Feminismos de primeira onda no Ceará: paradoxos e possibilidades a partir das disputas pelo voto feminino na imprensa (1900-1933)

Abstract

This research aims to analyze the process of formation of First-Wave feminisms in Ceará, on the first three decades of the twentieth century (1900-1933) through the press, following the disputes over/around the women’s suffrage as the central thread of the investigation. As a banner that gathered strength and reach within the demands that marked a “First-Wave” feminism, the debates around women’s political citizenship mobilized large portions of the society, raising arguments, justifications, multiple stances, and, above all, clashes. In the wake of those debates around the right to vote, other discussions, guidelines and practices were constituted in Ceará, this being the reason why we prefer to use “feminisms”. This research seeks to understand the women’s suffrage in its aspect of historically re-signified disputes and feminism itself, as a concept and movement, as an arena of open, unfinished struggles in Ceará. To the end, periodicals edited in Ceará along the chosen time frame, as well as magazines, books, speeches, legislative codes, and news from newspapers from other States of Brazil were used as sources.