Notable Women Research Articles

The crimes of womanhood: defining femininity in a court of law

Cultural views of femininity exerted a powerful influence on the courtroom arguments used to defend or condemn notable women on trial in nineteenth-century and early-twentieth-century America. A. Cheree Carlson analyzes the colorful rhetorical strategies employed by lawyers and reporters in the trials of several women of varying historical stature, from the insanity trials of Mary Todd Lincoln and Lizzie Borden's trial for the brutal slaying of her father and stepmother, to lesser-known trials involving insanity, infidelity, murder, abortion, and interracial marriage. Carlson reveals clearly just how narrow was the line that women had to walk, since the same womanly virtues that were expected of them--passivity, frailty, and purity--could be turned against them at any time. With gripping retellings and incisive analysis, this book will appeal to historians, rhetoricians, feminist researchers, and anyone who enjoys courtroom drama.

From Great Women to Top Girls : Pageants of Sisterhood in British Feminist Theater

Caryl Churchill's groundbreaking play Top Girls (1982) opens with a fleeting fantasy of transnational, transhistorical sisterhood as an eclectic group of eminent women, historical and fictional, gather to celebrate an apparent feminist victory--the promotion of a contemporary, high-powered businesswoman to a management position previously held by men. Sixty years earlier, at height of British women's suffrage movement, similarly fantastic gatherings of notable women from various nations and centuries were staged in support of women's rights. Like Top Girls, Pageant of Great Women (1909) and Women's Coronation Procession (1911) revived famous women from history and drew them into a contemporary feminist cause. By bringing together women from different time periods and geographic locations, all three productions present their audiences with a spectacle of female solidarity extending across national, cultural, and class boundaries. These pageants of sisterhood enact a fundamental feminist principle; as feminist theorist Rosi Braidotti observes, the recognition of a of commonality among women ... is foundation stone that allows for feminist position or standpoint to be articulated. (1) In dramatizing this bond of commonality, however, these productions express a feminist ideal more than they do a material reality; all three performances of united sisterhood signs of strain, though with different degrees of self-awareness. My purpose in this essay is to consider how British feminist productions with largely female casts from both ends of twentieth century appropriated elements of pageantry to create a vision of sisterhood responsive to feminism of their day. I begin with two suffrage-era productions that exploit modern pageant revival to garner support for a feminist cause: Cicely Hamilton's pageant play Pageant of Great Women, first performed in November 1909 at a large fundraising event for Actresses' Franchise League, and massive Women's Coronation Procession of 17 June 1911, whose purpose was to show strength of demand to win Votes for Women in Coronation year. (2) I then turn to a more recent feminist play, Caryl Churchill's Top Girls from 1982, whose opening act incorporates elements of pageantry reminiscent of suffrage pageants as colorful historical women gather around a dinner table in a spectacle that might at first appear to represent female solidarity across cultures and history, but which soon dissolves into conflict and chaos. Placing these somewhat disparate moments in British feminist theater in dialogue with one another brings out revealing convergences and discrepancies in their uses of women's history, particularly their representations of women's power and martyrdom, and in their constructions of sisterhood. Anticipating some of concerns of transnational feminism, Churchill's dystopian vision of fractured sisterhood throws into relief suffrage pageants' fantasy of universal, united sisterhood by encouraging attention to national, ideological, and class differences that must be elided to achieve such idealized visions of female solidarity. Despite her attentiveness to differences among women, however, Churchill does not deny possibility of sisterhood altogether, but uses Brechtian methods to suggest its possibility beyond social conditions represented in play. All three productions, to varying degrees, reveal tensions between potent feminist ideal of united sisterhood and material differences and disparities among women that ideal seeks to overcome. I. Cicely Hamilton's Pageant of Great Women, 1909 Pageant of Great Women exploited for feminist purposes pageant revival sweeping Britain and United States in first decade of twentieth century. Launched by Louis Napoleon Parker's large-scale historical pageant celebrating twelve hundredth anniversary of town of Sherbourne in 1905, modern pageant movement was a deliberate return to Renaissance pageantry inspired by late nineteenth-century arts and crafts movement. …

