Changes in Educational Policies in Britain, 1800-1920: How Gender Inequalities Reshaped the Teaching Profession - Hardcover

"... a magnificent book which presents a convincing argument for how we should understand gender struggles in education in the past, particularly in the teacher unions, and which brings the discussion up to date with reference to present-day concerns." - Prof. Gaby Weiner University of Edinburgh "... one of the most important books to be written in historical and sociological studies of teachers, gender and education in Scotland when compared with England and Wales." - Prof. Richard Finlay University of Strathclyde"

This is the first work to fully examine the comparative history of gender equality during the era of industrial capitalism in England, Wales and Scotland. Historically, education in Scotland lies at the heart of national pride and has been widely acclaimed as a more democratic and meritocratic system in terms of wider access to schools and universities when compared with England. One of the main paradoxes which this book unpacks is that under the Scottish public co-education structure, the treatment of women teachers as an occupational group in relative terms was more ideologically undemocratic and patriarchal in relation to their female counterparts under the English system. This book sets out on a historical journey and embarks on the reconstruction of policy formation on gender and occupational segregation in the elementary (now called primary) school teaching and it shows that there was nothing 'natural' about that process.