Women's Participation In Science Dbq Essay

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During the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, women actively participated in scientific research, translation, and discussion. Since science had been predominantly a male field of study, women were rarely acknowledged by the scientific community. The attitudes and reactions to women participating in the sciences varied from person to person. Some felt that women were capable and should be allowed to participate in science; others thought a woman who participates in science is sacrificing her household deeds. Some thought that science is a man’s field and women should have no place in it.
Many people, including other women thought that women should have no place in the science field. Women’s primary roles were for beauty and household work, not to study science. Samuel Pepys, and English diarist, wrote in 1667 about a time when the Duchess of Newcastle, after much debate, was invited to the Royal Society of Scientists. He says about her, “The Duchess hath been a good, comely woman; but her dress so
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German astronomer, Gottfried Kirch, gives his wife credit in finding a comet that he didn’t see. Gottfried Kirch’s profession as an astronomer, makes this even more valid because he is a scientist himself and he is saying that women are capable of working in the science field (doc 6). Another man who agrees with this idea is Gottfried Leibniz; he says, “I have often thought that women of elevated mind advance knowledge more properly than do men” (doc 7). Johannes Hevelius shows his acceptance towards woman in the sciences in his book The Heavenly Machine. Johannes displays a picture of him and his wife, Elisabetha Hevelius collaborating on astronomical research using a sextant. Obviously Johannes accepts women in the science field because he collaborates with his wife and puts it in his books for the public to see (doc

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