Josephine Butler – författare

Josephine Elizabeth Butler (1828-1906) was a prominent English feminist who was best known for her controversial campaigns concerning the welfare and civil rights of prostitutes. In 1869 she became the leader of the campaign to limit the extension of the Contagious Diseases Acts. These Acts aimed to control the spread of venereal diseases in the armed forces through mandatory internal examinations and imprisonment for women accused of prostitution. Butler's campaign was instrumental in having the Acts repealed in 1886. In this volume of 1871, Butler denounces the Acts for denying accused women their civil rights, and discusses how repeal, together with universal suffrage and constitutional reform, would prevent this situation from recurring. Butler was one of the first feminists to frame her arguments explicitly through female experiences, and this volume illustrates her approach. For more information on this author, see http://orlando.cambridge.org/public/svPeople?person_id=butljo

First published in 1869, this influential volume contains a compilation of essays written by prominent Victorian feminists and their supporters, both men and women, discussing a variety of issues which were considered of importance to the early feminist movement. Edited by campaigner Josephine Butler (1828-1906), the contributions from activists and supporters including Frances Power Cobbe (1822-1904) and Sophia Jex-Blake (1840-1912) challenge the widespread assumption that 'women's sphere is the home', through discussion of the contemporary attitude to and condition of women. Various aspects of the inequality which women experienced, including the need for female suffrage, the ending of women's legal non-existence, and the right of women to access higher education and careers including medicine and science, are explored and advocated, illustrating the central concerns of the early feminist movement and the areas in which the movement had success in later years.

Josephine Butler (1828-1906) was a prominent English feminist who was best known for her controversial campaigns concerning the welfare and civil rights of prostitutes. In 1869 she became the leader of the movement to limit the extension of the Contagious Diseases Acts, and was instrumental in having the Acts repealed in 1886. She later became involved in campaigns to stop child trafficking and child prostitution, which led to the age of consent being raised to 16 from 13 in 1885. This volume, first published in 1893, contains Butler's memoirs of her many campaigns. Focusing on the years 1869-1880, Butler explains the political background to the Contagious Diseases Acts, describes the moral and political opposition to the legislation, explores the ideology of the repeal campaign and describes her role. For more information on this author, see http://orlando.cambridge.org/public/svPeople?person_id=butljo

The Industrial Revolution in Britain from the eighteenth to the nineteenth century had profound effects on social and economic conditions; the working conditions of women were not an exception. Trade for women which had been rather confined to a small area such as nurses or governesses changed and British society began to permit more opportunities for women to take jobs in trades which used to be dominated by male workers. They included not only the manual labour, but also the professions, such as medicine. We often see those women workers in Victorian novels, and authors like Charles Dickens, Elizabeth Gaskell and others treated the issue of the working conditions or vocational education of women as important topics for their works, and the subject is now being widely studied by literary scholars as well as historian on Victorian society.This set of facsimile reprints includes eleven key contemporary publications which cover a wide range of the issues of women and trade in nineteenth-century England from various different perspectives. A pamphlet by Josephine Butler and a collection of essays by Frances Cobb, James Stuart, and George Butler, handbooks and educational books for women looking for jobs, official reports and statistics etc. are collected here, as well as a rare guidebook for young women and men published by The Apprenticeship and Skilled Employment Association in the early twentieth century. All together, it represents a very useful primary source of information for scholars on Victorian social history, culture, and literature.