Women and Economics [Hardcover]

Charlotte Perkins Gilman (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: November 1, 2007

Startling in its observations and radical in its conclusions, this classic of women's rights literature, this work-by pioneering American feminist CHARLOTTE PERKINS GILMAN (1860-1935)-was a phenomenon when it was first published in 1898, and was eventually translated into in seven languages and reprinted around the world. From her characterization of women as virtual economic, social, and sexual slaves, dependent on men for everything from food to friendship to protection, to her call for women to free themselves from these shackles, Women and Economics electrified Victorian readers. It remains a foundational work of feminist theory, essential reading for anyone wishing to understand women's struggle for full and self-determined personhood.

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Charlotte Perkins Gilman (1860-1935), author of the celebrated short story "The Yellow Wallpaper," is regarded by many as a leading intellectual in the women's movement in the United States during the first two decades of the twentieth century. Michael Kimmel is Professor of Sociology at SUNY, Stony Brook, and the author of Manhood in America: A Cultural History (1995). Amy Aronson holds a Ph.D. from Columbia University and has taught Media Studies at Rutgers University, Hofstra University, and the New School for Social Research. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 180 pages
• Publisher: Cosimo Classics (November 1, 2007)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1602069247
• ISBN-13: 978-1602069244
• Product Dimensions: 8.9 x 5.8 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #3,043,229 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Psychologist's analysis of "Women and Economics", March 31, 2008

By 

James S. Moore (Seattle, Washington, United States) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Women and Economics: A Study of the Economic Relation Between Women and Men (Great Minds Series) (Paperback)

Gilman's book and her ideas on the role of women in the struggles of all humans for equality and liberty are as relevant in the 21st century as they were in the 19th. The book should be on the reference shelf of every policy maker and used as a basic book on government and political science. Her personal struggles are shared by many women and men who face the devastating effects of inequality and the abuse of liberty by others who seek the "four creatures of greed and power: fame, fortune, lust, and luxury". Gilman's message is that women (and men) should be careful to not copy the behavior of other men and other women who have sought these "four creatures".

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Fantastic book, September 17, 2010

By 

James O. Sizemore III - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Women and Economics: A Study of the Economic Relation Between Men and Women As a Factor in Social Evolution (Paperback)

Women and economics, is even today a hundred years later still the best work ever written on the economic relationship between men and women. The ideals that Ms, Gillman put forward are clear and honest, the steps needed to make women and men equal economically, most of which have happened, just not in the social and communal way she invisioned them, have as a testament to her brilliance come to pass and as each one did women and men have started to converge economically.

I could not recommend this book more. Note this version is a photo copy of the original so does have the original layout and is very readable, the pages are not sized to fit the page very well but still better then some relayed out version I have seen.

5.0 out of 5 stars ONE OF THE MOST REMARKABLE EARLY FEMINIST WORKS, September 7, 2011

By 

Steven H. Propp (Sacramento, CA USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Women And Economics - A Study Of The Economic Relation Between Men And Women As A Factor In Social Evolution (Paperback)

Charlotte Perkins Gilman (1860-1935) was a prominent American sociologist, novelist, writer of short stories, poetry, and nonfiction, lecturer for social reform, and utopian feminist; her most famous book is The Yellow Wall-Paper, Herland, and Selected Writings (Penguin Classics).

She wrote in the Preface to this 1898 book, "This book is written to offer a simple and natural explanation of one of the most common and most perplexing problems of human life... To show how some of the worst evils under which we suffer, evils long supposed to be inherent and ineradicable in our natures, are but the result of certain arbitrary conditions of our own adoption, and how, by removing those conditions, we may remove the evils resultant... To reach in especial the thinking women of to-day, and urge upon them a new sense, not only of their social responsibility as individuals, but of their measureless racial importance as makers of men."

Here are some additional quotations from the book:

"Although not producers of wealth, women serve in the final processes of preparation and distribution. Their labor in the household has a genuine economic value." (Pg. 13)
"...whatever the economic value of the domestic industry of women is, they do not get it. The women who do the most work get the least money, and the women who have the most money do the least work." (Pg. 14-15)
"Because of the economic dependence of the human female on her mate, she is modified to sex to an excessive degree. This excessive modification she transmits to her children..." (Pg. 38-39)
"Where young boys plan for what they will achieve and attain, young girls plan for whom they will achieve and attain." (Pg. 86-87)
"The mercenary marriage is a perfectly natural consequence of the economic dependence of women." (Pg. 93)
"The women's movement rests not alone on her larger personality, with its tingling sense of revolt against justice, but on the wide, deep sympathy of women for one another." (Pg. 139)
"There is no female mind. The brain is not an organ of sex. As well speak of a female liver." (Pg. 149)
"Simply to bear children is a personal matter---an animal function. Education is collective, human, a social function." (Pg. 283)
"When parents are less occupied in getting food and cooking it, in getting furniture and dusting it, they may find time to give new thought and new effort to the care of their children." (Pg. 301)
"In our besotted exaggeration of the sex-relation, we have crudely supposed that a wish for wider human relationship was a wish for wider sex-relationship..." (Pg. 304)
"Not woman, but the condition of woman, has always been a doorway of evil." (Pg. 329)