Second to None: A Documentary History of American Women. Volume 2, From 1865 to the Present [Paperback]

Ruth Barnes Moynihan (Editor), Laurie Crumpacker (Editor), Cynthia Russett (Editor)

Book Description

Publication Date: January 1, 1994 | ISBN-10: 0803282044 | ISBN-13: 978-0803282049

At the beginning of the twentieth century it was still necessary for women to ask lawmakers, "Are women persons?" The rights and treatment of women in their homes, workplaces, and government were issues that men in power often preferred to ignore. But women refused to remain silent. This volume of Second to None, like volume 1, presents a multiplicity of voices, demonstrating that there is not a representative American woman, but many women worth remembering.

Here are women who are shapers of history, as well as its victims. In diaries, letters, speeches, songs, petitions, essays, photographs, and cartoons they describe, rejoice, exhort, complain, advertise, and joke, revealing women's role as community builders in every time and locale and registering their emergence into the public spheres of political, social, and economic life. The documents also demonstrate the value of gender analysis, for women's differences—in age, race, sexual orientation, class, geographical or ethnic origin, abilities or disabilities, and values—are shown to be as important as their commonalities.

Volume 2 contains 122 selections, ranging from a tract by Elizabeth Cady Stanton to the testimony of Anita Hill. Both volumes include section introductions that set the historical stage and comment on the significance of the selections.

Editorial Reviews

From Library Journal

Present in this collection of documents are the famous-Pocahontas, Anne Bradstreet, Abigail Adams, Eleanor Roosevelt, Betty Friedan, and Anita Hill-and those many anonymous and invisible women of American history-a Hopi bride, an indentured servant, an unwed mother, an immigrant. This collection is remarkable for its breadth and diversity. Volume 1 uses 153 selections and 55 illustrations to cover the period from just prior to white settlement through the Civil War, while Volume 2 uses 122 selections and 56 illustrations to cover the period 1865 to the present. Along with diaries, letters, and poems are excerpts from captivity narratives, court and legal documents, advertisements, myths from oral traditions, and gravestone inscriptions. Each volume is divided into sections, first chronologically and then by whatever typified women's experience during that period. Selections vary in length from a few lines to three or four pages, and each section and selection is preceded by valuable introductory material from the editors. Historians Moynihan, Cynthia Russett, and Laurie Crumpacker have produced in these volumes an exceptional resource for students of women's history. While there are a few recent documentary histories of American women (see Early American Women: A Documentary History, 1600-1900, edited by Nancy Woloch, Wadsworth, 1992; and Modern American Women, edited by Susan Ware, Wadsworth, 1989), none matches the scope of this work. Recommended for academic collections but accessible to the interested general reader as well.
Linda V. Carlisle, Southern Illinois Univ., Edwardsville
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Review

"This is a superb collection. The editors have amassed an unusually wide-ranging set of documents. . . . Extremely strong and valuable. I recommend it."-Sarah J. Deutsch, Yale University

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 365 pages
• Publisher: University of Nebraska Press (January 1, 1994)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0803282044
• ISBN-13: 978-0803282049
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 6 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.7 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #827,153 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5.0 out of 5 stars Hello primary sources!, December 29, 2011

By 

Sarah - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Second to None: A Documentary History of American Women. Volume 2, From 1865 to the Present (Paperback)

I am an undergrad history major and was required to get this book for my women's history class. I decided to keep it after the semester was over for reference and it proved to be very useful while writing my thesis on the Women's Suffrage Movement in Minnesota. The book explores a lot of different angles of women's lives and times in the past 100 years or so, for anyone looking to do women's research, it is a must have.