Women in the Time of the 14 War: A Critical Analysis of the Impact of WWI on Women's Place in Society

Extract

[...] The period retained is 1914-1939: corresponding to the beginning of the first world war to the period of the inter-war period. Finally, the space retained is French society as a whole, it should be noted, however, that the author does not dwell on the situation of women located within the overseas territories, we consider that the space is restricted to metropolitan France metropolitan, Corsica included. Restore the work in the historiography and in the theme of the session Historian, specialist in the issues related to the female condition, Françoise Thébaud is a researcher using a scientific method to feed a social and societal reflection: the place of women within society. [...]

[...] Furthermore, the author relies on drawings, testimonies and postcards to enrich her statements or denounce acts of barbarism such as rapes committed against women during the war. From then on, the criteria retained by the author are above all historical criteria: the issue is to have a corpus sufficient enough to be able to recouper each of the texts and stories established and to verify their accuracy: it is in this sense that, for example, press articles are used: they allow to account for a daily reality. [...]

[...] This current of thought, history of gender, has also been nourished by the work of Joan W Scott through the publication of the article 'Gender: A Useful Category of Historical Analysis' in 1986. From then on, through the author's bibliographical sources as well as other works, we were able to make the link between this work and the restitution of the work within the theme of the session: Actors and Forgotten of History. Indeed, by relying in particular on the work of broken faces as well as the reading of the work of the writer Louis-Ferdinand Céline, Voyage to the End of the Night, we note the importance of other characters who fuel this first world war such as deserters in particular. [...]

[...] Women in the Time of the 14 War - Françoise Thébaud (2013) - Critical Analysis Read the book and define its subject Within the framework of a scientific and critical work, historian Françoise Thébaud questions the influence of the female condition through the prism of the First World War. The central notions of this work, articulated around a historical research, combine the the female condition in the violence of war. In a context marked by the 1914-1918 war, it is the more general period of the IIIème Republic, and its influence on the female condition, especially after the war, which is retained by the historian. [...]

[...] However, difficulties have been noted throughout the reading of the book; it is a very dense and very rich research work that would gain in readability if the author had not wanted to talk about everything. In fact, the author wants to make this book a work accessible to all in telling the facts while maintaining a scientific style. However, the two positions are antagonistic and cannot be carried out properly. From then on, this book is akin to the exegesis of multiple distant and indescribable sources that cannot be understood solely by an informed reader but absolutely not or very little by a novice reader. [...]