The great diversity of women exemplars in China of late Qing

A group of illustrious women were introduced into China from the West in late Qing with Western learning spreading to the East, which presented an extraordinarily huge challenge to the traditional Chinese female ideal. The search for new exemplary women was actually in correspondence with the rising tide of women’s social education during that historical period. By interweaving the development of new education with the establishment of new exemplary women, the essay will explore the great diversity of women exemplars of late Qing in China emerging from an optional introduction of notable women from the West and the reevaluation of traditional women role models in China. The study will be carried out through the close-readings of seven biographies of famous Chinese and Western women published at that time and several biographical sketches carried in the columns of biography in Beijing nübao 北京 女报 (Beijing Women’s Newspaper) and Nüzi shijie 女子世界 (Women’s World) issued respectively in Beijing and Shanghai.

More Than Petticoats: Remarkable Ohio Women (review)

Reviewed by: More Than Petticoats: Remarkable Ohio Women Ginette Aley More Than Petticoats: Remarkable Ohio Women. By Greta Anderson. (Helena, Mont.: Globe Pequot Press, 2005. viii, 152 pp. Paper $10.95, ISBN 0-7627-3625-9.) Ohio has been home to many notable women whose influences were responsible for altering the course of local, state, or national history. Greta Anderson's More than Petticoats: Remarkable Ohio Women, which is geared toward a popular rather than a scholarly audience, introduces us to twelve diverse women with Ohio roots whose ambitions often brought them face to face with the social or political mores of their era. Undeterred, their lives symbolized a popular nineteenth-century adage that urged, "Let us be up and doing." The profiles, chronologically arranged, depict a diverse lineup of public minded women. The list includes Harriet Beecher Stowe, Eliza Trimble Thompson, Mary Ann Bickerdyke, Victoria Woodhull, Hallie Quinn Brown, Annie Oakley, Helen Taft, Jane Edna Hunter, Florence Allen, Ella Stewart, Lois Lenski, and Dorothy Fuldheim. Readers learn not only about their causes and achievements but also the personal and social contexts within which they developed. These women envisioned lives that went beyond themselves. Stowe's widely read Uncle Tom's Cabin, which began as serial installments in 1851, made slavery's inhumanity to black women, men, and families starkly and emotionally real to northerners. In doing so, it moved the nation closer to Civil War. Rough-mannered "Mother" Bickerdyke, who once assisted fugitive slaves in the Underground Railroad, found her life's mission doing "the Lord's work" as an unpaid sanitary and medical volunteer in the Union army, and later in fund-raising for the Northwest Sanitary Commission. Her devotion to soldiers was as strong as she was sharp tongued; yet, Gen. William Sherman steadfastly defended her as "the one person around here who outranks me" (25). Like many, "Mother" Thompson had become swept up in the temperance movement, which identified alcohol as the ruination of American society. In 1874, largely as a result of her spearheading campaign in Hillsboro, the Ohio Women's Christian Temperance Union (WCTU) was formed, followed almost immediately by the creation of the national WCTU in Cleveland. Some of the women here cultivated a rich public life. Notorious Victoria Woodhull, an ardent spiritualist, free-love advocate, and women's rights [End Page 141] lobbyist, pursued an entrepreneurial career that took her to New York City in the late 1860s. There she sold personal products to the major brothels and, in the process, came to know some of the powerful men who frequented them, such as Cornelius Vanderbilt. Through Vanderbilt she made a fortune in the stock market. Annie "Little Sure Shot" Oakley had already built her reputation as a fine hunter and game supplier while still a young woman. She later became the first white woman to join Buffalo Bill's Wild West show. African American pharmacist Ella Stewart consistently confronted and prevailed over racial barriers as she engaged not only in her business but also in her wide-ranging club activities in Toledo and beyond. This is not a scholarly work and students of women's history may be put off by the pejorative series title, More Than Petticoats. Yet readers will find these women interesting, if not inspiring. [End Page 142] Ginette Aley University of Southern Indiana Copyright © 2008 The Kent State University Press

