Abstract
This article will explore how Quaker writers expressed their relationship with God, and with the Quaker community. I will argue that Quakers simultaneously perceived themselves as having an “inward” connection to God, and an “outward” connection to their sect. In assessing these two aspects of Quaker writing, this article specifically looks at what can be termed self/society paradigms. The texts where self and society are most interconnected are those in which autobiographical accounts of the conversion process are given. Frequently, the woman writer will move between the “I” and “we” of discourse as she first describes an experience that is personal before enlarging her argument to show how this relates to particular aspects of Quaker theology. Hence, this article assesses the terms in which the writing of self and community appear to occur simultaneously
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