Abstract
Some scholars have identified a puzzle in the writings of Mary Astell (1666–1731), a deeply religious feminist thinker of the early modern period. On the one hand, Astell strongly urges her fellow women to preserve their independence of judgement from men; yet, on the other, she insists upon those same women maintaining a submissive deference to the Anglican church. These two positions appear to be incompatible. In this paper, I propose a historical-contextualist solution to the puzzle: I argue that the seeming inconsistency can be dispelled through a close examination of (i) the concepts of selfhood and self-government in Anglican women’s devotional texts of the period, and of (ii) the role that these concepts play in Astell’s feminist arguments.
Original language | English |
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Pages (from-to) | 713-730 |
Number of pages | 18 |
Journal | International Journal of Philosophical Studies |
Volume | 27 |
Issue number | 5 |
DOIs | |
Publication status | Published - 2019 |
Keywords
- agency
- Elizabeth Burnet
- feminist theories of autonomy
- Mary Astell
- self-government
- selfhood