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François Poulain de la Barre – Bibliography

Primary Material

  • de La Barre, François Poulain. The Equality of the Two Sexes. E. Mellen Press, 1989.
  • Poulain de la Barre, Francois. “On the Education of Ladies.” and Vivien Bosley (transl.), Three Cartesian Feminist Treatises (2002): 139-251
  • de La Barre, François Poulain. Of the excellence of men, against equality of the sexes . Flight. 1. Chez Jean du Puis, 1997
  • Essai des remarques particulieres sur la langue françoise, pour la ville de Geneve (An Essay of detailed comments about the French language, for the city of Geneva), 1691
  • La Doctrine des protestans sur la liberté de lire l’Ecriture Sainte, etc. (Protestant Teaching about Freedom to Read the Holy Scriptures, etc.), 1720

Secondary Sources

  • Whelan, Ruth. “‘Liberating the Bible from Patriarchy:’Poullain de la Barre’s Feminist Hermeneutics.” Judaeo-Christian Intellectual Culture in the Seventeenth Century. Springer, Dordrecht, 1999. 119-143.
    • This paper firstly describes Francois’s arguments for gender equality and the contemporary feminists’ arguments. Then, the author evaluates how feminism at Francois’time was different from contemporary feminism. Modern feminists at the time of Francois were active critics of the gender bias in the politics of knowledge.
  • O’Neill, Eileen. “The Equality of Men and Women.” (2011)
    • This article explores the debate about gender equality during early modern Europe. The author evaluates the work of many prominent feminist, including François Poullain De La Barre, Gabrielle Suchon, and Marie De Gournay. Their arguments ranged from Cartesianism to skepticism.
  • La Vopa, Anthony J. “Sexless minds at work and at play: Poullain de la Barre and the origins of early modern feminism.” Representations 109.1 (2010): 57-94.
    • In this article, Anthony writes how François was different from the other thinkers at his time. Anthony describes François as the “only early modern source that followed the logic of female intellectual equality to its practical conclusion, imagining women as professors at universities, ministers in churches, magistrates in courts, and generals commanding armies”. Later on, Anthony explains how François initiated the social change.

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