This book offers a spatial history of the decades in which women entered the universities as students for the first time. Through focusing on several different types of spaces – such as learning spaces, leisure spaces, and commuting spaces – it argues that the nuances and realities of everyday life for both men and women students during this period can be found in the physical environments in which this education took place, as declaring women eligible for admittance and degrees did not automatically usher in coeducation on equal terms. It posits that the intersection of gender and space played an integral role in shaping the physical and social landscape of higher education in England and Wales in the late-nineteenth and early-twentieth centuries, whether explicitly – as epitomised by the building of single-sex colleges – or implicitly, through assumed behavioural norms and practices.
Author(s): Georgia Oman
Series: Genders and Sexualities in History
Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan
Year: 2023
Language: English
Pages: 266
City: London
Series Editors Preface
Acknowledgements
Contents
Chapter 1: Introduction
Chapter 2: The Campus Ideal
Religion and the Middle Class
Regional Pride and the ‘Local’ University
Early Foundations and the Desire to Build
The Urban/Rural Divide and the Idea of the Campus
Oxbridge Influence and Rebellion
Conclusion
Chapter 3: The Question of Residence
The Rise of the Non-residential University
Women Students and Residence
Living in Lodgings
Residence to Non-residence and Back Again
Conclusion
Chapter 4: Class, Commuting, and the City
The City and the Suburbs
Women in the City
Class and Respectability
Temporality
Conclusion
Chapter 5: Libraries, Laboratories, and Learning Spaces
Lecture Theatres and Classrooms
Teaching Provision
Laboratories
Libraries
Conclusion
Chapter 6: Sport, Soirées, and Social Spaces
Collegiate Life and Athletic Spaces
Women’s Health and Sporting Spaces
Socialisation and Dances
Common Rooms
Conclusion
Chapter 7: Unions, Guilds, and Extra-Curricular Spaces
Students’ Unions
Debating
Student Government
The Suffrage Question
Networks of Educated Women
Conclusion
Chapter 8: Conclusion
Primary Manuscript Sources
Bibliography
Primary Printed Sources
Secondary Sources
Index