Notable Trade Book Lesson Plan—Rachel: The Story of Rachel Carson

Rachel Carson was a notable woman who studied the environment and cared for the planet Earth. Her life was highlighted by several significant events that unfolded to future events culminating with her writing the landmark book Silent Spring. In this NCSS notable trade book lesson plan format, students record 12 significant events in Rachel Carson’s life on a graphic organizer. The graphic organizer is designed as 12 circles like the face of a clock to show chronological order. Using the information provided in the book Rachel: The Story of Rachel Carson (Ehrlich, 2003), students record 12 events to illustrate the cycle of life. This practical graphic organizer also can be used for recording important events in other people’s lives read in biographies and autobiographies as well as important events in each student’s life. Reading and sharing from the graphic organizer in chronological order prompts meaningful class conversations and learning experiences.

The Fin-de-siecle poem: English literary culture and the 1890s

Featuring innovative research by emergent and established scholars, The Fin-de-Siecle Poem throws new light on the remarkable diversity of poetry produced at the close of the nineteenth century in England. Opening with a detailed preface that explains why literary historians have frequently underrated fin-de-siecle poetry, the collection shows how a strikingly rich body of lyrical and narrative poems anticipated many of the developments traditionally attributed to Modernism. Each chapter provides insights into the ways in which late-nineteenth-century poets represented their experiences of the city, their attitudes toward sexuality, their responses to empire, and their interest in religious belief. The eleven essays presented by editor Joseph Bristow pay renewed attention to the achievements of writers such as Oscar Wilde, John Davidson, Ernest Dowson, Lionel Johnson, and W. B. Yeats, who dominated the literary scene of the 1890s. This book also explores the lesser-known but equally significant advances made by notable women poets, including Michael Field, Amy Levy, Charlotte Mew, Alice Meynell, A. Mary F. Robinson, and Graham R. Tomson. The Fin-de-Siecle Poem brings together innovative research on poetry that has been typecast as the attenuated Victorianism that was rejected by Modernism. The contributors underscore the remarkable innovations in English poetry of the 1880s and 1890s and show how women poets stood shoulder-to-shoulder with their better-known male contemporaries.

It's One O'Clock and Here Is Mary Margaret McBride: A Radio Biography

While there have been more than a few fine radio histories written by professional and nonprofessional historians in the last forty years, the last decade must be the golden age of radio scholarship. This is especially true of scholarship about radio's relation to American social and cultural histories, such as Susan J. Douglas's Listening In (2004) and Michele Hilmes's Radio Voices (1997). Those two scholars are attentive to the gendered dimensions of these histories, and Susan Ware's It's One O'Clock and Here Is Mary Margaret McBride continues this current focus in radio scholarship. Ware has not written about broadcast history before, but she has written biographies of women who might be considered, among other things, media celebrities (such as the aviator Amelia Earhart). Her biography of McBride, one of radio's most famous talk show hosts in the 1930s and 1940s, will not disappoint readers who are familiar with Ware's past contributions to feminist history and historiography, which have grounded biographical narratives of notable women in perceptive, thoroughly researched accounts of social and cultural contexts.

