In the introductory reading about women's equality and opportunity, I found it very disturbing that

some of the views of people we herald as great, forward-thinking scholars were quite sexist, namely
Aristotle. I was surprised that Aristotle's teachings and the misinterpretation of the Creation myth was
the catalyst to the ongoing misogynist tradition. Coming from a Chinese family that was more traditional
than modern, I experienced firsthand the disparate treatment of women, but I could not believe the
open animosity toward women at the time. However, it was also heartening to hear that some men and
women back then challenged that notion, instead of just accepting it.
I learned that there was a major shift in women's history around the nineteenth century. There was a
Renaissance and early-modern tradition and a nineteenth- and twentieth-century tradition. The first one
seemed more passive, wanting to establish women's "nobility and excellence"(15). Then there was a
shift in thought to the concrete, regarding not only solutions such as increasing education, but also the
consequences for men failing to realize the worth of women (14). This makes Fonte's work all the more
impressive and beyond her time because she advocated education for women during the Renaissance.
Reading a book like The Worth of Women is important because the issues that the women brought up in
the book are issues that we still deal with today. I have always been aware of the issues because I have
experienced them throughout my life, but having to read a book such as The Worth of Women forces me
to grapple with and actively think about these difficult topics. The fact that essentially the same
problems from centuries ago still exist today is reason enough that more people need to be more aware
of the problem and even take action.