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ABSTRACT
This article uncovers the important participation by women in adult education between 1920 and 1945 in Yorkshire. It contributes to the current historiography by using statistical evidence, not previously used, to quantify and analyse the numbers of women and men students participating in adult education. Regional statistics collected by the Workers’ Educational Association (WEA) in Yorkshire and the University of Leeds, show that the number of women students matched and sometimes outnumbered male students attending adult education classes before and during the Second World War. The evidence reinforces the hypothesis that when male students were not present (as in war time) to attend adult education, women students readily filled those student places. This hypothesis indicates that a paradox existed in the world of adult education whereby in theory equal opportunities existed for men and women to access adult education, but structural barriers remained in place that limited the ability of women to attend classes. The article argues that structural barriers were a distinctive element in making adult education realistically accessible to women following their enfranchisement in 1918 and 1928 as equal citizens. It encourages a rethinking of the relationship between gender, educational opportunities and citizenship in the early twentieth century.
Acknowledgements
This article is based on research undertaken for my PhD thesis funded by a 110th University of Leeds Anniversary scholarship and subsequent post-doctoral research sponsored by the University of Leeds Arts and Humanities Institute and funded by a University of Leeds Brotherton Short-Term Post-Doctoral Fellowship in April 2019. All errors in calculations are my own.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).
Notes
1 JHB Masterman, ‘Democracy and Adult Education’, in Cambridge Essays on Adult Education, ed. R. St. John Parry (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1920, republished by Forgotten Books in 2012), 104. *Only women over thirty were eligible to vote in 1920. Either Masterman made an error, or his essay has been published incorrectly.
2 The 1919 Report. The final and interim reports of the Adult Education Committee of Reconstruction 1918–1919, reprinted with introductory essays by Harold Wiltshire, John Taylor and Bernard Jennings (Nottingham: University of Nottingham, 1980).
3 See Zoë Munby, ‘Women’s Involvement in the WEA and Women’s Education’, in A Ministry of Enthusiasm. Centenary Essays on the Workers’ Educational Association, ed. Stephen J Roberts (London: Pluto Press, 2003), 215–37; Roseanne Benn, ‘Women and Adult Education’, in A History of Modern British Adult Education, ed. Roger Fieldhouse et al. (Leicester, National Institute of Adult Continuing Education, 1996), 376–90; Gillian Scott, ‘As a War-Horse to the Beat of Drums’: Representations of Working-Class Femininity in the Women’s Co-operative Guild, 1880s to the Second World War’, in Radical Femininity. Women’s Self-Representation in the Public Sphere, ed. Eileen Janes Yeo (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1998), 196–219.
4 Caitriona Beaumont, ‘Citizens not Feminists: the Boundary Negotiated Between Citizenship and Feminism by Mainstream Women’s Organisations in England, 1928–39’, Women’s History Review 9, no. 2 (2000): 411–29.
5 Beaumont, ‘Citizens Not Feminists’, 412.
6 Anne Logan, ‘In Search of Equal Citizenship: The Campaign for Women Magistrates in England and Wales, 1910 – 1939’, Women’s History Review 16, no. 4 (September, 2007): 515.
7 Eve Worth, ‘Education and Social Mobility in Britain during the Long 1970s’, Cultural and Social History 16, no. 1 (2019): 67–83.
8 Ibid., 75–6.
9 Ibid., 77.
10 Ibid., 71.
11 Ibid.
12 Quoted by Valerie Yow, ‘In the Classroom Not at the Sink: Women in the National Council of Labour Colleges’, History of Education 22, no.2 (2006): 187.
13 For works on Albert Mansbridge and the WEA please see Bernard Jennings, Albert Mansbridge. The Life and Work of the Founder of the WEA (Leeds: University of Leeds, 2002); Jennings, ‘Knowledge is Power. A Short History of the Workers’ Educational Association 1903 – 1978’, Newland Papers, no. 1 (Department of Adult Education: University of Hull, 1979). The WEA initially called the Association to Promote Higher Learning in Working Men was renamed the ‘WEA’ in 1905 in acknowledgment that it served female as well as male students
14 A.J. Allaway, ‘Foreword’, in University Extension Reconsidered, Vaughan Papers in Adult Education, ed. B.W Pashley (University of Leicester, 1968), 4–5.
