The saint-simonian proletarian women and their inheritance – between concealment and (re)discovery of their itineraries and writings

Abstract

The proletarian women of Saint-Simonian movement, as they called themselves, are the authors of an important part of the legacy of Saint-Simon (Claude-Henri de Rouvroy, comte de Saint Simon, 1760-1825) and of Saint-Simonism. However, their legacy suffered a real indifference or even suppression during the nineteenth century, in particular the writings of Clare Demar, demonized as a "free woman," “monster woman”, "poisonous. The first study devoted to Saint-Simonian women, especially the Saint-Simonian proletarian women who created the periodical La femme libre (1832-1834), was published in 1926 by the sociologist Marguerite Thibert. Her work, still current, is entitled Le féminisme dans le socialisme français - de 1830 à 1850. In this article we will focus on their writings, in particular those of Claire Demar and Suzanne Voilquin. We will seek to address the inner diversity of the "proletarian women", introduce their writings, and propose a reading focused on the modernity of the view onto a feminism that forbids any linear approach to the history of feminism.