With the advent of sophisticated industrial machinery and large-scale colonialism in lands never before seen during the Victorian period, came the thirst of knowledge. Consequently, the purpose and value of education, which involved the acquisition of knowledge and the inculcation of social values, constituted a major concern of Victorian writers. Examining Charlotte Brontë's Jane Eyre and George Bernard Shaw's Mrs. Warren's Profession, this essay will examine three areas of similarity between the authors' views on education. Both texts describe education as a path to greater social respectability. However, both texts also see this respectability as a mask for hypocrisy. Both texts also describe education as a way to perpetuate gender inequality. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an original essay Education was seen as a path through which the individual gained greater respectability in the eyes of society. This is because education was believed to impart the discretion and intellectual capacity necessary to interact with men and women of higher social status. This perception is masterfully demonstrated by Shaw in the controversy between Mrs. Warren and Vivie. Vivie is stunned when her mother tells her that she was "taught badly on purpose" and her mother explains in response that Vivie "was taught in school and college to think rightly and correctly" but this "is just a pretense, to keep the coward". slave quiet common people.' Here Shaw's polemic reminds the audience of the way discretion is used to avoid offending society. Education then uses this "right and proper" thought to teach individual discretion that generates respect. Evidently, however, Shaw is skeptical of this “pretense” of respectability, which hypocritically masks social evils. Thus, Shaw exposes the hypocrisy of Victorian education even as he admits that it trains individuals to be respectable members of society. Similarly, Jane Eyre presents education as a tool for acquiring questionable social respectability. Instead of using polemic, Brontë's first-person narrative juxtaposes the way Mr. Brocklehurst treats the women of Lowood with the way he treats his own daughters to bring out the hypocritical nature of education. Mrs. Reed "fully approves" of the way the girls seem "silent and simple", almost like the children of the "poor people". This dialogue reveals that women's education is intended to help them become respectable by cultivating modesty. However, Mr Brocklehurst's own daughters wear dresses "trimmed with ermine", a royal material, and "false French curls". Brontë's apt choice of the word "false" calls the reader's attention to the falsity of Brocklehurst's supposed belief in modesty for the poor girls of Lowood. He's disingenuous because he's totally fine with his ladylike daughters wearing extravagant clothes. This suggests that men of power like Brocklehurst use education to teach the poor that modesty is respectable, so that they do not aspire to the success of politeness and rich society. Thus, Jane Eyre shows that the “respectability” of education is often used to create a false consciousness of subjugation in poor or common people. This echoes Shaw's earlier message. Thus, education in the Victorian era was a means of promoting respectability which was actually intended to mask material and class inequality. Likewise, both.