The phrase, "Well behaved women seldom make history," was first written my Laurel Thatcher Ulrich in a scholarly paper on Puritan funeral sermons. Being far from an academic of history myself I've not read the original paper, but after looking into things a little bit it appears that the author's intention was to point out the way these Puritan women weren't seeking fame or glory. The same paper contains the (much more poignant, in my own opinion) line, "They never asked to be remembered on Earth. And they haven't been."
From what I've found about Ulrich's career, the paper may have also served as criticism of the way history is studied. She seems to have lobbied criticism at the historical establishments and their failures to appreciate the effects and actions of the rank and file members of society. When honored as a professor at Harvard it was said
Ulrich is a pre-eminent historian of early America and of the history of women. Her innovative and widely influential approach to history has been described as "a tribute to 'the silent work of ordinary people'" - an approach that, in her words, aims to "show the interconnection between public events and private experience."When briefly discussing the famous quote with my wife she quickly arrived at the conclusion of, "Well behaved people rarely make history." There are some striking examples of this in technology. Edison is famous for the popularization of electricity and numerous inventions, but his contemporary and most likely superior Nikolai Tesla is only recently being recognized for his startling genius. Steve Jobs recently passed away to much fanfare and mourning while Dennis Ritchie - inventor of the C programming language and developer for the Unix operating system on which iOS is built - passed away around the same time to little to no fanfare. Tesla struggled with mental illness (he almost certainly had OCD) in a time where it was much less understood or empathized. Jobs was a demanding CEO who while Mr. Ritchie was more likely a quiet academic and engineer. Even these examples show how we focus in on certain celebrities rather than recognizing the many brilliant minds and Menlo Park or Apple that worked under the direction of these magnates.
I think this is where my quarrel with the famous quote comes in; it reinforces the idea that to be great or important, to influence history, to "make a difference" one must necessarily acquire fame in the process. The first black president of the United States would not have been elected without a society that collectively let the scourge of racism whither on the vine rather than hold on to obsolete mentalities. Dr. Ulrich addresses the idea, "that 'empowered' women are by definition 'wild' women. That is a very old idea. Since antiquity, misogynists have insisted that females, being more emotional than males, are less stable, more likely to swing between extremes." She also points out that, "Marie Curie didn't win two Nobel prizes by throwing tantrums in the lab." and that Rosa Parks made history not only for her refusal to abide with the bigoted laws of her day but also because she was recognized as a hard working, upstanding, "well behaved" woman (other women had been arrested for the same thing, but unlike Rosa Parks their lifestyle choices made it too hard to build a case to fight the unjust law they were bucking).
In my younger years, probably until about my junior year of college, I enjoyed aspirations to fame and greatness. I wanted to win the Nobel for physics after making my own re-writes to the laws that govern our universe. I still wouldn't mind doing this, or any other number of fantastic ventures, but I'm also content with my current role in life, unimpressive though it may be especially when compared with the grandiose aspirations of my youth. I feel that I will have lived a life of incalculable worth and leave a powerful legacy even if no one remembers my name after 100 years as long as I continue learning and enriching my mind, be a good husband to my wife (and someday I'm sure, a good father to my children), work hard and earn money honestly, use that money wisely, and live in accordance with my values. I don't feel women should be robbed of this feeling of contentment that living an unassuming & simple but upstanding and meaningful life because they are told that they should be empowered & wild, rebellious, and "not well behaved."
