Mary Wollstonecraft abolitionism

• Grant number: 24/03359-4
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships abroad - Research
• Start date: September 01, 2024
• End date: February 28, 2025
• Field of knowledge: Humanities - Political Science - Political Theory
• Principal Investigator: Eunice Ostrensky
• Grantee: Eunice Ostrensky
• Host Investigator: Andrew Fitzmaurice
• Host Institution: Faculdade de Filosofia, Letras e Ciências Humanas (FFLCH). Universidade de São Paulo (USP). São Paulo , SP, Brazil
• Institution abroad: Queen Mary University of London, England

Abstract

The project aims to investigate the importance of abolitionist arguments in Mary Wollstonecraft's theoretical work against the backdrop of the debate surrounding the legitimacy of the slave trade between the late 1780s and early 1790s in England. Probably a participant in these debates, Wollstonecraft establishes an equivalence between the political slavery of women and the civil or social slavery suffered by people forcibly transported to the West Indian colonies. This equivalence, however, is quite controversial. On the one hand, some argue that women, unlike enslaved Africans, were guaranteed some civil rights and social protection; on the other hand, some reply that women, like enslaved Africans in the colonies, were considered the property of men and were subject to their arbitrary will. The project suggests that the overlap between political and social slavery is neither paradoxical nor merely metaphorical. It derives from the concept of humanity formulated by Wollstonecraft in response to two distinct adversaries: anti-abolitionists and authors who defended the exclusion of women from the political world. The concept of humanity, in turn, entails that civil and political freedom is conditional on an abstract idea of equality. Furthermore, by reiterating the association between slavery, despotism and tyranny but focusing on the foundations of men's rule over women, Wollstonecraft highlights the dynamics of domination within the social domain.