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Entering the Professions: Women Library Educators and the Placement of Female Students, 1887–1912

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 February 2017

Joanne Passet
Joanne Passet*
Affiliation:
Indiana University School of Library and Information Science American Studies and in the Women's Studies Program
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Extract

Turn-of-the-century women, armed with college or professional education, encountered many barriers as they attempted to enter the professions. Although circumstances in such male-dominated areas as science and medicine differed from the feminized fields of nursing and librarianship, some similarities existed. Margaret Rossiter, in Women Scientists in America, revealed that colleges and universities were more willing to educate than employ female scientists and, as a result, women developed several strategies to infiltrate the field. The most successful approach was segregation, both topical (women gained control over such feminine areas as home economics and hygiene/physical education) and hierarchical (women gained employment as lab assistants under male supervision). Medicine, according to Gloria Moldow, provided an even greater challenge to women who wished to become doctors. Although marginal medical schools welcomed them as students, female graduates encountered great difficulties as they sought legitimation from hospitals and professional associations directed by men. Moreover, after 1900, these associations successfully drove the less-orthodox areas of medicine from the profession.

Type
Articles
Information
History of Education Quarterly , Volume 31 , Issue 2 , Summer 1991 , pp. 207 - 228
Copyright
Copyright © 1991 by the History of Education Society 

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