Smoking? Legs apart? Ties? Such an angry, unappealing expression on the face of the woman on the far right of the bottom panel? Obviously a bit tame by standards 106 years later, but the key themes are clearly that traditional women are more attractive, and more productive. So, this first picture is from 1906, and was showing ‘women of the past’ contrasted against ‘what women are becoming’. This group is more famous for its founder Emmeline Pankhurst(and her daughters), and their groups members’ label by the Daily Mail as the Suffragettes.

In 1903, the Women’s Social and Political Union (WSPU) split off in support of more radical action due to the lack of suffragist success. This group was non-militant and utilised pamphlet distribution, talks, and appeals to MPs, without using violence. In 1897, the National Union of Women’s Suffrage Societies ( NUWSS) was founded (from the merger of pre-existing groups), and its members termed Suffragists. Mary Wollstonecraft and John Stuart Mill are important examples – for their works A Vindication of the Rights of Women and The Subjection of Women respectively, written in 17. Important earlier writers and politicians have been retrospectively labelled the forebears of the feminist movement (though to call feminism a single movement was even then, let alone now, rather inaccurate). Feminism is often said to have its early beginnings in the second half of the 19th century, when a fair amount of social and political reform was going on. To my knowledge, all images originate from the UK or the US.Ī little background history first, though. I’ll be organising cartoons chronologically, or making the best guesses I can where I don’t know dates. What is a little more interesting is how the styles and commentary used in the pictures have changed very little. Iron Man – buns of steel, anyone?įeminists however, for longer than the word has been in common parlance, have been the targets of predictable, oppositional lampooning. The poster for the film ‘The Avengers’, as is. This little comparison has been doing the rounds on the internet lately, and it illustrates the point nicely. Betty Boop, Jessica Rabbit, Wonder Woman, the list goes on. When I think of the subjugation of women in this medium, it is often through sexualisation. Smearing of feminism – a history through illustrationsĬartoons have been sources of entertainment, political point-making, and propaganda for centuries.

The subjugation of women 1869