Examination of conscience, guilty conscience and formation of a feminine habit

The rituals that marked the adhesion to the catholic school culture of French tradition practiced at the female elite schools were above all articulated around moral practices. One of the central practices in that context, the so called conscience examination, even if it was inspired in the conscientiam excutere advocated by the Jesuit's Ratio Studiorum, applied only to the female public marking once again the difference in the construction of gender in the catholic establishments. The daily attribution of a note should compel the students to do a sincere self- criticism of their behaviour in the previous day, but it also intended to measure their capacity of interiorizing school norms, which aimed at the construction of a virtuous and obedient femininity. This ritual, founded on the notion of fault and sin, stirred up a strong guilt feeling, essential to the practice of women's social role.