Feminists and femininity: A case-study of WSPU propaganda and local response at a Scottish by-election

This article examines the attitudes towards femininity expressed by the WSPU speakers at the 1907 Aberdeen by-election and the response these attitudes elicited from Aberdonians. Although the evidence suggests that a majority of the local population accepted the WSPU's demand for votes (for tax-paying women only) on the grounds of equality, the WSPU felt a need to emphasize the expediency of its proposal. In order to argue that such an extension of the franchise would benefit all women WSPU speakers emphasized the priority of sex over all other social divisions but deliberately accepted the specific differences assumed in popular concepts of ‘femininity’ rather than drawing attention to the male ideology and social institutions in which such definitions originated. Some of the imputed feminine attributes which led Aberdeen men and women of all classes to accept the popular stereotype of domestic woman are examined, as are the difficulties the WSPU encountered because its campaigning activities clashed with its own concept of woman, a difficulty shared by other women's association in Aberdeen.