WS 341A-1 (TTH 11:00 - 12:15) Dr. Susan Cayleff Women in American History, 1620-1890 Fall 1993 Classroom: Storm Hall 240 Office: AH 3134 Office Hours: To Be Announced Phone: 594-5943 San Diego State University The following books are for sale at the SDSU bookstore for use in this course. The Reader is on sale at KB Books. Alcott Little Women Cayleff Wash and Be Healed (optional) Cott The Bonds of Womanhood Crane Maggie DuBois and Ruiz Unequal Sisters Ehrenreich and English For Her Own Good Lerner The Female Experience (optional) Lerner The Majority Finds Its Past Lerner Black Women in White America Lurie and Underhill Mountain Wolf Woman Rowson Charlotte Temple Schlissel Women's Diaries of the Westward Journey Grading: Students are expected to do all the readings and to come to class prepared to have that knowledge supplemented by lecture material. On discussion/slide class days, students will be asked to critically analyze a variety of the ideas, issues and themes that emerge in the readings and lecture material. Attendance will be taken during each class. Students will choose a Project Group with whom they will research, write and present their assigned final topic. Each group must use five primary and five secondary sources in their preparation. The equal distribution and implementation of each individual's responsibilities is to be administered by the group as a whole. Each collator will turn in an individually-authored group- evaluation. Class presentation may utilize slides (your responsibility), lecture-style delivery, or skits. Each group will utilize 30-35 minutes of class time. Further instructions will follow. Each student will research and write a 5-7 page paper that proposes another topic for inclusion in WS 341A. Students must suggest three primary and five secondary sources upon which they would base their lecture. You are not actually writing the lecture itself, but rather making a case for its inclusion in the syllabus given the relevance you believe it has. Therefore you would need to situate it within an existing unit, argue its importance, cite your sources and their value, and create a transition to the next existing topic. Further directions will be forthcoming. Late papers will be demoted one grade per-day-late. You have a choice between two two-page essay topics. See 10/19 and 11/9. Grading Group Project: 40% (see individual due dates) Final Paper: 40% (due 12/9) Attendance and discussion participation plus one short (2pp.) essay 20% (Due 10/19 or 11/9). 8/31 Introduction (No readings required for the first class.) Unit One: HISTORIOGRAPHY AND THEORY OF WOMEN'S HISTORY 9/2 I. Historiography Lerner, "New Approaches to the Study of Women in American History," and "Black Women in the United States," pp. 3-24 and 63-82 in The Majority Finds Its Past. Ehrenreich and English, For Her Own Good, pp. 1-26. 9/7 II. Demographics and the Female Life-Cycle Lerner, "The Majority Finds Its Past," in The Majority Finds Its Past, pp. 160-167. Lerner, The Female Experience, one excerpt from each chapter. Unit Two: WOMEN IN PRE-INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY 9/9 I. The Colonial Family Lerner, The Female Experience, pp. 49-50. Cott, "Eighteenth-Century Family and Social Life Revealed in Massachusetts Divorce Records," in A Heritage of Her Own, pp. 107-135. Reader. 9/14 II. Work and Expectations of Colonial Women Carr and Walsh, "The Planter's Wife: The Experience of White Women in Seventeenth-Century Maryland," in A Heritage of Her Own, pp. 25-57. Reader. Baxandall, et. al., America's Working Women, pp. 6-40. Reader. 9/16 III. The "Disorderly" Women: Forms of Protest; Anne Hutchinson and Others Ulrich, "Vertuous Women Found: New England Ministerial Literature, 1668-1735," in Cott & Pleck, A Heritage of Her Own, pp. 58-80. Reader. 9/21 IV. Native-American Women Lurie, Mountain Wolf Woman: Sister of Crashing Thunder, four chapters of your choosing and Commentary by N.O. Luire. Green, "The Pocahontas Perplex.." Unequal Sisters, pp. 1- 15. 9/23 V. Women as Healers Ehrenreich and English, For Her Own Good, pp. 26-58. 9/28 VI. Women, Revolutionary America, and the Constitution Norton, "Eighteenth-Century American Women in Peace and War: The Case of the Loyalists," in A Heritage of Her Own, pp. 136-161. Reader. 9/30 VIII. Parents and Children: Morality and Duty in Charlotte Temple: Discussion Rowson, Charlotte Temple 10/5 *** Group Project teams established--research begins. Groups meet in class. Unit Three: WOMAN'S CULTURE, 1815-1870 10/7 I. The Nineteenth-Century Reorganization of Work and the Rise of Sentimentality Lerner, "The Lady and The Mill Girl: Changes in the Status of Women In the Age of Jackson," in The Majority Finds Its Past, pp. 15-30. Cott, Bonds of Womanhood, Introduction and Ch. 1. 10/12 II. Woman's Sphere: Home and Family; "Domesticity Exalted" Cott, Bonds of Womanhood, Chs. 2-4. Review Ehrenreich and English, For Her Own Good, pp. 1-33. Lerner, The Female Experience, pp. 115-124. * Begin reading Little Women. 