Margaret Fuller's Concept of Gender in the context of her time

Thesis (M.A.) from the year 2007 in the subject American Studies - Literature grade: 200 University of Göttingen language: English abstract: Let them be sea-captains if you will Margaret Fuller stated in her main workWoman in the Nineteenth Century (Woman 346). Although even nowadays there maybe only few female sea-captains the quoted statement would hardly provoke anyone at least not someone in our contemporary western culture. However when regarded in its historical context two questions arise: Firstly what underlying gender concept encouraged Fuller to make such a statement in a time of excessive gender polarization (Bomarito (vol2) 1) a time in which the ideal of domesticity and Republican Motherhood (Freedman 25) determined the role of woman? And secondly how did antebellum American society react to such statements? The first question will be the main issue of part III the main part of my work. I will begin with Fuller's general gender concept that involves ideas of androgynity and the degendering (Davis 182) of language. Next the major influences on her concept namely those of transcendentalism (with special consideration of Emerson) Goethe Fourier and Swedenborg will be dealt with. Lastly I will consider how Fuller applied her concept to the specific fields outlined in chapter II that is marriage education andeconomy. I will concentrate on her main work Woman in the Nineteenth Centurybecause Fuller describes her gender concept there in most detail whereas her other works such as Summer on the Lakes do not contribute much additional information that is of special significance for the understanding of her gender concept. This is especially true in the case of her Memoirs which was heavily edited and censored by Emerson and others. It rather distorted Fuller's reputation as Urbanski states (5). Therefore I will only occasionally refer to them whenever they provide further information that is relevant to my topic.Regard