15 ‘Branch Histories – ‘X York’, The Supplement of the Yorkshire (North) Record, no. 41 in The Highway, Vol. XXVI, (February, 1934): np.
16 Tom Hulme, ‘Putting the City Back into Citizenship: Civics Education and Local Government in Britain, 1918–45’, Twentieth Century British History 26, no. 1 (2015): 26–51.
17 Workers’ Educational Association, Workers’ Education in Great Britain: a Record of Education Service to Democracy Since 1918 (London: WEA, 1943), 31.
18 Hulme, 45–6.
19 R.H.Tawney, The Adult Student as Citizen. A Record of Service by WEA Students Past and Present (Wea: London, 1938), 3–4.
20 Details of some of their biographies can be found in Christine Pushpa Kumbhat, ‘Working Class Adult Education in Yorkshire, 1918–1939’ (Unpublished PhD thesis, University of Leeds, 2018), 115–43.
21 Kumbhat, 125–7, 135.
22 In Kumbhat, 125.
23 Ibid., 135.
24 The Adult Student as Citizen, 2.
25 Munby, 231.
26 Ibid., Quoted, 231.
27 Ibid., 232.
28 Ibid.
29 Ibid.
30 Ibid.
31 WEA, Educational Facilities for Women. Report of a Woman’s Educational Committee Operating in the London District (London: WEA, 1926), np.
32 WEA, Educational Facilities for Women, np.
33 Ibid.
34 Ibid.
35 Ibid.
36 Ibid.
37 Ibid.
38 Ibid.
39 Munby, 226–7.
40 Margaret Macmillan quoted by Munby, 227.
41 Munby, 227.
42 Ibid., 216.
43 Ibid.
44 West Yorkshire Archive Services (WYAS), WYL669/2/1 Yorkshire District WEA Annual Reports and Statement of Accounts, No. 1-10 (1915–1924); WYL669/2/2 Yorkshire District WEA Annual Reports and Statement of Accounts, No.11–20 (1925–1934); WYL669/3/1 Yorkshire District North WEA Annual Reports and Statement of Accounts, No. 25-26 (1939–1940); TUC Archive, London Metropolitan University, /4/2/1/2, WEA Districts Reports 1912–1954, WEA Yorkshire District North Annual Reports (1930–1939).
45 University of Leeds Archive, LUA/DEP/076/1/46 University of Leeds Extension Lectures and Tutorial Classes Reports 1932–1946. (Reports from 1936–1937 to 1940–1941 inclusive were unavailable.)
46 For more information on classes and courses offered the WEA see The 1919 Report. 62-68. https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=0RBOAAAAMAAJ&printsec=frontcover&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q&f=false (accessed February 5, 2021).
47 WYAS, WYL669 1/2, YD 14th AR (1928), 3.
48 Ibid.
49 Figures for 1930 have not been included in because the subject groups for Group 1 and 2 were reversed in 1930 with Group 1 representing ‘Literature & the Arts’ and Group 2 representing ‘Economics & Politics’ From 1931 to 1939 the subject groups for Group 1 represented ‘Economics & Politics’ and the subject groups for Group 2 represented ‘Literature & the Arts’. To maintain uniformity between the statistics for each year the author judged that it was better to compare like with like, by excluding statistics for 1931, to avoid ambiguity and confusion in understanding the statistics.
50 Paul Bolton, Education: Historical Statistics, House of Commons Library, November, 2012: p.20. https://researchbriefings.files.parliament.uk/documents/SN04252/SN04252.pdf (accessed November 30, 2021).
