Margaret Fuller and the Liberal Arts

Once upon a time back in the day, I asked my mom why it was OK for me -- or any woman -- to go to college. This, you must understand, was a very serious question -- we were close friends with a family who didn't believe in sending their girls to college, and there is a whole Christian homeschool sub-subculture out there that agrees with them. (There is also a more mild sub-subculture that thinks college is OK as long as the girl is still living at home, and an even more liberal variant that thinks it's OK as long as the college is very near by).

I rather wanted to go to college, wanted to go to one that would probably end up being a good distance from home, and desperately hoped there was some solid Christian, biblical reasons for doing so.

I asked several people the question, "why is it OK for women to go to college?" And received in every instance one of the following answers:

• "A woman is supposed to be a helper to her husband. And one can be a better helper by having a higher level of education, closer matching to the husband's" (This was my mom's answer, and the one I took the most seriously at the time)
  
• "What if the husband dies? A woman needs some practical means of supporting herself and her family if worse comes to worse."
  
• "One is better prepared to make and enrich a home if one has an education. People who try to force a dichotomy between "learning to be a homemaker" and "pursuing an education" are wrong."

I wasn't entirely convinced, but for better or for worse, I bought the arguments, and went to college.

Where, in my junior year, I took Artes Liberales -- a study of how different historical periods have defined a "liberal arts education," and a discussion of what a "liberal arts education" should consist of and aim towards.

One of the main themes of the class was the distinction between a liberal arts education as a "means" and an education as an "end in itself." A basic conclusion of the class was that, yes, a liberal education is useful for many, many things. But that shouldn't be the main reason one pursues that education. The main reason to pursue it is that human beings were created by God with an intellect that can apprehend reality, and a desire use that intellect to understand reality. Developing these faculties is a part of fulfilling what God designed us to be -- part of fulfilling our telos as human beings. Though the hows and whys are subject matter for another post, I ultimately came to agree with this position (at least so long as it always includes the words "part of" when discussing telos and fulfilling).

Jumping further ahead: This semester, we had to read a portion of Margaret Fuller's Woman in the Nineteenth Century for American Intellectual History. And I was rather surprised -- and a bit delighted -- to find in her writing echoes of Dr. Whalen's argument for a liberal arts education. Moreover, she applied them specifically to the question of why women should pursue higher education -- a question I still had not managed to resolve in my own mind:

So much is said of women being better educated that they may be better companions and mothers of men! They should be fit for such companionship, and we have mentioned with satisfaction instances where it has been established. Earth knows no fairer, holier relation than that of a mother. But a being of infinite scope must not be treated with an exclusive view to any one relation. Give the soul free course, let the organization be freely developed, and the being will be fit for any and every relation to which it may be called. The intellect, no more than the sense of hearing, is to be cultivated merely that Woman may be a more valuable companion to Man, but because the Power who gave a power, by its mere existence signifies that it must be brought out toward perfection.

It's unfortunately a rather convoluted quote -- Fuller wasn't known for her scintillating prose. Rephrased a bit better: "A woman's intellect is no more to be cultivated to make her a more valuable companion to man than is her sense of hearing. Both are to be cultivated primarily because the Power who gave that power desires His gift to be brought to perfection."

And this is now the answer I'd give if someone asked me why women should be able to attend college (especially a liberal arts college). It's not, at root, for the end of "better helping one's husband" or even "making a better home" -- it's because God created us as beings with the capacity and desire to understand reality, and that capacity ought to be developed, both for its own sake and to prepare us for ANY role we undertake later in life. I can see the value of the other arguments people offered me; practical considerations about specific later roles in life do have a place. Indeed, most men are told to go to college for similarly utilitarian reasons. (E.g. -- "You will need to support a family later on." "You will be a more competent intellectual and spiritual leader of your household with an education.")

But, at root? I'm with the strange bedfellows of Dr. Whalen and Margaret Fuller.

Hair

I hate having long hair. I know it's a woman's glory and all that. And that, according to Rachel S., long and unbound hair is (right after blue-jeans) one of the biggest turn-ons to the opposite sex.

But I do hate it. Especially right now in this medium inbetween stage, where the layers are growing out. It pulls down flat. It clings itches the back of the neck. It looks like a freakin' mullet. I want to take scissors and chop it all off in one fell swoop. Except that that wouldn't look so good, either -- the hairdressers all agree I need a layered cut to have a decently framed face, and my own experience confirms this).

Then there's the psychological impact of the whole mess. Aside from being damnedly uncomfortable, long hair says, "young and girly!" It makes me feel 14. And probably like a homeschooler, too. You notice how so many of the girls who graduated last semester got short haircuts? It's POWER, I tell you! I want my old haircut back, the clipped and layered one that makes me feel 22 and sharp and professional. :(

But keeping up a decent short haircut takes money, which I really don't have. So I'm bobby-pinning and headband-scarfing and clipping this whole mess into order as best I can, and hoping it gets a bit more manageable as it gets longer.

