The development of the child / by Nathan Oppenheim.

  • Nathan Oppenheim
Date:
1898
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The development of the child / by Nathan Oppenheim. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    285/320 (page 267)
    namentation has been laid against the education of women even more than against that of their brothers and fathers. For years back the charge was made that the main object of their training was decorative. And there is no doubt that the charge was true. Not only were the methods of instruction exceedingly faulty, but also the subjects of instruction were plainly de- signed for the effect it might have upon the estimation in which the girls were held. The main consideration sought was to make them seem educated, refined, endued with the characteristics of the most favorably placed class in the community. Such a class was supposed to be the rich, the leisure class, people who were beyond the need of useful and productive work, who therefore had the opportunity of placing most stress upon the refinements, the luxuries and the unnecessary things in life. The fact that these per- sons were able to buy the services of those who did the common, everyday work of the world placed the latter in a seemingly inferior position. Each person, feeling himself somewhat higher in the scale than those in the class below him, and aiming to equal the circumstances and opportunities of the rank above him, strove to obtain the characteristic marks of supe- riority. These marks were usually evidences of luxury, luxury-fetiches, things which argued the possession of more than what was really essential to life or even comfort.