Editing Private sphere (section)

==Shifting boundaries==

The parameters separating public and private spheres are not fixed but vary both in (cultural) space and in time.

In the classical world, economic life was the prerogative of the household,<ref>M. I Finley, ''The World of Odysseus'' (1967) p. 69 and p. 91</ref> only matters which could not be dealt with by the household alone entered the public realm of the [[polis]].<ref>J. O'Neill, ''Sociology as a Skin Trade'' (1972) pp. 22–3</ref> In the modern world, the public economy permeates the home, providing the main access to the public sphere for the citizen become consumer.<ref>J. O'Neill, ''Sociology as a Skin Trade'' (1972) pp. 23–4</ref>

In classical times, crime and punishment was the concern of the kinship group, a concept only slowly challenged by ideas of public justice.<ref>R. Fagles trans. ''Aeschylus: The Oresteia'' (1977) pp. 21–2</ref> Similarly in medieval Europe the blood feud only slowly gave way to legal control,<ref>G. O. Sayles, ''The Medieval Foundations of England'' (1967) pp. 109, 234</ref> whereas in modern Europe only the [[Feud|vendetta]] would still attempt to keep the avenging of violent crime within the private sphere.

Conversely, in early modern Europe, religion was a central public concern, essential to the maintenance of the state, so that details of private worship were hotly debated and controverted in the public sphere.<ref>J. H. Elliott, ''Europe Divided'' (1968) p. 93-5</ref> Similarly, sexual behavior was subject to a generally agreed code publicly enforced by both formal and [[informal social control]].<ref>F. Dabhoiwala, 'The First Sexual Revolution' ''The Oxford Historian'' X (2012) pp. 41–6</ref> In [[postmodern]] society, both religion and sex are now generally seen as matters of private choice.

===Gender politics===

Throughout many decades, the public and private sphere have incorporated traditional [[Gender role|gender roles]]. Women were mostly kept to the private sphere by staying at home, taking care of their children and attending to house chores. They were not able to participate in the [[public sphere]], which was dominated by men. <ref name=":0">{{Cite journal|last=King|first=Kathryn R.|date=1995|title=Of Needles and Pens and Women's Work|journal=Tulsa Studies in Women's Literature|volume=14|issue=1|pages=77–93|doi=10.2307/464249|jstor=464249|issn=0732-7730}}</ref>

The private sphere was long regarded as women's "proper place" whereas men were supposed to inhabit the public sphere.<ref>{{cite journal|last1=Vickery|first1=Amanda|year=1993|title=Golden age to separate spheres? A review of the categories and chronology of English women's history|url=https://www.cambridge.org/core/services/aop-cambridge-core/content/view/BAD618F258B35B87F7D198F8ED74B1A7/S0018246X93000019a.pdf/golden_age_to_separate_spheres_a_review_of_the_categories_and_chronology_of_english_womens_history.pdf|journal=[[The Historical Journal]]|volume=36|issue=2|pages=383&ndash;414|doi=10.1017/S0018246X9300001X|s2cid=53508408 |author-link1=Amanda Vickery}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal|last1=Tétreault|first1=Mary Ann|year=2001|title=Frontier Politics: Sex, Gender, and the Deconstruction of the Public Sphere|journal=[[Alternatives: Global, Local, Political]]|volume=26|issue=1|pages=53&ndash;72|doi=10.1177/030437540102600103|s2cid=141033858}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|last1=May|first1=Ann Mari|title=The 'woman question' and higher education: perspectives on gender and knowledge production in America|publisher=[[Edward Elgar Publishing]]|year=2008|isbn=978-1-84720-401-1|location=Cheltenham, UK; Northampton, MA|page=39|chapter=Gender, biology, and the incontrovertible logic of choice|chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=rhr12MIJ1fkC&pg=PA39}}</ref>  Although feminist researchers such as [[V. Spike Peterson]] have discovered roots of the exclusion of women from the public sphere in ancient Athenian times,<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Peterson|first=V. Spike|date=2014-07-03|title=Sex Matters|journal=International Feminist Journal of Politics|language=en|volume=16|issue=3|pages=389–409|doi=10.1080/14616742.2014.913384|s2cid=147633811|issn=1461-6742}}</ref> a distinct ideology that prescribed [[separate spheres]] for women and men emerged during the [[Industrial Revolution]] because of the severance of the workplace from places of residence that occurred with the build up of urban centres of work.<ref>{{cite book|last1=Wells|first1=Christopher|title=Encyclopedia of feminist literary theory|publisher=[[Routledge]]|year=2009|isbn=978-0-415-99802-4|editor1-last=Kowaleski-Wallace|editor1-first=Elizabeth|location=London, New York|page=519|chapter=Separate Spheres|chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=blI0_52wIwYC&pg=PA519}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|last1=Adams|first1=Michele|title=The concise encyclopedia of sociology|publisher=[[Wiley-Blackwell]]|year=2011|isbn=978-1-4051-8353-6|editor1-last=Ritzer|editor1-first=George|location=Chichester, West Sussex, U.K.; Malden, MA|pages=156&ndash;57|chapter=Divisions of household labor|editor2-last=Ryan|editor2-first=J. Michael|chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Dz4wU64f_JYC&pg=PA156}}</ref> Even [[writing]] was traditionally considered forbidden, as "In the anxious comments provoked by the 'female pen' it [was] easy enough to detect fear of the writing woman as a kind of castrating female whose grasp upon that instrument seems an arrogation of its generative power".<ref name=":0" />

Feminists have challenged the ascription in a number of (not always commensurate) ways. In the first place, the slogan "the personal is political" attempted to open up the 'private' sphere of home and child-rearing to public scrutiny as well as call to attention how the exclusion of women from the public sphere makes the private sphere political.<ref>J. Childers/G. Hentzi ed., ''The Columbia Dictionary of Modern Literary and Cultural Criticism'' (1995) p. 252</ref> At the same time, there was a new valorisation of the personal&nbsp;– of [[experiential knowledge]] and the world of the body&nbsp;– as against the (traditional) male preserves of public speech and theory.<ref>Mary Eagleton ed., ''Feminist Literary Criticism'' (1991) p. 6</ref>

All the while, due to the activism of feminists, the public sphere of work, business, politics and ideas were increasingly opened up to female participation.<ref>Susan Faludi, ''Stiffed'' (1999) pp. 9, 35</ref>