This document compares the feminist philosophers Mary Wollstonecraft and Simone de Beauvoir. It notes that Mary Wollstonecraft was an 18th century British writer and philosopher best known for her work A Vindication of the Rights of Woman, in which she argues that women are equal to men but appear inferior due to lack of education. Simone de Beauvoir was a 20th century French writer and existentialist philosopher best known for her 1949 work The Second Sex, a foundational tract of feminism which analyzed women's oppression. Both philosophers believed that social constraints, not nature, placed women in an inferior position and their ideas challenged the common belief of their times that women were inherently inferior.

1. Feminist Philosopher
Comparing Mary
Wollstonecraft
&

2. Mary Wollstonecraft
Mary Wollstonecraft(1759-1797)
was an eighteenth-century British
writer, philosopher, and feminist. During
her brief career, she wrote
novels, treatises, a travel narrative, a
history of the French Revolution, a
conduct book, and a children's book.
Wollstonecraft is best known for A
Vindication of the Rights of Woman
(1792), in which she argues that women
are not naturally inferior to men, but
appear to be only because they lack
education. She suggests that both men
and women should be treated as rational
beings and imagines a social order
founded on reason.

3. Simone de Beauvoir
Simone de Beauvoir (1908 –1986), was a
twentieth century French writer,
intellectual, existentialist philosopher,
political activist, feminist, and social
theorist. While she did not consider herself a
philosopher, Beauvoir had a significant
influence on both feminist existentialism and
feminist theory. Beauvoir wrote novels,
essays, biographies, an autobiography,
monographs on philosophy, politics, and
social issues. She is best known for her
novels, including She Came to Stay and The
Mandarins, as well as her 1949 treatise The
Second Sex, a detailed analysis of women's
oppression and a foundational tract of
contemporary feminism.

4. Similarity:
Mary Wollstonecraft Godwin
and De Beauvoir believed that
it is only tradition and social
constraints that put women in
an inferior position. Many
people at that time accepted
the belief that women were
born inferior. Their ideas
shocked many people but
brought inspiration and hope
to millions of women who
recognized their own lives in
her writing.

5. End : ))))
Prepared By:
Leony G. Daisog
III- H BSE Social Studies