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Olympe De Gouges and Charlotte Corday, Play During the French Revolution? by the Way, What Is the French Revolution? to Find Out, Let’S Explore This Digital Book!

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Olympe De Gouges and Charlotte Corday, Play During the French Revolution? by the Way, What Is the French Revolution? to Find Out, Let’S Explore This Digital Book! WOMEN AND THE FRENCH REVOLUTION A feminist overview of the year 1789 Octobre 5 le Versailles à femmes des marche La Unknown, 1789, 1789 July 14th in France is the National Day! On this occasion, let's put women in the spotlight! Do you know what role did women, such as Olympe de Gouges and Charlotte Corday, play during the French Revolution? By the way, what is the French Revolution? To find out, let’s explore this digital book! FOREWORD The purpose of this digital book is not to retranscribe all the facts of the French Revolution, nor to retrace the lives of all the important figures of the period. It is an educational tool, necessarily simplifying, because of its format. It will give you a brief overview of the French Revolution and you will discover some feminist personalities of the period. To make this experience fun and interactive, don't forget to click on the web links: they will redirect you to videos, websites, interviews of historians, writers and specialists! S. G 1 First of all, let's go back to the historical context of the end of the 18th century in France... WHAT HAPPENED WHAT DO THE DURING THE FRENCH FRENCH CELEBRATE REVOLUTION? ON JULY 14? The French Revolution broke out in a The celebration of July 14 is still debated period of social, political and today because it refers both to the evolution economic troubles. It is usually said towards a democratic Republic and to that the French Revolution began with Robespierre's bloody Terror. the opening of the last Estates-General of the Ancien Régime (May 5, 1789) In his article 'Débats Actuels sur la and ended with Napoleon Bonaparte’s Révolution en France' (1990), the French coup d’état (November 9, 1799). historian Maurice Agulhon wrote on the occasion of the bicentenary of the French The French Revolution put an end to Revolution: “En politique, les Français ont the Ancien Régime, by replacing the révélé des penchants opposés et profonds, absolute monarchy with successive héritage d'une division originelle ; c'est de different regimes: first a constitutional façon quasi instinctive que, en fonction de la monarchy, then the First Republic. As culture reçue, les uns se sont trouvés part of the French history, the French favorables au souvenir de la Révolution (ah ! Revolution has always been celebrated la Liberté, la Bastille abattue, les Droits de as a victory of the people over l'Homme...) et les autres hostiles (ah ! la absolutism and arbitrariness and over guillotine, la Terreur...)." (1) unequal society and privileges. In brief, on one hand, the French Revolution Among the key dates of the French originated from the philosophy of the Revolution, one is particularly Enlightenment, whose main idea is rationalist important, both from a historical and and universalist humanism; on the other a symbolic point of view: July 14, hand, the initial liberty of 1789 led to the which became French national day Terror and the civil war between royalists from 1880. Although this date is and federalists four years later. generally associated with the storming of the Bastille (in French For more details on the French Revolution 'Prise de la Bastille') and the popular and its context, watch this video: uprising of July 14, 1789 - 'the https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5fJl_ZX91l0 awakening of freedom', Victor Hugo wrote -, it also refers to the Festival (1) Agulhon, Maurice, 'Débats actuels sur la of Federation (in French 'Fête de la Révolution en France', in. Annales historiques Fédération'), held on July 14, 1790. de la Révolution française, 1990, n° 279, p.1. 2 The Estates-General, the Tennis Court Oath, the Storming of the Bastille... WHAT ARE THE EVENTS THAT LED Musée TO THE STORMING OF THE BASTILLE? 1791-2, (detail), In May 1789, King Louis XVI, with the " hope to resolve the deep agricultural and Oath financial crisis that was paralysing the ourt C country, convened in Versailles the Estates-General, a consultative assembly Tennis of the three estates of the society, namely "The clergy, nobility and commoners. David, On June 20, the 300 representatives of the J.-L. du Louvre,Paris At the same time, the firing of Necker, Third Estate, newly formed National Minister of Finances, and the rumor of an Assembly, claimed their unity and intervention by the royal troops made the legitimacy as lawmakers by proclaiming people convinced to organise the revolution. the Tennis Court Oath (in French, 'Le On July 14 in the morning, a crowd, Serment du jeu de Paume'), which was a composed of craftspersons and commitment to a national constitution and storekeepers, decided to take up arms at representative government. Swearing the Place des Invalides, then take “never to separate [them]selves from the gunpowder in the Bastille Prison. Yet, the National Assembly, and to reassemble prison governor ordered the soldiers to wherever circumstances require until the shoot at the revolutionaries. After one day constitution of the realm is drawn up and of fusillade, the governor was executed and fixed upon solid foundations”, they vowed the garrison surrendered. That is the not to disband until the King had Storming of the Bastille. recognized their sovereignty. Representatives of clergy and nobility Juillet joined the National Assembly a few days 14 arrestation le later. et astille Launay, Becoming one of the most iconic scenes of B la de the French Revolution, represented by the de M. painter J.