All posts tagged: mythbusting

Rules of Conduct for Women Teachers, 1915?

My bookshelf holds a copy of  ‘Instructions for New Zealanders’: a collection of excerpts from the hundreds of instruction guides that have been issued to Kiwis over the last 150 years, covering everything from the clothing an immigrant should bring, to how to take a bath, to what children may be employed as street vendors. One of the more interesting inclusions is a list of ‘Rules of Conduct for Women Teachers, 1915’.  ‘Instructions for New Zealander’s’  credits the list to the Museum of Transport & Technology, Auckland.  Some things in the list don’t read quite right to me so I did a bit of digging, and found that the National Library has a copy of the ‘original’, apparently located at the Tauranga Historical Village Museum.  It’s also reproduced on the Puke Ariki website. Ok.  Lots of NZ Museums using it.  But…the language isn’t accurate for New Zealand, nor do the rules make any sense for what was going on nationally or globally.  So what’s up? Sure enough,  a bit more looking also turns up the …