Eugenics in race and state.

International Congress of Eugenics

Date:: 1923

Catalogue details

Licence: Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International (CC BY-NC 4.0)

Credit: Eugenics in race and state. Source: Wellcome Collection.

478/534 (page 462)

462 DISCUSSIONS We need further controlled statistics of that kind, comparing coUege women with the sisters and cousins of the same social scale before we can say that college education is responsible for the low marriage rate among college women. It seems highly probable that in the prosperous middle class from which college women are largely drawn there is a relatively lower marriage rate than in the laboring group or the group of the very rich. College education does for women precisely what college education does for men. It individualizes them. It makes of young women developed individuals looking out into a world of broadening opportunity. Naturally they are going to select from that world the elements which will make for them a satisfying life, not merely in the sense of self- expression but in the finer sense of opportunity to perform socially useful work. It may be that by extolling home economics in colleges, by offering courses in eugenics and in the social history of the family, we may raise the marriage rate among college women. But I doubt whether education can accomplish much by these methods. The low mar¬ riage rate among college women is an index of a deep social movement. We do not know whither it is going. Let me add that I think the speaker was perfectly correct in saying that our present social organization should be more flexible with respect to the needs of the professionally trained married woman who wants part time work or a full day's work outside the home. At present society virtually says to these highly educated women who marry; There is one vocation for you—home-making and child-bearing; while it says to her brother: The whole field of professional opportunity is open to you, nor shall you be denied the joys of marriage and fatherhood in addition. Dr. Robie: I have no quarrel with anything that was said. In fact, I agree witìi everything that was said; but I merely wish to add a coroUary or two. The speaker said: At present, college education for women has a dysgenic influence. Personally, I see no reason for its having such an influence. It is a fact, however, that too little attention is paid to biological science; and that is one of the causes of the failure of the education of women. But I have a special point that I wish to present; and perhaps I can illustrate it by a single case. Within twenty-four hours I have talked with a college woman, forty years of age, who is about to be married. She bemoans the fact that she has never been in love until now. This lady, when she was seven or eight years old, had an experience, which was no fault of hers, with an elderly man, which caused a shock to her system. This was never explained. She never talked this matter out. No one ever talked to her about the fundamental things that we are talking about. This girl was never taught a thing about sex in her childhood, nor during her college course. She grew up with a fear of men. She has had that fear of men till about two years ago, when she obtained some reading along the lines of sex hygiene, and determined for herself the reason for this fear. Now she has fallen in love with a man, and intends to marry him. Her reason for talking with me was to find out whether or not she would be capable of bearing children, at her age. If you put into the curriculum of your women's colleges a course in mental hygiene, involving sex hygiene, it will help a great deal to do away with the reason why a great many college women do not marry. I could give you readily fifty illustrations similar to the above. One reason why coUege women do not marry, and one reason why young men do not want them, is because they have a feeling of fear, self-consciousness, and self-depreciation. They keep aloof from young men, but they must do something; so they develop an interest