Bathsheba's Breast: Women, Cancer and History (review)

Reviewed by: Bathsheba’s Breast: Women, Cancer and History Mindy A. Schwartz Bathsheba’s Breast: Women, Cancer and History. By James S. Olson. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins Univ. Press, 2005. Pp. 320. $26.95 (cloth), $26.95 (paper). This remarkable book, originally published in 2002 and recently reissued in paperback, probes the history of breast cancer, unquestionably one of the most dreaded diseases affecting women. The author, James S. Olson, is both the chair of the History Department at Sam Houston State University and a cancer survivor. In his introduction, we learn that he contemplated this book during his own personal odyssey with cancer and its treatment. The book examines breast cancer as both medical condition and social phenomenon. Although heart disease is a far more prevalent cause of death in women and lung cancer has a greater case mortality, women uniformly and disproportionately fear breast cancer, largely due to the fact that, in addition to being a prevalent and life threatening disease, breast cancer involves potential disfigurement and a broad assault on one's self esteem and sexuality. The book traces the chronology of diagnosis and treatment of breast cancer. Both Hippocrates and Galen knew this disorder. Though no longer thought to be due to an excess of "black bile," the cause of breast cancer remains mysterious to this day. Olson traces the progress in our understanding of this disorder through the traditional landmarks of medical history: developments in surgical anesthesia and antiseptic technique, the discovery of x-rays and radiology, radioactivity and radiation therapy, and advances in pathology and staging. His grasp of the relevant medical issues is comprehensive, and his chronology provides the framework through which he interweaves the current controversies, including the rise and fall of hormonal therapy, breast implants, environmental carcinogens, pesticides, and, most recently, ecogenetics. What makes this book so compelling is Olson's ability to communicate the experience of having this affliction through the cases of famous (and infamous) women throughout time. The book is a veritable who's who of women with breast cancer. It includes unforgettable women such as Dr. Jerri Nielsen, the emergency physician in Antarctica who excised her own tumor and then went on to treat herself with adjuvant chemotherapy, as well as such notable women as Anne of Austria (mother of Louis XIV), George Washington's mother, Adolf Hitler's mother, and Abigail Adams (daughter of John and Abigail Adams and the sister of president John Quincy Adams.) Olson makes their situations memorable and accessible to a modern audience. His descriptions of surgical treatment in the pre-analgesic and pre-antibiotic era (when the operation required a male physician with brute strength and a lightning fast pace) are unforgettable and harrowing. Olson leads us through the unexplored territory of infamous diseases in modernity. Of late, a handful of diseases—breast cancer among them—have become [End Page 147] lightning rods for larger a social movements. What started as a few demanding and entitled patients with breast cancer has evolved into a readily identifiable cause involving power, presence, money, and politics. It is clearly as effective as is its more controversial counterpart Act Up, the highly political organization of the early HIV movement. The effectiveness of the breast cancer lobby, however, reflects the particular attributes of women-run organizations, such as grassroots lobbying, along with local and community networks of family, coworkers, and friends. Olson draws our attention to the evolution of cancer patient labels from "victims" or "sufferers" to the current terminology of "cancer survivors." The ubiquitous (and now mundane) pink ribbons are a testament of this sisterhood of survivors and supporters who relinquish dependency for empowerment. Olson also emphasizes the new and critical roles played by advocacy groups, self-help movements, alternative medicine, and evidence-based practice. At the heart of the book are the controversies around the evolution of surgery. Time has barely diminished the legacy of the character and phenomenon that was William Stewart Halsted. After 100 years, it is still Halsted's eponymous procedure—the radical mastectomy—that remains the standard against which all treatments are measured. Halsted's classic operation removed the breast tissue and the underlying lymph nodes and the pectoralis muscle en...

How to Make It as a Woman: Collective Biographical History from Victoria to the Present by Alison Booth

