Maria Rye and Hegemonic Femininity: Case Study of a Victorian Migration Broker

Maria Susan Rye (1829-1903) was the founder of the Female Emigration Society in Victorian Britain. A charismatic women's migration organiser, she claimed that imperial migration-defined by the press and Victorian authorities as internal human mobility within the British Empire as opposed to emigration, outside the contours of the British Empire-was the most promising opportunity for unmarried British gentlewomen. An intermediary of migration, Rye did not perform gender as women of her time were expected to and she was thus framed as ambivalent and unfeminine, troubling gender norms and social expectations imposed on Victorian men and women. Indeed, her physical appearance and her perceived unwomanly behaviour and activities (she spoke in public, used the press to attack her opponents, and worked in migration) were often commented upon by her detractors. The objective of this article is to introduce a new historical method on gender performance in migration studies by focusing on the elements that contributed to frame Rye as a non-normative deviant woman. This paper resorts to Butler's gender performativity and arguments on the exclusiveness of male/female binary to revisit the figure of Rye from a non-binary perspective and underline the fluidity of gender. Through the case study of Rye, whose femininity was framed as nonconforming to Victorian ideals, I show the construction of her multiple femininities and look into the correlation between migration and gender identity in the context of Victorian migration brokerage.

Automated summary

This article introduces Maria Susan Rye's contribution as a women's migration organizer and her struggle with gender expectations in Victorian Britain. By studying Rye's case, the article explores the perspectives of gender performativity and fluidity, highlighting the construction of her as a non-normative woman.