Hi All!
If you have iTunes, and you are interested in learning more about Victorian Women and Feminism/Anti-Feminist in America, I would encourage you all to check out Dr. Jennifer Burns’ lectures on these subjects. You can get them through iTunes U, an INCREDIBLE resource with THOUSANDS of FREE lectures on all manner of things. Heck, even Reformed Theological Seminary has their entire Master of Arts program lectures on iTunes U. You can get a full seminary education without writing a single paper, LOL!
These lectures are OUTSTANDING! I’m listening to them again tonight as I do my evening routine and I am just absolutely struck with how similar the history of Victorian women is to patriocentricity today. Dr. Burns goes through history, ideology, and the actual lives of women during these times. Did anyone know that before the Civil War, a full 10% of women worked outside the home. After the Civil War, that number doubled to 20%. So much for it being a rarity…
Anyway, you can find these lectures by going to the iTunes store on your iTunes. To the left of the screen, click on iTunes Us. Find UC Berekley. (Yes, I know, it sounds liberal, but, as a BA in History, I have to say that Dr. Burns is amazingly unbiased.) Click on Social Sciences. Then, click on History 7B. Download the lectures “Victorian Women” and “Feminism and Anti-Feminism.” And if you like her, I’d recommend downloading ALL of Dr. Burns’ lectures.
Thank you so much for the resource.
Cally wrote: “Did anyone know that before the Civil War, a full 10% of women worked outside the home. After the Civil War, that number doubled to 20%.”
Yes …
It has also been suggested that those percentages are very low because it did not take into account women foreigners and women of color.
If you have the time, take a look at pictures of NYC around the turn of the century. There you will see many women working … they had to … these women from foreign lands had to provide for their families.
The property of wealthy women from landed families in the USA generally had control of their own money; however, what I find most fascinating is the 1848 Women’s Property Act in NY. It would seem that wealthy, landed women and upper middle class women were beginning to look out for those women with less auspicious connections. Here is the act in full. I put it here to demonstrate many women were beginning to earn fairly good incomes.
1848 Women’s Property Act (NY State; as amended in 1849) …
In act for the more effectual protection of the property of married women:
§1. The real property of any female who may hereafter marry, and which she shall own at the time of marriage, and the rents, issues, and profits thereof, shall not be subject to the sole disposal of her husband, nor be liable for his debts, and shall continue her sole and separate property, as if she were a single female.
§2. The real and personal property, and the rents, issues, and profits thereof, of any female now married, shall not be subject to the disposal of her husband; but shall be her sole and separate property, as if she were a single female, except so far as the same may be liable for the debts of her husband heretofore contracted.
§3. Any married female may take by inheritance, or by gift, grant, devise, or bequest, from any person other than her husband, and hold to her sole and separate use, and convey and devise real and personal property, and any interest or estate therein, and the rents, issues, and profits thereof, in the same manner and with like effect as if she were unmarried, and the same shall not be subject to the disposal of her husband nor be liable for his debts.
[Note: 1837: Thomas Herttell, NYC judge, attempted to pass in the NY Assembly a bill giving married women more property rights.]
I have had a miserable time getting I-Tunes to work. The course lectures from UCBerkeley and Covenant Seminary are also available for direct download from their websites:
http://webcast.berkeley.edu/courses.php
http://www.covenantseminary.edu/worldwide/
Cool! I’m going to go find that. I’m an itunes podcast junkie…
Cool! I’m downloading it now.
Merci ktir!