Charlotte Perkins Gilman Quotes on Politics
Charlotte Perkins Gilman brought a sociologist's eye to the politics of gender, and the quotes gathered here present her central argument. Gilman contended that the political subordination of women is rooted in their economic dependence, holding that until economic independence of women is achieved, no other equality can be lasting. She analysed the household itself as an economic institution rather than a private sanctuary, arguing that the home is not a refuge from the economy but the central economic institution disguised as a refuge. She underscored the point with the striking claim that the human is the only animal species in which the female depends on the male for food. Most of these formulations are marked as attributed. Drawn from Women and Economics and her later writing, they present the politics of women's equality as fundamentally a question of economic structure.
Quotes
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Attributed to Charlotte Perkins Gilman:
“Until economic independence of women is achieved, no other equality can be lasting.”
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Attributed to Charlotte Perkins Gilman:
“The home is not a refuge from the economy; it is the central economic institution disguised as a refuge.”
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Attributed to Charlotte Perkins Gilman:
“What we call women's nature is for the most part women's training under economic dependency.”
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Attributed to Charlotte Perkins Gilman:
“We are the only animal species in which the female depends on the male for food.”
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“The latest and highest form of Feminism has great promise for the world. It postulates womanhood free, strong, clean and conscious of its power and duty.”
Feminism" (1908), quoted in Susan Ware, Why They Marched: Untold Stories of the Women Who Fought for the Right to Vote . Harvard University Press , 2019. -
“A million million worlds that move in peace; A million mighty laws that never cease; And one small ant-heap, hidden by small weeds, Rich with eggs, slaves and store of millet-seeds. They sleep beneath the sod And trust in God.”
In this Our World : Poems(1898) | A Common Inference .