I072 Reviews and English-speaking cultural systems from the eighteenth century (Laclos's Les Li aisons dangereuses, 1782) to the very recent past (Jens Sparschuh's Lavaters Maske (Cologne: Kiepenheuer &Witsch, 1997) and Jeffrey Ford's The Physiognomy (New York: Avon, I997)). The volume marks an interdisciplinary effort in the truest sense: not only is Lavater's legacy approached from philosophical, theological, scientific, literary, pho tographic, and artistic angles, it is also traced in the French, German, British, and American cultural contexts. The appropriation of Lavater's teachings becomes un derstandable as amirror of themodern transformation of European culture: not only modern techniques (mechanical representations of nature) but also modern concerns (anonymity and facelessness in the urban metropolis) can be studied with Lavater as the cue. In this volume, the engagement with Lavater's legacy is showcased as a truly rewarding and timely activity. NATIONAL UNIVERSITY OF IRELAND, MAYNOOTH FLORIAN KROBB How to Make it as aWoman: Collective Biographical History from Victoria to thePre sent. By ALISON BOOTH. (Women inCulture and Society) Chicago and London: University of Chicago Press. 2004. 423 pp. /17.50. ISBN 0-226-o6546-4. Taking as her subject the underexplored area of female prosopography, Alison Booth offers a fascinating and insightful exploration of the significance of these texts and the way inwhich they have both challenged and reinforced concepts of womanhood, gender difference, nationhood, race, and class. Exploring the problematic categoriza tion of women throughout history, Booth considers the (mis)representation of women in collective biographies. Uncovering over goo collective biographies of women pub lished between I830 and 1940 (this exhaustive bibliography is included in an ap pendix, with an annotated version available online at http://etext.lib.virginia.edu/ WomensBios), Booth argues convincingly for the influence of these texts in con structing representative 'types' of womanhood, and thus lays the groundwork for further study in this area. The large number of female prosopographies listed in the bibliography is indicative of the wide scope of Booth's study, and, inevitably, the author is selective in terms of her approach, electing to focus primarily on the broader themes of biography and gender, with a comprehensive exploration of a number of female 'types' (e.g. heroic women, Medusas) supported by a detailed study of a few individual women, whose reputations have been directly influenced by their inclusion in or exclusion from collective biographies. Of these individuals, Queen Victoria epitomizes the extent towhich representation can influence reputation-a woman, as Booth observes, 'so representative, she is hard to distinguish' (p. 264). Of particular interest is Booth's analysis of how eminent women have directly influenced the reputations of other notable women through (sometimes negative) biographical depictions of them: Anna Jameson's descent into relative obscurity was, Booth argues, aided by Harriet Marti neau's less than complimentary obituary, while Charlotte Bronte's reputation in the nineteenth century was, in part, shaped byMargaret Oliphant's (rather negative) and Elizabeth Gaskell's (more positive) biographical representations. Through the selective process of inclusion and exclusion which Booth herself in evitably employs, her position becomes analogous with that of the editors and authors of collective female biographies, who effectively determined which women were to be represented in society's collective historical conscience. Thus Booth imitates the authors and editors of nineteenth-century prosopographies, selecting for her reader's attention various prominent women and offering a synopsis of their lives and contri butions to history. However, Booth's study goes much further than this, forcing us to MLR, 101.4, 2oo6 I073 question the implications of these varying constructions of 'representative' feminine types. Her awareness of her problematic position as author of a text on the represen tation of women in collective biographies leads her to question feminist criticism's approach to the past-particularly its emphasis on literary women-forcing the fe minist reader to consider feminism's selectivity and tendency to overlook or dismiss women who do not conform to certain expectations. Feminist criticism has, in a sense, been as selective as the authors of female prosopographies in determining who has 'made it' as awoman. Booth suggests that Virginia Woolf encouraged the trend of dis missing from history certain previously eminent women...

Daughters of the Nile: Photographs of Egyptian Women's Movements, 1900-1960 (review)

