Colloquium in American Women's History

Spring Semester 2000

Professor Golden

Office: 316 Armitage Hall Office Phone: 225-6075

Course Overview:

This course is designed to introduce graduate students to recent scholarship in American women's history, to the history of American women and to the use of gender as a category of historical analysis and inquiry. We will focus in particular on the intersections of race, class, and gender, look at issues of economy and value, examine the links between women's history and family history, explore the roots of social and political movements to see the influence of gender, chart the changing meaning of feminism and define the differences between women's history and gender history. Among the questions we will ask of our readings, both individually and collectively, are: what approaches do the authors take both methodologically and theoretically? what historiographic traditions do the books follow or reshape? what sources do they use and how do they use them? what contributions do the books make to social history, family history, legal history, medical history and other historical sub-specialties? We will also examine the contributions of other disciplines, particularly anthropology, sociology, law, philosophy, and political theory to the study of women's history. Finally, we will consider the relationship of biography to history as a means of asking about historical methods.

Assignments:

Students will write five comparative essays (8-10 pages) and one analysis of a group of articles. The writing assignments will be discussed in detail in class. The purpose of these assignments is twofold. First, I want to encourage you to develop a comparative approach to history and to sharpen your critical skills. Secondly, I want you to gain experience writing about contrasting interpretations of historical events. Papers will be presented to the seminar and discussed by the group.

Assigned Readings:

Articles:

Joan Scott, "History and Difference,"

Nancy Hewitt, "Beyond the Search for Sisterhood: American Women's History in the 1980s,"

Joanne Meyerowitz, "American Women's History: The Fall of Women's Culture,"

Joan Scott "Gender: A Useful Category of Historical Analysis,"

Carroll Smith-Rosenberg, "Hearing Women's Words: A Feminist Reconstruction of History,"

Linda Kerber, "Separate Spheres, Female Worlds, Woman's Place: The Rhetoric of Women's History,"

Books:

Kathleen Brown, Good Wives, Nasty Wenches & Anxious Patriarchs: Gender, Race and Power in Colonial Virginia

Laurel Thatcher Ulrich, A Midwife's Tale: The Life of Martha Ballard

Suzanne Lebsock, Free Women of Petersburg: Status and Culture in a Southern Town, 1784- 1850

Jacqueline Jones, Labor of Love, Labor of Sorrow: Black Women, Work and the Family from Slavery to the Present

Linda Kerber, No Constitutional Right to Be Ladies: Women and the Obligations of Citizenship

Leslie J. Reagan, When Abortion Was a Crime: Women, Medicine and Law in the United States, 1867-1973

Peggy Pascoe, Relations of Rescue: The Search for Female Moral Authority in the American West, 1874-1939

Linda Gordon, Pitied But Not Entitled; Single Mothers and the History of Welfare

Judith Walzer Leavitt, Typhoid Mary: Captive to the Public's Health

Ellen Chessler, Woman of Valor: Margaret Sanger and the Birth Control Movement in America

Blanche Weissen Cook, Eleanor Roosevelt vol 1.

Week I: January 19, 2000

Discussion Theme: Why study women's history?

Defining terms: sex, gender, feminism, etc.

Reading:

(handout) Joan Scott, "History and Difference," Daedalus 1987

Week II: January 26, 2000

Discussion Theme: What is women's history?

Readings: (xerox packet)

1. Nancy Hewitt, "Beyond the Search for Sisterhood: American Women's History in the 1980s,"

2. Joanne Meyerowitz, "American Women's History: The Fall of Women's Culture,"

3. Joan Scott "Gender: A Useful Category of Historical Analysis,"

4. Carroll Smith-Rosenberg, "Hearing Women's Words: A Feminist Reconstruction of History,"

5. Linda Kerber, "Separate Spheres, Female Worlds, Woman's Place: The Rhetoric of Women's History,"

Essay #1: Write a brief summary and critique of the five assigned articles and Scott's essay from the previous week.

Week III: February 2, 2000

Discussion Theme: Gender History and Women's History

Reading: Kathleen Brown, Good Wives, Nasty Wenches & Anxious Patriarchs: Gender, Race and Power in Colonial Virginia

Week IV: February 9, 2000

Discussion Theme: Sources in Women's History

Reading: Laurel Thatcher Ulrich, A Midwife's Tale: The Life of Martha Ballard

Essay #2: Write an essay comparing Ulrich and Brown. Consider the authors'approaches to women's history.

Week V: February 16, 2000

Discussion Theme: Race, Class and Region in Women's History

Reading: Suzanne Lebsock, Free Women of Petersburg: Status and Culture in a Southern Town, 1784-1850

Week VI: February 23, 2000

Discussion Theme: African American History and Women's History

Reading: Jacqueline Jones, Labor of Love, Labor of Sorrow: Black Women, Work and the Family from Slavery to the Present

Essay #3: Comparative essay on Lebsock and Jones. Consider how each author uses the concepts of race, class and gender.

Week VII: March 1, 2000

Theme: Women History and Political History

Reading: Linda Kerber, No Constitutional Right to Be Ladies: Women and the Obligations of Citizenship

Week VIII: March 8, 2000

Theme: Women's History and Legal History

Reading: Leslie J. Reagan, When Abortion Was a Crime: Women, Medicine and Law in the United States, 1867-1973

Essay #4: Comparative essay on Kerber and Reagan, examining their use of law and politics as subjects

Week IX: March 22, 2000

Theme: Women's History and the Analysis of Power

Reading: Peggy Pascoe, Relations of Rescue: The Search for Female Moral Authority in the American West, 1874-1939

Week X: March 29, 1999

Theme: Motherhood and Women's History

Reading: Linda Gordon, Pitied But Not Entitled; Single Mothers and the History of Welfare

Essay #5: Comparative essay on Pascoe and Gordon considering their use of the concept of maternalism.

Week XI: April 5, 1999

Theme: Women's History and History of Medicine

Reading: Judith Walzer Leavitt, Typhoid Mary: Captive to the Public's Health

Week XII: April 12, 1999

Theme: Biography in Women's History

Reading: Ellen Chessler, Woman of Valor: Margaret Sanger and the Birth Control Movement in America

Week XIII: April 19, 1999

Theme: Public and Private in Women's History

Reading: Blanche Weissen Cook, Eleanor Roosevelt

Essay #6: Comparative essay on Leavitt, Chessler and Cook examining the role of biography in women's history.

Week XIV: April 26, 1999

Theme: Summing Up