Sex and Citizenship in Antebellum AmericaWith this book, Nancy Isenberg illuminates the origins of the women's rights movement. Rather than herald the singular achievements of the 1848 Seneca Falls convention, she examines the confluence of events and ideas--before and after 1848--that, in her view, marked the real birth of feminism. Drawing on a wide range of sources, she demonstrates that women's rights activists of the antebellum era crafted a coherent feminist critique of church, state, and family. In addition, Isenberg shows, they developed a rich theoretical tradition that influenced not only subsequent strains of feminist thought but also ideas about the nature of citizenship and rights more generally. By focusing on rights discourse and political theory, Isenberg moves beyond a narrow focus on suffrage. Democracy was in the process of being redefined in antebellum America by controversies over such volatile topics as fugitive slave laws, temperance, Sabbath laws, capital punishment, prostitution, the Mexican War, married women's property rights, and labor reform--all of which raised significant legal and constitutional questions. These pressing concerns, debated in women's rights conventions and the popular press, were inseparable from the gendered meaning of nineteenth-century citizenship. |
From inside the book
Results 1-5 of 76
Page ix
... nineteenth century by examining the ways in which church , state , and family all contributed to the notion of citizenship . The Commonwealth Center at the College of William and Mary , which provided a two - year postdoctoral ...
... nineteenth century by examining the ways in which church , state , and family all contributed to the notion of citizenship . The Commonwealth Center at the College of William and Mary , which provided a two - year postdoctoral ...
Page xiii
... nineteenth century that curtailed women's rights to due process , redress , self - protection , and civil liberty , and rights within the home , church , and state . To conflate women's rights with liberal individualism or focus solely ...
... nineteenth century that curtailed women's rights to due process , redress , self - protection , and civil liberty , and rights within the home , church , and state . To conflate women's rights with liberal individualism or focus solely ...
Page xiv
... nineteenth century , citizenship was complicated by com- peting and contradictory definitions of political identity . One civic ideal celebrated active participation , measured not only by the vote but by jury and militia service ...
... nineteenth century , citizenship was complicated by com- peting and contradictory definitions of political identity . One civic ideal celebrated active participation , measured not only by the vote but by jury and militia service ...
Page xv
... identities . That women did not receive the right to vote until 1920 reflects the layers of ideological uncertainty that per- INTRODUCTION sisted throughout the nineteenth century and that successfully rationalized women's -XV-
... identities . That women did not receive the right to vote until 1920 reflects the layers of ideological uncertainty that per- INTRODUCTION sisted throughout the nineteenth century and that successfully rationalized women's -XV-
Page xvi
... nineteenth - century democracy . Publicity had several different meanings : it connoted public opinion , pub- lic appearance , and the question of whether any individual had the political legitimacy to assume a public persona or to act ...
... nineteenth - century democracy . Publicity had several different meanings : it connoted public opinion , pub- lic appearance , and the question of whether any individual had the political legitimacy to assume a public persona or to act ...
Contents
1 | |
15 | |
3 Visual Politics | 41 |
4 Conscience Custom and Church Politics | 75 |
5 The Political Fall of Woman | 103 |
6 The Bonds of Matrimony | 155 |
7 The Sovereign Body of the Citizen | 191 |
Notes | 205 |
Bibliography | 273 |
Index | 309 |
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Common terms and phrases
antebellum antebellum feminists antebellum period Anti-Slavery Bugle argued authority Bloomer body BONDS OF MATRIMONY Boston century Child Christian CHURCH POLITICS citizens CITIZENSHIP UNDERSTOOD civil claimed common law constitutional convention contract courts coverture Culture custody Declaration of Sentiments defined democratic divestment Divorce domestic duties Elizabeth Cady Stanton equal FALL OF WOMAN Feminism feminists fugitive slave Gage Gender Gerrit Smith husband Ibid issue John Journal labor letter liberty Lily Lucretia Mott Lydia Maria Child male marital marriage married women Mary Massachusetts meeting moral natural nineteenth Nineteenth-Century NOTES TO PAGES Ohio Paulina Wright Davis petition Philadelphia POLITICAL FALL Progressive Friends prostitutes protection public sphere Quaker reform religious Republican Review rule Sabbath Seneca Falls convention Sentiments sexual slavery social status Swisshelm theory tion University Press VISUAL POLITICS vote wages wife wife's William wives Woman Suffrage women's rights activists women's rights advocates women's rights convention Worcester WRC 1850