-L. David, the Tennis Court Oath rise was a revolutionary act and an assertion "P that political authority derived from the uverneur go people rather than from the monarchy. Unknown, du 1789", GrandPalais,Paris 3 ...and the French Revolution's legacy , WHAT HAPPENED 1789" AFTER THE de STORMING OF THE BASTILLE? citoyen du t e One year after the storming of the Bastille, for the Festival of Federation, the l'homme French people, including local federations de of the National Guard that had been created in every province during summer droits des 1789, celebrated the first anniversary of the storming of the Bastille, marking the Republic's adherence to human rights and "Déclaration the rejection of all despotisms. , MuséeCarnavalet,Paris 1 arbier, B With the presence of the royal family, a Le 1789 Mass was celebrated by the bishop Talleyrand, followed by the declaration of The Revolution led to the abolition of the the King's oaths to the Nation and to the broad orders of social hierarchy, to a Law. The Federation Day sealed the greater division of land ownership, the reconciliation between the King and the limitation of the exercise of political power, people, but this reconciliation was of short the rebalancing of relations between duration… As we all know, King Louis XVI church and state and the redefinition of and Marie-Antoinette were guillotined in family structures. In its first article, the 1793, as were the remaining aristocrats in ‘Declaration of the Human and Civic the Terror period. Rights of 26 August 1789’, newly drafted by the National Assembly, lays down that “Men are born and remain free and equal in rights. Social distinctions may be based only on considerations of the common good.” “Men, men, men”: Have we forgotten anyone? Yes: WOMEN! To have an overview of Marie-Antoinette's life, watch the eponymous film (2006), written and directed by Sofia Coppola, with the actress Kristen Dust. Here is the trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yBWyKRoh98U 4 Many scholars, historians, writers and artists have explored the essential yet paradoxical relation between women and the French Revolution WHAT ROLE DID Clyde Marlo Plumauzille, Research WOMEN PLAY IN THE fellow at CNRS and PhD in History at the FRENCH REVOLUTION? Institute of History of the French Revolution, University of Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne, It is true that the first years of the explains in an interview the involvement of French Revolution saw the emergence women, from the storming of the Bastille to of a movement to improve the status of the last days of the Revolution. Women women. But, as we have seen, the played the roles of rioters, 'Tricoteuses', 'Declaration of the Human and Civic polemicists and writers… Yet, the outcomes of Right' concerned only the rights of the revolution are contrasted, including “both men, and women were deprived of exclusion and emancipation”. “In 1791, political rights. Despite that, many of marriage became a civic contract; in 1792, them were educated, involved in the people were allowed to divorce”, Clyde life of the city and participated Marlo Plumauzille explains. Yet, because of actively in the events of the French the progressive radicalisation of women in Revolution. While the revolutionary the French Revolution, men chose to exclude government forbade women to be part them for the political realm. of any political assembly in 1793, Parisian women remained active in the Listen to the interview of Prof. Plumauzille: fight against the Girondins, federalism https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4exrrcu9eG8 and the moderates. They were present in the public assemblies, supporting the 'Sans-culottes' (French revolutionaries) As Sara Melzer and Leslie W. Rabine and the Jacobins. They were wrote in Rebel Daughters. Women and nicknamed the 'Knitters' (in French the French Revolution (1992), “Although 'Les Tricoteuses') because it is said the male leaders of the Revolution depended that they attended the political debates on the women's active militant participation, while working on their sewing. they denied to women the rights they helped to establish. At the same time that women were banned from the political sphere, 'woman' was transformed into an allegorical figure which became the very symbol of (masculine) Liberty and Equality." In this essay, the two authors analyse “how the revolutionary process constructed a new gender system at the foundation of modern liberal culture.” 5 “The French Revolution [...] led some women to lose power and others to hone the skills needed to win social influence.” - J.
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