The Cultural Identity Of Seventeenth Century Woman

In this anthology, N.H. Keeble illustrates both the historical circumstances of women's lives in the seventeenth century and the cultural notions of woman which prevailed then. Within the body of the collection, contemporary evidence is arranged topically, drawn from printed sources. The images, roles and virtues of woman are examined, providing a sourcebook which illustrates the way woman has in the past been culturally constructed.

This anthology brings together extracts from a wide variety of seventeenth-century sources to illustrate the ways in which the cultural notion of `women' was then constructed. historical circumstances of women's lives in the seventeenth century and the cultural notions of `woman' which prevailed then. What did women and men think women should be? Over 200 extracts from books, pamphlets, diaries and letters are arranged under three main headings: female nature, character and behaviour; female roles and affairs; and `feminisms.' Each chapter is introduced by N.H. Keeble who contextualises the extracts and draws out the main issues revised.

The first comprehensive anthology of seventeenth-century English women writers

Women's Worlds in England presents a unique collection of source materials on women's lives in sixteenth and seventeenth century England. The book introduces a wonderfully diverse group of women and a series of voices that have rarely been heard in history, from Deborah Brackley, a poor Devon servant, to Katharine Whitstone, Oliver Cromwell's sister, and Queen Anne. Drawing on unpublished, archival materials, Women's Worlds explores the everyday lives of ordinary early modern women, including their: * experiences of work, sex, marriage and motherhood * beliefs and spirituality * political activities * relationships * mental worlds In a time when few women could write, this book reveals the multitude of ways in which their voices and experiences leave traces in the written record, and deepens and challenges our understanding of womens lives in the past.

Fabulous Identities revises traditional interpretations of the fairy-tale vogue which was dominated by salon women in the last decade of the French seventeenth century. This study of women's tale narratives is set into an investigation of how aristocratic identity was transformed by political and social realignments forced by royal absolutism or ambitious materialism. Women's distinctive contributions to the genre are defined by drawing upon various texts that articulated the century's moral, cultural, and aesthetic values, as well as upon contemporary critical perspectives including seventeenth-century historical and cultural studies. Caught up in the philosophical, political and social controversy over woman's nature, seventeenth-century women writers benefited from salon culture and their access to writing through the literary genres of fairy tales and novels, to explore new identities and expand representations of subjectivity. Women's tales can be seen as a theater for staging an authorial persona at odds with their portrait as presented in male-authored didactic treatises and in the fairy tales of Charles Perrault. At a time when the pressures of social conformity weighed heavily upon them, the conteuses highlight through metamorphosis the affective dimension together with its impact on evolving notions of personal autonomy.

Advice books published by women were a popular genre in Seventeenth and early Eighteenth-century England and they were moral manuals with strong religious overtones. Here, Urban highlights a notable exception: Age Rectified, which counsels women to acquire a 'disposition of mind' in old age which allows them to be accepted by younger generations.

Addressing a key challenge facing feminist scholars today, this volume explores the tensions between shared gender identity and the myriad social differences structuring women's lives. By examining historical experiences of early modern women, the authors of these essays consider the possibilities for commonalities and the forces dividing women. They analyse individual and collective identities of early modern women, tracing the web of power relations emerging from women's social interactions and contemporary understandings of femininity. Essays range from the late medieval period to the eighteenth century, study women in England, France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, and Sweden, and locate women in a variety of social environments, from household, neighbourhood and parish, to city, court and nation. Despite differing local contexts, the volume highlights continuities in women's experiences and the gendering of power relations across the early modern world. Recognizing the critical power of gender to structure identities and experiences, this collection responds to the challenge of the complexity of early modern women's lives. In paying attention to the contexts in which women identified with other women, or were seen by others to identify, contributors add new depth to our understanding of early modern women's senses of exclusion and belonging.

Regarded by contemporaries as the chief dispute of our times, tithes were the subject of intense controversy in the 1650s. Ministers, reformers, radicals and sectarians all went into print to defend or destroy the clergy's right to a tenth of the produce of the land. Tithes pushed the limits of private property, and both their opponents and their defenders recognized their significance for ownership, the law, liberty and individuality.