Women In Canada During World War 2 Essay

The females worked as nurses and as manufacturers during the war they also had to work on farms to keep the crops going and take care of their families at the same time. When the men were in the trenches women had to keep the economy going that meant working the jobs men would have been doing. The motion after the war gave women more respect and started a new beginning for being a woman. During the war an “Income War Tax” was brought in to help with finances and debt, canadians were taxed on the income they made. Canadians whose income per year that was 6,000 or more were taxed between 2-25%.

Most importantly, during WWI, men would have to leave their homes to go into war while the women and children stayed home. Since most men left to go to war it had caused a problem revolving around the lack of workers for jobs. They decided to get women to do these jobs that men usually did. Some jobs the women of the Home front did were railway guards, ticket collectors, buses/train conductors, postal workers, police, firefighters, bank tellers, clerks, and especially munition factory workers. The women had responsibilities to do which gave them an opportunity to do things men usually did. After the Homefront it helped them to be treated as equals among the men because the woman showed that woman can do the jobs as good as men can. A woman named Vera Britain was a WWI woman on the Homefront who decided after the first year of WWI that her duty was serving for her country and then spent most of the war being a nurse in London. At the beginning of WWI, 570,000 women worked in Canada’s industry, after the years almost 1 million women were employed including many working in traditional male factory

The government and the general populace realized how hard the woman had worked for the sake of Canada, and this earned woman the respect that they had longed for from the general populace and the government. Furthermore, this very sense of respect was proved when the government under Prime Minister Borden approved the War measures act on September 20, 1917(“Woman’s right to vote in Canada”). This very act was a prime gesture from the Canadian government that illustrated how winning the respect of the people resulted in the destruction of the misogynistic sentiments of that era. Furthermore, many historians regard the “War Times Act” as a gesture that was carried out in order to acknowledge the efforts that women had done in order to aid in the war(“Suffrage in Canada”). As said previously, woman raised funds for war, they volunteered as nurses overseas, worked endless hours in factories in order to build munitions, and provided countless other services for the benefit of the economy and the government. Moreover, they simultaneously kept their families together,”while men went overseas”(“Woman get the vote”), and kept war efforts moving through funds raised by various non-profit organizations run by women. The government witnessed this and rewarded the services of such woman by granting them the right to vote. Furthermore, the fact the government wanted to integrate women into the Canadian political system reveals that the long arduous toiling that woman had done for the nation was finally beginning to reap rewards for their own battle for gender equality.. Although, the right to vote was only bestowed upon those who were related to soldiers fighting overseas, it nonetheless

During the period of the Second World War from 1939 to 1945, Canadian women were allowed a rapid introduction into spheres of labor previously dominated solely by

This was the first time in history Canadian women were permitted to actively joining the Canadian military. The formation of the Women’s division Royal Canadian Air Force, Canadian women’s army Corps, and Royal Naval Women’s service were all ground-breaking for women’s social status. Women ran essential jobs that helped win the war such as driving mechanical transport vehicles, cooks, clerks, typists, ciphers, and even pharmacists. The RCAF noticed the impeccable potential in women and allowed women to fly delivery planes over the Atlantic to Britain. However, the government was initially weary of involving women in the war, which just goes to show their contributions did not go unnoticed.

WWI was a time of great change for Canadians. This time period was one of progress for many Canadian women. Although women were not allowed to enlist in the military during WWI, women did play a huge role during the war as nurses and ambulance drivers. As stated in the content section of Unit 2 activity 1, “images and news of nurses working hard at the front and sacrificing their lives helped to change notions of women as fragile, helpless creatures.” For many women this was their first time to work outside of the home, providing them “with many opportunities to prove their worth as citizens” (McClung). Another group that saw a period of progress during WWI was War Artists. As mentioned in the content section of activity 1 “The new medium of

Throughout this article the writer makes numerous references towards how the government of Canada attempted to do the right thing towards female workers during the war, but it also shows how the government’s heart wasn’t into it, thus just making offers to female workers just to appease their complaints for the time being until the war was over. The government was terrible on providing financial support to women whose husbands were away at war, offering only meager amounts of their pay each month, thus forcing more women into the workforce. The article goes on to further explain how during the war, women felt empowered by their circumstances and how once the war was over that women continued to fight towards equality and many refused to ‘go back to the kitchen’ after the war and further challenged the norms by continuing to work.

Traditionally, throughout history the roles of women had remained more or less the same, taking care of the household, children and preparing food. The roles had been set in place long ago, which made it incredibly difficult for women to go beyond this simply because it was out of the ordinary. However WWII was when everything started to change. The role of Canadian women changed drastically over the span of only six years to include responsibilities that were not fixated solely on the home, and instead encompassed roles that helped the war effort directly. Some of these included, working on farms and food production, being employed in factories, and joining female army divisions.

Women had a huge role in the World War II that so many do not recognize. Women were involved in many different jobs that allowed them to step out of the ordinary norm as the “typical housewife”, and dive into fierce hardworking jobs that until then only a man could do. Women jumped into the factories and many different roles that contributed to World War II, because the need for more American workers was crucial.

In the past, WWII and WWI, women were very dominant; they had to take care of their children, do all the chores and also had to cook the food. During WWII, women had to take place for the men (First world war.com). The war changed the life for all Canadian women. When men went to fight, women were called upon to fill their jobs, and this included many jobs that were previously thought of unsuitable for women. Women were called up for war work from March 1941(Women during World War II). The roles of the women were positively impacted by World War II, because they had the potential to re-enter the workforce, control the farms and join the military for the first time. Taking control of the military was tough, but women had shown that they could work together and handle the situation.

While men fought in the war, the women temporarily took over their job positions, but when the men returned home, the women had to return to the traditional role of being a mother and a housewife. Some women did not want to go back to the old ways, as they wanted an opportunity to work whatever position they'd like. However, under the words of the Constitution, women were to be excluded from society, as they were not considered as "persons". Eventually, though, with a fight, women got the right to vote and to work in some occupations, such as lawyers, judges, and doctors. Although they accomplished some achievements, they still weren't accepted into the Canadian society. Considerably, the 1920s for them was a

The last and biggest way woman helped Canada and the allied effort defeat Germany was through the Canadian Womans Army Corps (CWAC). The CWAC was a combat free branch in the army made for specifically the purpose of reliving men from their non-combat roles in order to get them fighting in the war and increase our man count. Some of the many jobs woman would do while enlisted in the CWAC included working at radar stations, cleaning jobs, cooking, secretarial, and even as mechanics. without the CWAC we we would have put less men into combat decreasing our man count. These brave women wanted to help there country in the fight and they did it with pride

December 7, 1941 was the day when America declared war, but it was also the years following that women had the chance to show their patriotism in a way they never had before; working outside of their homes. World War II was a chance to contribute to what was needed most, the war efforts. In a dire situation that is War, women moved from their homes help the America for the better of society and their husbands off at war.

The first way that the Women’s Movement significantly impacedt Canada’s history was economically, in WWI. This was the first time the role of women in society and their contributions to the economy

Women filled all sorts of jobs, many of them dangerous and skilled. They worked in shipyards and drove trams, buses and ambulances. Women also built aeroplanes and airships. Farming the land 48,000 women worked on the land as part of the women's land army. Most of them had had experience in farming as on a farm, wives and children were expected to work without pay anyway.