Tripney, Janice; (2023) Women’s lives at the crossroads of social science and social policy, c.1870-1920: a collective biography. Doctoral thesis (Ph.D), UCL (University College London).

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Abstract

Women barely feature in histories of the social sciences in Britain, and their influence as producers of social knowledge on the origins of modern social policies is insufficiently appreciated. This thesis remedies this neglect by researching a variety of women and women’s experiences of pursuing social science, mostly in England but with occasional examples from Scotland and Wales. Set against a backdrop of social change and legislative reforms from around 1870 to 1920, it examines the motives and influences that drew women to social science, how they negotiated access to and participation in intellectual activities, the role of overlapping organisations and networks, and the outcomes of their actions. I approach the topic from a feminist perspective and address the lack of discussion of women’s education and activities as emergent social scientists in the extant literature. Central to the investigation was the selection of pragmatism as the research paradigm and the combined use of prosopography and collective biography to gather and analyse a dataset containing biographical information on 188 women, many previously forgotten. Data were drawn from a range of sources, including biographical dictionaries and autobiographical accounts. The Oxford Dictionary of National Biography was of special significance to the study. Generational differences were considered through use of Olive Banks’ (1986) schema, namely two birth cohorts (1849-1871 and 1872-1891) which roughly correspond to the first and second generation of women’s higher education. The social sciences took shape in close interaction with the making of modern social policies. The argument that women were important agents in this process runs as an implicit thread throughout the thesis, contributing to the emergent knowledge of the relationship between research and policy. As the first study to attempt to identify all women in the formative years, the analysis reveals that women’s early interaction with the social sciences was more widespread, and more diverse, than previously acknowledged. It contributes new dimensions to our understanding of the shifting identities and porous borders between academic and non-academic social science, and enables a new appreciation of women’s achievements, especially intellectual collaborations and contributions that go beyond disciplinary boundaries.

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