iii ; 2 pemellicad A. Stewart for the many hours that she id insight have been invaluable to me. I would like to thank’Dean Robert Carrier fot his many years of patience and for the knowledge that he has provided me throughout my time here.1 mL. Introduction‘© © Education is the central concern in all Jane Austen’s novels, and the narratives specifically revolve around the educatign 6f heroines, ‘This thesis is an inquiry into the conception of. knowledge in Austen, ay rece is the ultimate determinant of roles when education is the central problem: The disbursement of power largely depends on the valuation of the various forms of knowledge. Austen places a higher value on certain types oflearning than on others, tn theory this need not lead {o the intellectual subjection of one’ gender to another, but in practice it always does. In Austen’s novels, men are consistently identified with the most valuable forms of knowledge, and women with the sleast hoe there is crossover, it is ridiculous or unworkable. For Austen, the main goal of education is the same for men and women: self- Knoviledge. She inherited much of the framework for her ideology from John Locke. Locke maintained that four essential components ought to comprise the education of men and women, each more important than the next, but all parts of a wholé: virtue, wisdom, breeding, and learning. Depending upon gender, each component takes on a different meaning. For example, if virtue is the recognition of duty, men and women clearly have different duties, so it is not surprising that they manifest their virtuousness in different ways, Locke and Austen intend that every component listed above should encourage self-knowledge. The novels which I consider in depth here — Emma, Pride and Prejudice, and Sense and Sensibility — arc all, with the possible exception of the last, Stories in which heroes reveal heroines to themselves. The plots cannot conclude untilthe heroines totally reevaluate themselves and their relationships to others, What qualifies the heroes as educators, excepting desire? Thiere can be no doubt that to want to edify is sine qua non for teachers, but the heroes’ true qualification is access to the most. culturally valuable forms of knowledge: In the first chapter I examine ter ‘ociated with men in the texts: judgment, information, and knowiedge of the world. While the terms remain neutral in theory, practice politicizes them; they become an avenue by which traditional power structures are legitinitzes and maintained. The words carry different connotations, depending upon whether the author applies them to men or to women. In Austen, men and women do not exercise judgment after the same fashion. For this reason, the only way for women to bridgg.the critical gap is to find 2 mentor. ‘The fact that this mentor will become a husband adds a decided wrinkle. What bearing will the acceptance of the supremacy of male judgment by women, in particular women who value their ability to judge highly, have on marriage? ‘The marriages that constitute the only possible closure in Austen’s World are often labeled “egalitarian.” The word suggests that, within a marriage, men and women can see and treat each other as equals, though the world perceives them as nable at such nowhere else. The potential for a truly egalitarian relationship is ques best given the inequality of education and exposure to experience before marriage. In the second chapter I examine the most concrete manifestations of female education in eightcenth-century society: accomplishments. I seek to discover Austen's opinions about the value of feminine accomplishments and what she believed about this direction of energy. An obvious contrast exists between the public nature of accomplishments meant for display in polite society and the much more private nature ofand substantial education. How.is the gentry’s expectation that a woman be secompished significant i the ‘context ofa marriage market saturated with single women? What significance do the sccodernents of refinement have for men who seek a bride? In connectifig’education with the most superficial of accomplishments, the society that Austen depicts has encouraged pietension and minimized woman's potential Instead of associating perfection of education with self-knowledge, this society has associated perfection of education with perfection for company. In the third chapter I examine a term of my own construction: situational intelligence. Situational intelligence is a composite term that includes perceptiveness, “knowledge of human behavior, and comprehension of correct responses, 1 inquire whether the author explicitly links this kind of intelligence with cither gender in the novels and what role it plays in the education of the heroines, toward reaching their educational goa! of self-knowledge. An individual's construction of an identity is a central aspect of the joumey toward self-knowledge. Therefore, determining to what extent the characters in these novels connect the ability to interpret situations with their identities must be a goal here ‘The heroines of the novels under consideration seem to believe that their ability to interpret correctly people and situations is what makes them who they are, When they become aware that they are guilty of a misinterpretation, wholesale reevalnations of self ensue, Invariably the hero is put in the position of revealer, though not for his superior situational intelligence. The fact that he is privy to the most important information andhas more exposure to the more powerful gender gives him a decided edge in interpreting the most crucial situations. This is prot i¢, for after the revelation that a heroine has misjudged a situation; she attempts to restructufe her identity entirely, from one that did not need guidance at all.to one that requirés guidance to attain moral maturity. e fd intended to discover whether education When I set