ABSTRACT
Dominant ideologies in the Renaissance oppressed women with their theories of female inferiority and male superiority. Women had no legal rights, no public voice, and certainly no literary voice (outside the accepted areas of religion and domesticity). But like all ideologies, these in the Renaissance were not monolithic. Contradictions within them, inefficient surveillance (too much or not enough control), and the unforeseen course of change itself left room for subordinate groups like women to manoeuvre their way through. With these premises, I have tried to analyse the secular writings of a number of Renaissance Englishwomen. My aim has been principally to explore their opposition to prevailing cultural norms and ideologies and to identify the various writing strategies they employ, considering all along their subjectivity as women in a culture inimical to female creative activity.
