Female education is a catch-all term for a complex of issues and debates surrounding education (primary education, secondary education, tertiary education and health education in particular) for females. It includes areas of gender equality and access to education, and its connection to the alleviation of poverty. Also involved are the issues ofsingle-sex education and religious education, in that the division of education alonggender lines, and religious teachings on education, have been traditionally dominant, and are still highly relevant in contemporary discussion of female education as a global consideration.
While the feminist movement has certainly promoted the importance of the issues attached to female education, discussion is wide-ranging and by no means confined to narrow terms of reference: it includes for example AIDS.[1] Universal education, meaning state-provided primary and secondary education independent of gender, is not yet a global norm, even if it is assumed in most developed countries.
Islamic history
Women in Islam played an important role in the foundations of many Islamic educational institutions, such as Fatima al-Fihri's founding of the University of Al Karaouine in 859. This continued through to the Ayyubid dynasty in the 12th and 13th centuries, when 160 mosques and madrasahs were established in Damascus, 26 of which were funded by women through the Waqf (charitable trust ortrust law) system. Half of all the royal patrons for these institutions were also women.[2]
According to the Sunni scholar Ibn Asakir in the 12th century, there were opportunities for female education in the medieval Islamic world, writing that women should study, earn ijazahs (academic degrees), and qualify as scholars and teachers. This was especially the case for learned and scholarly families, who wanted to ensure the highest possible education for both their sons and daughters.[3] Ibn Asakir had himself studied under 80 different female teachers in his time. Female education in the Islamic world was inspired by Muhammad's wives: Khadijah, a successful businesswoman, and Aisha, a renowned hadith scholar and military leader. According to a hadithattributed to Muhammad, he praised the women of Medina because of their desire for religious knowledge:[4]
"How splendid were the women of the ansar; shame did not prevent them from becoming learned in the faith."
While it was not common for women to enroll as students in formal classes, it was common for women to attend informal lectures and study sessions at mosques, madrasahs and other public places. While there were no legal restrictions on female education, some men did not approve of this practice, such as Muhammad ibn al-Hajj (d. 1336) who was appalled at the behaviour of some women who informally audited lectures in his time:[5]
[edit]European history
[edit]Medieval period
In medieval Europe, education for girls and women was at best patchy, and was controversial in the light of pronouncements of some religious authorities.[6] Shulamith Shahar writes,[7] of the situation in the nobility, that Among girls there was an almost direct transition from childhood to marriage, with all it entails.
Education was also seen as stratified in the way that society itself was: in authors such as Vincent of Beauvais, the emphasis is on educating the daughters of the nobility for their social position to come.
Educational opportunities for women were poor. Girls were only allowed to receive elementary instruction from their mothers, while boys could go off to be tutored, go to church-run schools, or join a guild or burger school to learn an occupation. Mostly the only schools for girls were associated with convents. However some aristocratic women were educated in palace schools during the age of chivalry in household duties, good manners, music, and conversation. In medieval Frankish society, however, women were given a more equal education and the education of the average lay women was comparable to that of her husband.[citation needed]
The majority of the most educated women in the middle ages were nuns. The nuns ran convent schools where they taught young girls chants and singing as well as reading and writing; and domestic arts like cooking, weaving, and spinning wool. One of the most notable educated nuns of the middle ages was Hildegard of Bingen (1098–1179), who given permission by the pope to preach and write books on theology.[citation needed]
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