E X P L O R E The role of women in the Enlightenment Enlightenment thinkers defended equality for all human beings and rejected slaver y. However, with a few exceptions, they were not in favour of equality between men and women . Most thinkers agreed that women had to stay at home, governed by their fathers or husbands. It was felt that women only needed the basic instruction necessar y to perform the role of wife and mother. Despite this, many Enlightenment thinkers who did not support equality went to salons (11) that were organised by women such as Madame de Lambert, Madame Geof frin , Madame d 'Épinay and Madame Necker. These were spaces for discussion about politics, literature, finance, philosophy, art, music, science, etc. In these gatherings, women were treated as intellectual equals. The scientific work of Madame du Châtelet (1706 – 1749) Émilie du Châtelet was a mathematician and physicist, and one of the most outstanding women of the Enlightenment. She received an excellent education, which was unusual in her time. In 1737 she wrote Dissertation on the Nature and Propagation of Fire. In 1740 she wrote Foundations of Physics, where she explained concepts of differential calculus. She also translated Isaac Newton's masterpiece, Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy from Latin into French, and wrote a commentary on it. 10. Madame du Châtelet 11. Reading of Voltaire's tragedy The Orphan of China in the salon of Madame Geoffrin, by Lemonnier. (A) Madame Geoffrin. (B) d'Alembert. (C ) Diderot. (D) Bust of Voltaire. (E ) Rousseau. (F ) Montesquieu. (G) Duchess d'Anville. (H) Count of Buffon. (I) Mademoiselle Clairon. (J) Soufflot. A B C D E F G H I J 20
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