Women’s education in the United States during the 18th century was a highly contended issue. While some believed education for women would interfere with their roles as mothers and wives, the concept of Republican motherhood required women to have some form of education to act with intelligent guidance for their husbands and children.[9] Education for women mostly consisted of reading and writing in addition to domestic crafts such as sewing and needlepoint.[10] The tension surrounding women’s education is encapsulated in Charlotte Temple as education is treated as both a virtue and a vice.[11] It is at boarding school where Charlotte first meets Montraville while on a school outing; as academic scholar, Shelly Jarenski suggests that “the quasi-public sphere of school, distanced from the protection of home and family, is what allows Charlotte to be seen and ultimately victimised”.[12] School is also culpable for Madame La Rue’s influence over Charlotte, who uses her power as a teacher to manipulate Charlotte into ruining herself in the eyes of society.[11] However, Jarenski also remarks that it is not education that fails Charlotte but her choices that dictate her fate. Through Charlotte’s story, Rowson argues against those “who believed that education would ruin women for marriage and family life. Instead, they use their heroines' fates to show that it is precisely the refusal of available education that ruins women”.[13] The subdued style in which Rowson encourages female education reflects the contemporary societal fears of women’s education.
Rowson also uses Charlotte Temple to reflect the increased silencing of women that occurred at the time. The formation of the middle class came about in America during the 18th century, and with this, the social expectations of women and femininity changed. Upper and middle-class women were reduced to the private sphere, “trapped behind the walls of their homes, they were increasingly forced into silence”.[14] Charlotte becomes increasingly silenced by male authority throughout the novel which represents the oppression of women during this time. Scholar Susan Greenfield suggests that the immense popularity and cultural impact of the novel come from the relatability of the silencing of Charlotte’s character.[15] Greenfield also comments on the irony of this period’s history as “the same culture which insisted that women be private and silent also generated women's unprecedented access to written words”.[16] The 18th and 19th century gave way to the rise of female authors and female readers, as well as fictional novels as literature.[17] Greenfield notes that “The novel was as much a middle-class product as the domestic female”.[16] Where Rowson differs from many other female seduction novel authors is her style of writing. Epistolarity was a common style of many seduction novels, Rowson, however, chose to narrate the novel which is described as maternal, like “a very human mother advocating for the ruined child”.[18][19] Jarenski proclaims that through Rowson’s narrative intrusions she attempts to assert “ an authoritative female voice in a male-dominated public sphere”, creating a voice for the women who are silenced.[20]
