Mary Wollstonecraft (1759-1797)

English philosopher. In A Vindication of the Rights of Woman (1792), Wollstonecraft argued that women possess the same rational capacities as men and are therefore entitled to the same rights, especially education. She extended Enlightenment principles to gender, exposing how the supposedly universal language of natural rights was being applied only to men.

Central claim: Natural rights apply equally to women. Denying education to women violates Enlightenment principles.

Why this matters: Wollstonecraft demonstrates that the Enlightenment was internally contradictory. Universalist principles were being violated even by those who proclaimed them. This contradiction will recur throughout the course (abolitionism, women's suffrage, decolonization).