the man and the woman. It is certainly an improvement from earlier time periods where there was less mutual responsibility. Ban Zhou was certainly a female Confucian who was respectively an advocate for family values. Given that she was a female historian under a male emperor may dilute her true feelings about the matter somewhat, but her written words may well express her actual thoughts because of the widely accepted public prejudice, Private accounts from the influentials of both Indian and Chinese cultures would be helpful in determining just how biased the publications of 100 BC to 200 CE really were.
Another later more generalized application of women's roles in society during 242 CE came from Plutarch's "Women's Live in Greece and Rome". Essentially Plutarch equated a good and wise household to one with the husband and wife in agreement, but stressed an everlasting theme that has come to dominate feelings about women for centuries: that women are second to men. Concessions have been made to accommodate the growing dissent of women and how they were treated up to this point, but obviously not enough. Quote, " ... it will still be evident that it is the husband who leads and makes the final choice." Evidently, no landmark achievements were accomplished in the push for gender equality, but nevertheless progress was made. Plutarch is speaking from the perspective of man in Greek and Roman culture, having already accepted the supposed inferiority of women, like so many others. A private diary entry from a woman in Greece and Rome would help to explain how women felt about their rights, as opposed to the constant perspectives of men.
Small but important changes took place from 1800 BC to 200 CE, which saw women accepted as people opposed to property. Slowly but surely, guidelines were put in place to improve the statuses of women in Indian, Chinese, Greek, and Roman culture.