10/14 III. Female Friendship Smith-Rosenberg, "The Female World of Love and Ritual: Relations Between Women in Nineteenth-Century America," in A Heritage of Her Own pp. 311-342. Reader. Cott, Bonds of Womanhood, Ch. 5. 10/19 IV. "Scribbling Women": Literary Insights Alcott, Little Women. Two page essay on Alcott's Little Women due. 10/21 V. Black Women: Slavery and Plantation Life Lerner, Black Women in White America, pp. 1-65. Genovese, "Life in the Big House," in A Heritage of Her Own, pp. 290-297. Reader. Gutman, "Marital and Sexual Norms Among Slave Women," in A Heritage of Her Own, pp. 298-310. Reader. White, "Female Slaves..." Unequal Sisters, pp.22-34. Discussion and Slides 10/26 VI. Women on the Frontier Schlissel, Women's Diaries of the Westward Journey, pp. 10-144; read one of the three diaries; Rudd, or Knight, or Tourtillott. Pascoe, "...The Marriages of Mission-Educated Chinese American Women, 1847-1939," Unequal Sisters, pp.123-141. Slides and Discussion 10/28 VII. Lowell Mill Girls: Discussion Baxandall, et. al. America's Working Women, pp. 41-68. Reader. Lerner, The Female Experience, pp. 275-283. *** We are slightly more than half way through the class. Students should begin selecting and researching their individual final papers. Unit Four: MEDICAL AND SOCIAL THEORIES: THE "PROOF" OF WOMAN'S SPHERE AND PSYCHOLOGICAL NATURE 11/2 I. "Victorian" Sexuality, Domestic Feminism, and Voluntary Motherhood Cott, "Passionlessness: An Interpretation of Victorian Sexual Ideology, 1790-1850," in A Heritage of Her Own, pp. 162-181. Reader. Lerner, The Female Experience, pp. 81-87. Smith, "Family Limitation, Sexual Control, and Domestic Feminism in Victorian America," in A Heritage of Her Own, pp. 222-245. Reader. Gordon, "Family Violence, Feminism, Social Control," Unequal Sisters, pp. 141-157. 11/4 II. Women as Patients: Female "Nerves", Sexual Surgery and the Cult of Invalidism Ehrenreich and English, For Her Own Good, pp. 101-140. Unit Five: THE WOMAN'S RIGHTS MOVEMENT 11/9 I. The Nineteenth-Century Water-Cure Movement: A Case Study in Moral and Social Reform Lerner, "Women's Rights and American Feminism," in The Majority Finds Its Past, pp. 48-62. Ehrenreich and English, For Her Own Good, review pp. 48-58; 58-68. Smith-Rosenberg, "Beauty, the Beast and the Militant Woman: A Case Study of Sex Roles and Social Stress in Jacksonian America," in A Heritage of Her Own, pp. 197-221. Reader. Slides and Discussion Cayleff, Wash and Be Healed (optional): chs. 1, 2, and 5. A two-page essay based on Cayleff's Wash and Be Healed due 11/10. 11/11 II. Theory and Practice of Women's Rights: Social Feminism Cott, Bonds of Womanhood, Conclusion. (continued page 6) WS 341A-1 - page 6 Lerner, "Political Activities of Anti-Slavery Women," in The Majority Finds Its Past, pp. 112-28. Lerner, "The Feminists: A Second Look," in The Majority Finds Its Past, pp. 31-47. Lerner, The Female Experience, pp. 342-354. Lerner, "Black and White Women in Interaction and Confrontation," in The Majority Finds Its Past, pp. 94-111. Sklar, "Hull House in the 1890's..." Unequal Sisters, pp. 109-123. 11/16 III. Black Women's Nineteenth-Century Feminist Activities Lerner, "Community Work of Black Club Women," in The Majority Finds Its Past, pp. 83-93. 11/18 IV. ***Group One: Presentation on Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony ***Group Two: Presentation on Nineteenth-Century Utopian Thinkers 11/23 V. ***Group Three: Presentation on the theories of two major feminist thinkers and/or leaders, selected from Mary Wollstonecraft, Sarah and Angelina Grimke, a primary document such as the Seneca Falls Convention, or the "Marriage of Lucy Stone Under Protest," the writings of John Stuart Mill, Sarah Winnemucca or Harriet Tubman. DuBois, "Working Women, Class Relations, and Suffrage Militance..." Unequal Sisters, pp. 176-195. ***Group Four: Presentation on the daily lives of one group of ethnic women; selected from: Italian, Irish, or Jewish. THANKSGIVING BREAK 11/25-27. 11/30 ***Group Five ***Group Six Unit Six: REWARDS AND BURDENS: MOVING TOWARDS THE TWENTIETH CENTURY (More "rewards" in 341B) 12/2 I. The Urban Working Woman and the American Conscience: Women Workers and Protective Labor Legislation (continued page 7) WS 341A-1 - page 7 Ruiz, ..."Mexican Cannery Workers in Southern California, "Unequal Sisters, pp. 264-275. Lerner, The Female Experience, pp. 293-302. Baxandall, et.al., America's Working Women, pp. 85-131. Reader. Pleck, "A Mother's Wages: Income Earning Among Married Italian and Black Women, 1896-1911," in A Heritage of Her Own, pp. 367-392. Reader. Lerner, "Making A Living: Doing Domestic Work," and "From Service Jobs to the Factory," in Black Women in White America, pp. 227-252. Trennert, "Educating Indian Girls..." Unequal Sisters, pp. 224-238. 12/7 II. Urban Morality: The "Fallen Woman": Discussion Crane, Maggie 12/9 Discussion and Summary: Final Individual Paper Due If time: Lizzie Borden: Murder, Matrons and Morals; A Film.