out towrite this pape inheres in the love relationship. No longer am T uncertain about this proposition, Now it is obvious t® me that, in’ Austen's novels, to love someone is to be willing to spend one’s time teaching that person, toward ong-end: the prospect of the loved one’s enjoyment of new ideas. Still, even this acceptance is problematic. For what will inform said judgments of value? Are certain forms of knowledge inherently more valuable than others, or is valuation always culturally specific? How does the restriction of one class of people from what their culture considers the most valuable knowledge ensure the stasis of roles? In The Use of Pleasure (Volume Ik of The History of Sexuality), Michel Foucault shows that the combination, in literature, of romance and education dates to antiquity. Greek literature depicts a complex system of courtship between men and boys. One way for men to prove that they were worthy of the affections of boys was to be willing to teach and guide the latter. So one partner educating the other in a love relationship is not especially remarkable. ‘The eighteenth-century context creates further problems for the linkage between knowledge and love, for then gender roles are predetermined and unvarying, Tradition largely determined Jane Austen’s narrative choices. How much her inherited form, the novel of comic realism, informed her decision-making and how muchshe diverged from normal standards to. ongiiealtemative or even subversive plots isa matter of much debate. In Jane Austen’s Art of Memory, Jocelyn Harris argues that almost every aspect of Austen's work can be seen as a sort of compilation and advancement of the work of earlier and contemporary authors. Sir Charles Grandison provides inspiration for the characters who populate Pride and Prejudice, but Austen has developed atid tefined personalities to generate a unique product. I do not contend that Austen's stractaral decisions depart greatly from literary traditions. Succeeding at a realistic depiction, nowever, enables the author to adress the limitations for men and ‘women that are the natural consequences of certain initial assumptions. The decision to have a hero teach a heroine about herself is not particular to Jane Austen, Her accurate and ironic depiction of human behavior, however, draws readers’ attention to the problems that result from of granting certain attributes to certain people without specific, critical examination,Judgment, Infermation, and ledge of the World Jane Austen connects the men and women of her novels with different types of knowledge. The petsonal goal of education for both sexes is self-knowledge, but knowledge itself has other, essentially social implementations, Judgment, information, and knowledge of the world are all vital considerations in the power structure of the world of Austen. How she defines these terms in her texts ~ and what the significance of possessing or lacking them is — contributes to an understanding of the construction of. gender in this period. This notion, of the possibility of the “social implementation” of knowledge, is an important one. Judgment, particularly when conceived as “decision-making,” has a significant impact beyond the person who judges. Many of the men in Austen's novels maintain that only they can possess the ability to make important decisions. They appeal, to support their claim, either to tradition or to conventional wisdom. Additionally, many women support the notion that women are incapable of exercising critical judgment in important situations. We cannot count Jane Austen among them. Austen sets up her heroes as paragons of judgment. In the novels under consideration, the characters of Mr. Darcy, Mr. Knightley, and Colonel Brandon embody judgment. But while this is a vital quality for heroes, the same is not tue for heroines. When Austen uses judgment in connection with women, often she does so derisively. In Pride and Prejudice, for instance, the officious Lady Catherine “[delivers] her opinion onevery subject in so decisive a manner as proved that she was not used to have her jerine cannot merit this authority, however, judgment controverted” (PP 121), Lady Cat for its source is her rank, and not her geniys (62). Furthermore, a woman who values her judgment after the manner of men niust be an object of ridicule. ‘The abo statements require qualification. A central element in the novels under consideration is the’education and development of the faculty of judgment in the heroines. Austen dill not believe, as many of her contemporaries were apt to, that women could not learn how to exercise critical judgment at all. Jane Austen, more optimistically than [Hannah More and Mary Wollstonecraft], maintained that despite the irregular nature of women’s education, worthy women are capable of using their reason to judge correctly. Her novels dramatize the process. (Horwitz 14) ‘The modified claim, then, is that for heroes to be heroes they must already have judgment (ic. before the narrative begins), but this is not the case for heroines, (Of course, this is partly so because the heroines in the novels under consideration are all quite young. ‘Though I do not examine Persuasion, I will say in passing that Anne Elliot's age must. contribute to her ability to judge with moral maturity.) Evidence in the novels suggests that Austen did not believe that only men are capable of exercising judgment. She explicitly ridicules women who depend on their husbands’ judgment in all matters (S$ 212). Contemporary writers on female educationoften idealized such relationships, believing tat in doing so, they were not only readying women for motherhood, but for periet marriages as well. Jane West writes: ‘No portrait can be more truly amiable, than that of a well- disposed well-informed woman ordering her domestic affairs with propriety, and guided in the more important contems of life by the judgment of