51 The references for each year depicted in are as follows: 1928 – WYAS, WYL669 1/2 WEA Yorkshire District (YD)15th Annual Report(AR) (1929), ‘Women and Men Students 1927/28’, 3. 1929 – WYAS, WYL669 1/2, YD 15th AR (1929), ‘Women and Men Students 1928/29, 3. 1930 – WYAS, WYL669 1/2, YD North 17th AR (1931) ‘Summary, 1929–30’, 5. 1931 – WYAS, WYL669 1/2, YD North 17th AR (1931) ‘Summary, 1930–31’, 5. 1932 – WYAS, WYL669 1/2, YD North 18th AR (1932) ‘Occupational Analysis, Totals all Classes’, 6. 1933 – WYAS, WYL669 1/2, YD North 19th AR (1933) ‘Occupational Analysis’, 5. (The WEA did not record the total figures for male and female students in this report, so the author calculated the total number of male and female students by adding the totals of each subject group.) 1934 – WYAS, WYL669 1/2, YD North 20th AR (1934) ‘Summary of Group Totals’, 4. 1935 – TUC, /4/2/1/2, WEA Districts Reports 1912–1954, WEA YD North 21st AR (1935) ‘Occupational Analysis’, 6. 1936 – TUC, YD North 22nd AR (1936) ‘Occupational Analysis’, 7. 1937 – TUC, YD North 23rd AR (1937), ‘Occupational Analysis’ & ‘Summary for Totals by Subject Group’, 13, 16. I found a discrepancy between the figure given for the total number of male students under ‘Occupational Analysis’ and the ‘Summary of Totals by Subject Group’. Under ‘Occupational Analysis’ the total number of male students was given as 2,642 but under ‘Summary’ the total number of male students was 2,462. The author checked the male total number by adding the totals of each subject group. 2,462 is the correct total of male students for 1937. 1938 – TUC, YD North 24th AR (1938) ‘Occupational Analysis’, 7. 1939 – WYAS, WYL669 1/2, YD North 25th AR (1939) ‘Summary of Totals by Group Subject’, 8.
52 The references for each year depicted in are as follows: 1931 – WYAS, WYL 669 1/3, WEA YD North 17th AR (1931), 4. I found three calculations to be incorrect in the statistics for student numbers by occupation and subject group on page 4. 364 was the number of female tutorial and extension class students for Group 1 subjects recorded. The correct figure is 384. 125 was the total number of female students taking one-year and terminal courses recorded. The correct figure is 258. I have adjusted the figures presented for 1931 in to reflect these corrections. A discrepancy exists between the total numbers of male and female students recorded on page 4 and the statistical summary on page 5 of the report. This is explained as occurring because ‘Particulars of occupations have not been supplied in a few instances. This explains the discrepancy between the gross totals … and the statistical summary’, 5. In order to get a sense of the number of male and female students attending WEA classes by group subject the figures from the table depicting students by group subject and occupation have been presented . 1932 – WYAS, WYL 669 1/3, WEA YD North 18th AR (1932), 6. 1933 – WYAS, WYL 669 1/3, WEA YD North 19th AR (1933), 5. 1934 – WYAS, WYL 669 1/3, WEA YD North 20th AR (1933), 4. 1935 – TUC, /4/2/1/2, WEA YD North 21st AR (1935), 6. 1936 – TUC, YD North 22nd AR (1936), 7. 1937 – TUC, YD North 23rd AR (1937), 16. 1938 – TUC, YD North 24th AR (1938), 7. 1939 – WYAS, WYL 669 1/3, YD North 25th AR (1939), 8.
53 Excludes Summer School Student Numbers.
Additional information
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Pushpa Kumbhat
Pushpa Kumbhat is a lecturer in Foundation Year Studies at Newman University, Birmingham. She was awarded her PhD, ‘Working Class Adult Education in Yorkshire 1918–1939’, by the University of Leeds in 2018. She has published articles about adult education and the labour movement in the Socialist History (2021), Urban History (2020), the History of Education Journal (2020), and the Journal of Co-operative Studies (2016).