Hair, hair, and more hair...yay.

Women in the Church

Some additional thoughts concerning this point from my last post:

We need the strengths of women just as much as we need the strengths of men. When women's strengths -- such as dialog, communication, bridge-building, hospitality -- aren't seen as necessary and valuable to the life of the church, and given freedom to be exercised -- the church suffers.

If men and women really are different, then the tendencies of women have an important "fleshing out" role to play in the life of the church. Our proclivities for dialog, communication, bridge-building, hospitality aren't things to be afraid of and corralled into narrow limits, but important balancing factors to men's proclivities for confrontation, wall-building, aggression. I don't mind at all calls for the "masculinization": of the church - but people seem to forget in the mix that, just because the church needs a strong masculine element, this doesn't mean it doesn't need a strong feminine element as well. That the absence of "feminization" is just as much a problem as the absence of "masculinization." I have problems when "masculine" elements are associated with "good", and "feminine" with "bad." I have problems with it being fine and good for the life of the church when men are men -- but bad and damaging to the life of the church when women are women.

When our tendencies aren't valued, we have to become like men to get heard. And that's just not good for anyone.

It's much like John Henry Newman's view of education and reality. If we only get the ethicist's + chemist's perspectives on reality, we get a skewed and incomplete picture of the world. We need all disciplines and "ways of knowing" to contribute to the image. Likewise...if there really is a root difference between men and women, and if we only get the perspective of men on things, we've got a skewed and incomplete picture of reality. If men and women ARE truly different in how they approach and understand and value things in life -- and if those "ways of knowing" are indeed both necessary and important (equal, even?) -- if it is "not good that man should be alone" -- then kicking out (or treating as second-rate) what the women have to say on things gives us only a partial picture that will be eventually disastrous.

I just want my work to be seen as valuable and important, not dangerous. I want my proclivities for dialog, communication, bridge-building, and hospitality to be respected and valued as necessary aspects of the life of the church, in a necessary tension with more "masculine" proclivities. I damn well WANT to be a woman - but it's rather difficult when everything feminine and womanly is looked upon with suspicion as "unchristian" and "syncretic" and "weakening to the doctrine and life of the church." It's very difficult when, in one's life and theology, one has to act like a man to be seen as a true Christian, a defender of the faith, and "like Christ."

Of course we need aggression and defense and firm-standing and who knows what else. But give those free reign unchecked and unbalanced, an you'll have problems.

Women

So. I've been thinking a lot about the "role of women in the church." Partly because my friend Alisa is writing her honors thesis in defense of evangelical feminism and egalitarianism. Partly because I've heard about 50 gazillion sermons on Tutus 2, I Timothy 3, and Ephesians 5, all of them from a complementarian persepctive. Partly because I wonder from time to time whether God is angry at me for going to college. Partly because I have no freaking CLUE what it looks like to be an academically inclined Christian woman.

And mostly because I think there must be a resolution to all this that is true and good and beautiful, and doesn't do violence to revelation. Or experience or reason. :P

There's several ways I've come to resolve the matter in my own mind. Probably not entirely right or complete, in any way -- but I do believe they ring a bit truer than most of the flack flying around in these debates.

Important point #1: Men are women image the relationship between Christ and the church. The relationship between husband and wife was put in place by God in large part to provide a visible image of this deeper reality. Maybe I'm just crazy, but this rationale for gender roles strikes me as deeply beautiful, and though I may chafe sometimes at some of the implications, I can live quite happily with it.

Important point #2: We need the strengths of women just as much as we need the strengths of men. When women's strengths -- such as dialog, communication, bridge-building, hospitality -- aren't seen as necessary and valuable to the life of the church, and given freedom to be exercised -- the church suffers.

Important point #3: God is on the side of the weak and the oppressed and the helpless. Which is where a lot of women throughout a lot of history have found themselves.

Important point #4: The current era really is a "new day" for women. We have areas of life and work and study open to us that we never had before. We have the opportunity to do things unthinkable before. And we also have few guides or role models for what it looks like to do these things qua "women."

I DO think a woman will -- or ought to be -- an academic, a manager, a scientist, even, in a different way than a man. I don't know what it looks like. I'm hoping that in 500 years, maybe we'll get some idea. Especially of which parts of how those things are studied and pursued are fundamentally necessary to do the discipline well...and which parts are distinctly suited to more "male" tendencies and "ways of knowing." Which parts are up for debate, and which parts have to stay fundamentally the same.

These four points aren't fully developed by any stretch of the imagination. But, needing some guideposts to steer by in this mess, they're what I've currently ended up with. More on them later, I suppose, as I keep working with them in the back of my mind.