Defined by the men in their lives, women in ancient Rome were valued mainly as wives and mothers. Although some were allowed more freedom than others, there was always a limit, even for the daughter of an emperor. (PBS)

Pre-contact Hawaiians lived their lives according to a strictly enforced system of responsibility and duty, regulation, restriction, and resource management called kapu.

In precontact Hawai’i, the majority of women were not chiefly, but commoners, the maka’āinana, literally the people that attend the land.

Women lived and worked in their own domains and labored at traditional tasks suited to their own domestic requirements, weaving mats, beating kapa for clothing, twisting cordage for nets, fishing and collecting food.

The women’s domestic labor produced finished mats, and yards of kapa cloth, necessary contributions towards maintaining their place on the land in a reciprocal arrangement between their family household and the chiefly land managers.  (Connors)

Pukui and Handy note, “The division of labor in the kauhale was very definite in old Hawaiian times. Under the system of strict kapu where the sanctity of the male was concerned, it was necessary that men of the household be guarded against contamination of their food and working gear by women, who were periodically ‘unclean.’”

“Hence, the production and preparation of food devolved upon men (as did likewise the offerings to the family gods in the mua), not upon women as later came to be the custom after the formal overthrow of the old religious system.”

“This basic principle led to an infinitude of restrictions upon what could or could not be done by whom, in connection with the simplest activities of daily living.”  (Pukui and Handy)

As noted in an article by U’ilani Dasalla, The Mana Wahine of Hawai’i:

“It was a religious law called ‘aikapu that then separated male and females from eating with one another.”

“Males became la’a [sacred] and females were haumia [defiling] because of menstruation.”

“The Kahuna also decided that there should be four nights of worship dedicated to the four major gods, Kāne, Lono, Kū, and Kanaloa, all of whom were male.  On these nights, men could not sleep with women.”

“Furthermore, ancient Hawai’i had many other rules that separated men and women. Not only were they eating separately, but their food was even cooked in a different imu.”

“Additionally, women could only eat certain foods. It was kapu to consume pork, banana, coconut, and certain types of fish.”

“If a woman was found in her husband’s sanctuary or at another man’s eating house, she suffered the death penalty. However, a husband could enter his wife’s eating house with no penalty.”

“This shows the status that men held over women. Although there were eating taboos, the family did have a house in which, if not eating or worshipping, they could interact freely with each other.”

“Women did stay in different housing while menstruating, called the hale pe’a. Men thought women were dirty because of menstruation, so it became kapu to sleep in the same hale [house] during her monthly cycle.”

“Additionally, it was recognized that their society was dominated by males, in both the ‘akua [gods] and the kanaka realm.”

“Men were considered very sacred and, as mentioned previously, even the four primary gods are male. Although there was much segregation overall and the gods were all male, women were allowed to participate in religion and worship, giving them a bit of autonomy.”

“However, many rules applied to women and breaking any of the kapu was punishable by death.”  (Dasalla)

Malo affirms this when he said, “During the days of religious tabu, when the gods were specially worshipped, many women were put to death by reason of infraction of some tabu.”

“According to the tabu a woman must live entirely apart from her husband, during the period of her infirmity; she always ate in her own house, and the man ate in the house called mua.”

“As a result of this custom, the mutual love of the man and his wife was not kept warm; the man might use the opportunity to associate with another woman, likewise the woman with another man.”

“It has not been stated who was the author of this tabu that prohibited the mingling of the sexes while partaking of food. It was no doubt a very ancient practice; possibly it dates from the time of Wakea; but it may be subsequent to that.” (Malo)

“The house in which the men ate was called the mua; the sanctuary where they worshipped was called heiau, and it was a very tabu place. The house in which the women ate was called the hale ai’na. These houses were the ones to which the restrictions and tabu applied, but in the common dwelling house, hale noa, the man and his wife met freely together.”

“The house in which the wife and husband slept together was also called hale-moe. It was there they met and lived and worked together and associated with their children.”

“The man, however, was permitted to enter his wife’s eating house, but the woman was forbidden to enter her husband’s mua.”  (Malo)

History of Gender and Education on the Continent

There was nothing unique about segregating the sexes in the American schools on the continent.

Hamilton University provides an excellent historical perspective in their syllabus for a class, Government 375: Educational Reform and Ideology, that highlights the historical context of gender segregation in education in the US,

“Early education in the American colonies had a religious purpose. Schools existed to train boys to be clergymen. Consequently, the education of women was not a priority.”

“Most colonial town schools did not admit women until the nineteenth century, although Boston public schools admitted some girls in 1789. When girls were finally permitted to attend town schools, they attended at different times of the day than boys.”

“The rise of the common school, with tax supported, free, compulsory education for all, occurred in the early nineteenth century. Both boys and girls had the opportunity to attend the common school.”

“Although these schools were coeducational in name, segregation by sex was de facto: girls and boys entered through separate doors, went to different sides of the building, and often learned only from instructors of the same sex.”

“True coeducation with social and recreational interaction between boys and girls existed only in those communities that could not afford to house students separately. Most towns could not afford to build and support one school for boys and one for girls, thus coeducation began to develop.”

“The first coeducational high school opened in Lowell, Massachusetts in 1840. Up until the Civil War, the spread of coeducational high schools was slow.”

“At the end of the nineteenth century, girls had the opportunity to attend public elementary schools, most of which were coeducational. Some, however, remained segregated by sex.”

“By 1882, 90 percent of urban high schools claimed to be coeducational. At this time, wealthy families often chose to send their children to single-sex religious and private schools.”

“Occurring simultaneously with the development of the public high school was the academy movement, which proposed to teach students more classical and fewer practical subjects. The academy movement significantly impacted the development of higher education for women.”

“The curriculum grew to include teacher training programs along with such courses as chemistry and languages. These academies became firmly associated with women and gradually began to refer to themselves as ‘colleges.’ Georgia Female College was the first to do so in 1836.”

“While women’s colleges received renewed support following the Civil War, men’s colleges were also growing in stature and number. For financial reasons, colleges in the west were mostly coeducational, while colleges in the east could afford to remain single-sex.”

“In 1837, Oberlin became the first coeducational college. At the turn of the century, coeducation began its sharp rise. By 1900, 98 percent of public high schools were coeducational, and by 1910, 58 percent of colleges and universities were coeducational.”

“In the 1960s, approximately 62 percent of non-religious independent schools were single-sex. Originally, 100 percent of Catholic schools were single-sex; now almost 60 percent are coeducational. There were almost 300 single-sex colleges and universities in the 1960s.”

“In one six month period in 1968, almost one quarter of all women’s colleges either closed or merged with men’s institutions. As of 1996, only 83 all-female colleges remained in operation. These statistics demonstrate the rapid spread of coeducation.”

“Thus, education in the U.S. began as exclusionary of women, progressed to including women but keeping them separate from men, and finally progressed to widespread coeducation. At this point, the American public views coeducation as the norm.”

“However, gender inequity in the classroom has sparked a drive to return to single-sex education, as a way to truly educate males and females equally.”

Another reminder of the discrimination against women … women didn’t get the right to vote in the US until 1920.

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