Ashley Montagu (1952). The Natural
Superiority of Women.
Macmillian New York
"Dr. Montagu's The Natural Superiority of
Women was a pioneer statement on sexism,
first published some years before the
emergence of the Women's Liberation
movement. Even with the rise in Women's
Consciousness today, the book remains a
revolutionary volume, since it show the that
superiority of women is a biological fact." From
Back Cover.
Additional Commentary
"Woman knows what true love is; let her not
be tempted from her knowledge by false ideas
that man has created for her to worship
Woman must stand firm and be true to her
own inner nature; to yield to the prevailing
false conceptions of love, of unloving love, is
to abdicate her great evolutionary mission to
keep human beings true to themselves, to
keep them from doing violence to their inner
nature, to help them to realize their
potentialities for being loving and cooperative. Were women to fail in this task, all hope
for the future of humanity would depart from the world".(p. 250)
"I consider the theme of this book to be a most important one, for I am convinced, and I
hope the reader will agree, that good relations between the sexes are basic to the
development of good human relations in all societies" (p. 238.)
"Women are the bearers, the nurtures of life; men have more often tended to be the
curtailers, the destroyers of life." (p. 241).
"Women must be granted complete equality with men, for only when this has been
done will they fully be able to realize themselves" (p. 242).
"All human beings should enjoy the rights that are theirs by virtue of their being human,
and not one iota of their rights should ever be abridged on the ground of sex; but to
secure them women will have to labor hard. It cannot be too often repeated that they
will have to do most of the work themselves in improving their status. Getting laws
passed will not be enough; the long hard pull will be to achieve full recognition and
acceptance of their abilities in all phases of national and international life." (p. 243).
"Human societies must be based on human relations first, and economic activities
must be a function of human relations--not the other way round" (p. 243).
"The sexes should not compete; they should cooperate and complement each other".
(p. 245).
"Women are the mothers of humanity; do not let us ever forget that or underemphasize
its importance. What mothers are to their children, so will man be to man" (pp. 247-
248)
"Women are the carriers of the true spirit of humanity--the love of the mother for her
child. The preservation of that kind of love is the true function of women. And let me, at
this point, endeavor to make it quite clear why I mean the love of a mother for her child
and not the love of an equal for an equal or any other kind of love" (p. 248).
Ashley Montagu (1952/1974). The Natural Superiority of Women