It Is High Time for Serious Women

Abstract This article aims to highlight aspects of female emancipation in the Kingdom of Poland in the second half of the nineteenth century that gave this movement a specific, national character. The political and economic consequences of the January Uprising (1863–1864) hit the landed gentry particularly hard. As a result, many gentry women faced the necessity of earning a living and this forced a change in their way of life and aspirations. The traditional model for elite women did not match the economic challenges, and with this in mind, the Polish press, especially magazines for female readers, aimed to create a new model of gentry womanhood. Most periodicals agreed that women's emancipation was on a certain level necessary. But to what extent? This question has been a subject of dispute. Some columnists postulated to limit women's professional aspirations to manual occupations in order to preserve the domain of prestigious intellectual labor exclusively for men. This conservative movement succeeded only partially, with some upper-class women devoting themselves to handicrafts while others, against conservatives’ wishes, graduated from universities abroad and obtained qualifications for performing previously male professions. The majority of these educated women combined paid labor with social work. They were strongly influenced by the promoted ideal of a “new Polish woman” who was to be hard working, constantly improving her mental faculties, and engaging in activities that benefitted Polish society and the nation. This model contributed significantly to the formation of a new generation of distinguished female activists.