Reviewed by: Daughters of the Nile: Photographs of Egyptian Women’s Movements, 1900-1960 Laura Bier Daughters of the Nile: Photographs of Egyptian Women’s Movements, 1900-1960Hind and Nadia Wassef, eds. Cairo: American University of Cairo Press, 2001. Had it been written a decade ago, Daughters of the Nile would have been on the cutting edge of research on the history of Egyptian women's political activism. At that time, attempts to write women back into Egypt's [End Page 109] modern history were just beginning to bear fruit, at times complementing and at other times challenging and rewriting conventional historical narratives. Appearing now, Daughters of the Nile, a compilation of photographs celebrating half a century of Egyptian women's activism and participation in political movements, appears a bit old fashioned. It neither draws on the most recent scholarship on women in Egypt, which has attempted to move beyond a focus on notable women to the project of recovering voices by exploring how gender worked as a constitutive element of political and social discourse, nor does it add much to the work by scholars such as Margot Badran and Beth Baron, whose pioneering monographs set the standard for Egyptian women's history in the early 1990s. Still, there are things to recommend this thoughtful compilation of photographs. Editors Hind and Nadia Wassef clearly have exerted an enormous amount of effort in gathering a wide variety of images, some of which are from private collections and never before have appeared in published form, as well as many others that appeared in the popular and women's press. These include formal portraits of prominent women activists and photos chronicling their various activities. These are arranged thematically rather than chronologically, a recognition by the authors that "developments seldom occur in historical narrative's linear terms" (4). Captions are simple and in many cases allow the images to speak for themselves. An introduction does the work of laying out the theoretical and historical context necessary to guide readers. One of the most noteworthy and novel aspects of the book is that it is bilingual: both the introduction and the captions are presented in English and Arabic, making it more accessible to an Egyptian audience. The inclusion of English and Arabic in the same book speaks to the aims of the work itself. The editors, both active in women's issues in Egypt, locate their project as a work of scholarship and a self-conscious feminist attempt to reclaim a very rich heritage of Egyptian women's involvement in politics and social movements for a new generation of women activists, hence the book's emphasis on women's "agency." According to the editors, most scholars have analyzed photographs of Middle Eastern women through the lens of anti-Orientalist critique, "presenting a one-sided view that emphasizes women's subjectivity and denies women agency" (2). This collection is a useful attempt to shift [End Page 110] the focus from how photography portrayed women to how women appropriated photographic technology to serve their own ends. The photos, particularly those that appeared in the women's and popular press, speak to the ways in which politically active Egyptian women began to court the press for its power to disseminate images. This raises some interesting issues, but they are not issues that are, or can be, fully explored without additional analysis of the individual photos themselves, as well as a more extended history of Egyptian photography and photographers in the first half of the twentieth century. Largely missing from the work are photos of non-elite women. The authors, to their credit, are conscious of the "gap between housemaids and hanims" in the collection and make an effort to address the issue in the introduction. But this absence speaks to the wider theoretical and conceptual choices made by the authors. It is not simply that photos of non-elite women are not represented in the collection. It is also the aim of the authors themselves to write women back into an ultimately nationalist narrative of history. This work succeeds, but one wonders if the narrative itself could have been decentered further. How, for example, did the leaders...

Front-page women journalists, 1920-1950

During a time when female reporters were almost always relegated to the society and women's pages of the newspapers, a few hundred notable women broke barriers and wrote their way onto the front pages of metropolitan newspapers. Front-Page Women Journalists, 1920-1950 takes a look at the lives and careers of women who worked successfully in this male-dominated profession. Kathleen A. Cairns examines the roles women played in early-twentieth-century newspaper journalism and the influence they had on future generations of newspaperwomen through the examples of Agness Underwood, Charlotta Bass, and Ruth Finney. Each of these front-page women faced her own challenges, whether in regard to class, race, or gender. To get to the newsroom, and to stay there, they had to craft subtle, clever, and exhausting strategies. They had to be tough but compassionate, deferential yet independent, tenacious but also gracious. Most important, they could never openly challenge larger cultural assumptions about gender or suggest that they sought to advance the status of all women as well as themselves. In spite of these challenges, front-page women played a significant role in reshaping public perceptions about women's roles. The public nature of journalism gave these women a large audience and a prominent stage on which to act out new professional identities. Their audience witnessed them traipsing through war zones, debating politics, and gaining scoops on high-profile criminal cases. The women viewed themselves as path-breakers, although they rarely openly acknowledged it. Between the lines, however, they suggested that they understood how important their success was to future generations of women. They quietly mentored other young female reporters, paved the way for the eventual admission of women into the all-male press clubs, and opened up more career opportunities for women.

