History of the Barbie Doll

George Washington became the first president under the new Constitution on April 30, 1789. Washington gave a speech that day revolutionizing the generation’s principle of tremendous historical importance. Although political harmony was a sought out goal at this time, the 1790’s became known as an “age of passion” because of each party’s uncertainty of the others faithfulness to this new founding nation and with the voice of the people taking it upon themselves to ensure the “survival of American freedom” there would bound to be revolutionizing turn in society. In 1793 and 1794 supporters of the French Revolution, which was a period of social and political upheaval in France that declined monarchies and churches, formed nearly fifty Democratic-Republican societies. The incentive behind these short-lived societies was a stated desire to guard against the government conspiring against the people.

Democratic-Republican Societies were at the heart of debate about the nature of the early American Republic. Members toasted the French Revolution at their meetings, buffed enthusiastically in newspaper articles published in the expanding press, and warmly greeted Citizen Edmund Charles Genet, the French ambassador, when he visited the United States in 1793. The societies also tended to be mistrusting of the second Federalist administration of President George Washington. Many Federalists came to believe that the societies themselves were conspiring to overthrow the government, a theory that was often broadcasted in newspapers. This society insists on the centrality of “free communication of opinions” in preserving American liberty because to debate and possess equal rights the people had to be the voice that formed against the government.

While these societies were going on the rights of women were being brought to surface for the first time. Judith Sargent Murray held many ideas about women’s education that were extremely radical for the late 1700s, and perhaps even for today. She felt that the typical chores of women’s lives did not offer any intellectual stimulation and that if women did not find more uses for their intellect, they would use it for ill purposes. She also believed that the accusation that women were intellectually inferior stemmed not from their natural abilities, but from the way they were raised, as boys were encouraged to learn while girls were neglected.

Unlike many other women, she never taught school nor worked as an educational administrator; instead, she arguably can be termed a pioneering philosopher. Clearly capable of perplexing and original thought, she did not limit herself to educational philosophy, but wrote fluently and wittily on aesthetics, ethics, politics, and more. Murray argued that women would not be neglecting their domestic employments but enhancing themselves with the support of education instead of being denied the knowledge that could flourish their role as a woman.

The inhabitants of the North American colonies did not have a legal right to express opposition to the British government that ruled them. Nonetheless, throughout the late 1700s, these early Americans did voice their discontent with the Crown. These documents are another reminder of the expanding ideas to express freedom by each movement, achievement, and dispute organized and ran by the people and for the people. These documents help represent the common man and woman that are now wanting their voices heard.