Women’s training in self defense was both a reflection of and a response to the broader cultural issues of the time, including the women’s rights movement and the campaign for the vote. Some women were inspired to take up boxing and jiu-jitsu for very personal reasons that ranged from protecting themselves from attacks by strangers on the street to rejecting gendered notions about feminine weakness and empowering themselves as their own protectors. It is nearly impossible in today’s day and age to imagine a world without the concept of women’s self defense. However, few realize that the Progressive Era also witnessed the birth of the women’s self-defense movement. At the turn of the twentieth century, women famously organized to demand greater social and political freedoms like gaining the right to vote. The surprising roots of the self-defense movement and the history of women’s empowerment.
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