The English Woman’s Journal (EWJ) was first published in March of 1958. It was started by two middle-class women, Barbara Leigh Smith Bodichon and Bessie Raynor Parkes. Bodichon and Parkes started the journal after the failure of the Married Women’s Property Act to pass parliament. Although the act failed, Bodichon and Parkes started the journal to increase support for women’s issues, create a space for feminist theorizing, and provide a public record detailing feminist activity (Dredge 133).

The EWJ focused heavily on advocating for the expansion of women’s employment opportunities and it advertised existing employment opportunities for women as well (Nestor 96). This is one of the main reasons why they were considered radical. Their suggestions that women can find happiness outside the home and that the ideal Victorian woman included unattainable and absurd standards were very controversial and provoked varied reactions from cultural critics and other publications (Schroeder 4). In addition, the EJW published material about many of the most popular feminist causes at the time, including marriage law reform, higher education for women, and female suffrage (Dredge 135).

The EJW was comprised of a few recurring sections, the “Open Council,” which was a space for reader contributions and information about groups and events, the “Passing Events” section, which includes a variety of news pieces about women and women’s issues, and “Notice of Books,” which showcased reviews of publications both about women’s issues and about other literary pieces. In addition, each issue commonly had a poem and an installment of a story as well (Nestor 98).

Although the EJW never reached much more than 1,000 subscribers and was very low-budget, its publishing is still considered a revolutionary feminist event in Victorian history (Schroeder 13). It was impactful to simply have a female-controlled source of media when most other publications were controlled by men. The EJW remained authentic to its value of appreciating women’s intellectual capabilities, as much of the staff were female, though men were allowed to contribute as well (Schroeder 3). In addition, Parke responded publicly to criticisms of the journal, even though they came from male-dominated publications and she was advised not to by her father. This refusal to back down was an important event in 19^th century feminism (Schroeder 14). In addition, the EJW was able to effectively highlight the importance and power of individual women’s stories. They allowed women who felt invisible, to share details about their domestic life that were often graphic or heavy, and spurred political interests, such as supporting bills related to women’s rights (Dredge 142).

However, there were limitations to the EJW’s feminist resistance. The EJW was made by middle-class women, and catered to middle-class women. This led their feminism to be less radical and more liberal than many other feminist organizations, which sometimes resulted in them supporting the same patriarchal forces that they also argued against, creating a discourse that seemed haphazardly constructed and confusing to some (Dredge 135). However, the ideology of reform, versus radical reconstruction, served to gain the EJW greater social acceptance than many other feminist or Marxist groups at the time (Dredge 134). In addition, the journal sometimes also played into dismissive and harmful stereotypes about women, such as dismissing the intellectual capacity required to write literature, which was thought of as an appropriate activity for women (Nestor 99). It is also important to note that the EJW held the stance that motherhood and family care was a woman’s highest calling, but it didn’t have to be her only calling (Schroeder 4).

The last issue of the EJW was published in 1864. Its publication ended due to not having enough funds and disagreements between the women running the journal. However, in 1865, a woman named Jessie Boucherett started the journal up again under the name Englishwomen’s Review, and the journal had sustained success for decades (Dredge 155).

Works Cited

Dredge, Sarah. “Opportunism and Accommodation: TheEnglish Woman’s Journaland the British Mid-Nineteenth-Century Women’s Movement.” Women's Studies, vol. 34, no. 2, 2005, pp. 133–157., doi:10.1080/00497870590923935.

Nestor, Pauline A. “A New Departure in Women's Publishing: ‘The English Woman's Journal’ and ‘The Victoria Magazine.’” Victorian Periodicals Review, vol. 15, no. 3, 1982, pp. 93–106.

Schroeder, Janice. “On the English Woman’s Journal, 1858-62.” BRANCH: Britain, Representation and Nineteenth-Century History. Ed. Dino Franco Felluga. Extension of Romanticism and Victorianism on the Net. Web.

Image Citation: 

Nineteenth Century Serials Edition, Birkbeck University London, 2018, ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/ewj/issues/fewj_01031858/page/1/articles/ar00102/.