a worthy intelligent, husband . .. A well- disposed mind, conscious of its own imperfections . . . shrinks from the burden of unnecessary responsibility. (West qtd. In Horwitz 123) Elinor Dashwood’s possession of good judgment might seem to refute my claim. But Elinor’s judgment, though sound, differs in kind from that of the heroes, Hers is the knowledge of proper responses to particular situations, while theirs is a far-reaching ability to discern differences in seemingly similar objects and ideas, as well as the capacity to affect situations practically through the imposition of judgment. When we think of the exercise of male judgment in the novels, “the connotations . .. are restricted to terms that measure power in the society” (Stewart 59). Therefore it would be more correct to call Elinor's judgment “situational intelligence,” whereas the judgment of the heroes includes “situational intelligence” but goes further. (I shall define situational intelligence here, briefly, as the ability to understand people and their behaviors; this form of knowledge will be the focus of Chapter 3.)@ Barbara J. Horwitz offers d different explanation in Jane Austen and the Question of Women’s Education. According tehen Sense and Sensibility, an earlier work, reflects an agreement with the writers on education who argued that women should be taught to govern their emotions with reaSor As Austen matured asa writer, she developed a new understanding of emotion, ote that could not abide its unilateral repression. Sense and Sensibility is no as successful in exposing character asthe other novels. Perhaps this is because the conflict'in the novel is really between Elinor and Marianne, and the heroes largely play a secondary role; this is Laura Mooneyhan White’s claim in “Jane Austen and the Marriage Plot: Questions of Persistence”: In all of Austen's novels except Sense and Sensibility, education and then marriage are the integral products of the relationship between hero and heroine. In these novels, education is romance, and vice versa, and Austen's values hold that marriage be the natural result of education and love. ... [the] clashes and conjoining between lovers constitutes the royal road to the only acceptable close for Austen's imaginative world: marriage. (White 78) Even if she takes the place that the hero would normally occupy, Elinor’s judgment is not comparable to that exercised by men. She can make use of this skill only when called upon to do so, and it tends to affect only herself and her immediate family; but the heroes have no similar restriction, and they may affect others when they choose.10 6 In Austen, a man’s capacity 10 judge defines who he is. Darey’s judgment is a vital component of his character, and it essentially determines the narrative of Pride and Prejudice. Early on we discover that “[o]n the strength of Darcy's regard Bingley had the firmest reliance, and-of his judgement the highest opinion” (PP 11). Darcy's sister, Georgiana, is so sure of her brother's excellence here that, according to her, “his judgement could not err” (196). When Elizabeth considers the benefits of a marriage to Darcy, they notably include “his judgement, information, and knowledge of the world” (225). In Jane Austen and the Didactic Novel, Yan Fergus states that in Pride and Prejudice “Austen intends, evidently, to write a didactic comedy of judgement, a comedy which implicates and educates the reader's eritical judgement while relentlessly poking fun at it” (90). This doubling of reader and protagonist is apt, but Fergus goes too far, attempting to implicate Darcy as well. Although it is clear that Darcy can and does misjudge information and situations ~ most notoriously when he believes that Elizabeth desires his proposal — this novel is constructed around the heroine’s willingness to align her judgment with that of the hero. While Darcy is often unable to respond properly to the immediate scene in which he participates, his judgment behind the scenes is infallible. Hidden behind the immediate scene and becoming visible more quickly to the reader than to Elizabeth are the large patterns of power that render Elizabeth completely helpless. ‘These patierns of power include the patrilineal transmission of property, the social vulnerability of women not protectedu by men, and the social codes of propriety that deny women the ability to initiate action. (Stewart 40) Fergus skips over the crucial difference that exists between the scenes we witness and those we do not; in reality, Darcy’s power has no limits and needs no guidance Judgment also defines the character of Mr. Knightley in Emma. Barly on we learn that the eponymous heroine of this novel “had a sort of habitual respect for his judgment in general” (Emma 61), Mr. Knightley himself acknowledges that Emma's own judgment has become better over the years but does not resemble his own, remarking that now their faculties are “‘a good deal nearer” (91, emphasis in original). ‘This occurs in a conversation about how much better Emma’s judgment has become sitice she was born, at which time Mr. Knightley was sixteen. Mr. Knightley’s intellectual superiority is the result not only of his gender, but of his age; he has had many more experiences from which to learn, Mr. Knightley’s affirmation that “[Mr. Martin] always speaks to the purpose. open, straight forward, and very well judging” (54) is high praise, in that its source is a powerful, property-owning gentleman. Likewise his censure is significant when, vis-2- vis Jane Fairfax’s receipt of a pianoforte, he considers the possibility that the mysterious donor might have been her guardian, Colone! Campbell. “Surprizes are foolish things. ‘The pleasure is not enhanced, and the inconvenience is often considerable. I should have expected better judgement from Colonel Campbell” (210). ‘The source of one man’s opinion of another, then, derives from an assessment of judgment.