Russ
Inkshed October 5

Questions: when people ask them it's usually in a different social context than this.  There is a real situation -- someone you're in contact with knows (or you think she knows) what you want to find out. You may be asking on behalf of someone else, but there's a real occasion for the question.

Now, though, the questions are being asked retrospectively, or theoretically, and without any real assurance that you're addressing someone in a position to answer them.  It's also not clear what you want to advance as an agenda.  Why do you want to know (e.g.) who the women writers of nonfiction prose were?  You probably really don't want to know; you're asking because it's a question you suspect probably could be answered.

 What circumstances might actually generate such a question? Well, if you were writing a paper about something else -- say, 18th century journalists -- and needed that information as part of an assertion in your text.  That's when I tend to ask such questions, anyway.