In her own words: Aileen Cavanagh

Last year, the IEEE History Center presented in these pages biographies of four figures in the history of IEEE and of technologies for which first-hand material was available in our collections, with the outlines of their lives enhanced through the use of first-person accounts. The feature was entitled In His Own Words. Although all four individuals were more than worthy, all were male, and we fear our title inadvertently may have driven home the point that, historically, social, economic, and political pressures kept women underrepresented in our profession. Despite these forces, however, over the years many women have managed to contribute greatly to IEEE and to IEEE-related professions and technologies. It is important for a number of reasons, including role modeling for today's young women, to highlight the achievements of these pioneers. Since March is Women's History Month, the publication partially rectifies their oversight by presenting one of these notable women, Aileen Cavanagh, In Her Own Words.

Women Artists; Works from the National Museum of Women in the Arts

Beautifully designed and illustrated, Artists: Works from the National Museum of Women in the features eighty-six notable women artists who have helped shape the world of art for the past five hundred years, from the Renaissance to the present. Written by the art historian Nancy G. Heller and showcasing the most noteworthy artists and key holdings of the National Museum of Women in the Arts in Washington, D.C., Artists authoritatively records the history of women in art. Among the artists featured are the Italian Renaissance painter Lavinia Fontanta, considered Western Europe's first professional woman artist; the eighteenth-century silversmith Louisa Courtauld of England, one of the most important women of her time in the silver trade; modern-day artists such as Louise Bourgeois, Elizabeth Catlett, and Nan Goldin; and other legendary artists, including Berenice Abbott, Mary Cassatt, Louise Dahl-Wolfe, Helen Frankenthaler, Frida Kahlo, Lee Krasner, Maria Montoya Martinez, and Georgia O'Keeffe, among many others. Artists' books from the collection are featured in a special section. Artists presents the artists and their works in eight sections representing chronological and regional groupings. Each section opens with an introductory essay that places the works in a historical context, providing a general overview of the social and political forces that shaped the era and region in which the works were created. In addition to illustrating the artists' works in full color, Artists provides a portrait of each artist, a brief biographical entry, and a discussion of her work. Included is a complete listing of the artists whose works constitute themuseum's 2,600 holdings.

Notable Women of China: Shang Dynasty to the Early Twentieth Century (review)

Notable Women of China: Shang Dynasty to the Early Twentieth Century (review)

The Trials of "Las Mujeres Pensantes": Juana Inés and María Luisa Find a Room of Their Own

... after making Sor Juana, after telling dramatic story of this extraordinary woman--I don't think in world there's been a woman with competence and richness of mind of Sor Juana--I said to my own sex, to my beloved sisters, here are five films each with questioning women. Here are examples by which to model your own identities. Maria Luisa Bemberg, qtd. in Caleb Bach 27. Maria Luisa Bemberg is one of more significant among handful of women filmmakers working in contemporary Latin American cinema (recognizing her death in 1995). During her brief career, she made films that are not only examples of quality cinematographic production in Latin American context, but also important feminist interventions into filmmaking. Even she noted her unique position, describing herself and her positive reception as the first successful grandmother filmmaker in [Argentina] (qtd. in Bach 23). Her exceptional status in male-domi-nated spheres--be they artistic, intellectual or social is distantly parallel to another avis rara, woman considered by many to be first feminist of America, (1) Sor Juana Ines de la Cruz. It is therefore significant that one of her last projects is a film on life of Sor Juana, Yo, la peor de todas (1990). True to life and work of her subject, director identified project as part of her continued efforts to break with traditional stereotypes of women: Para mi era imperativo contar la historia de esta mujer, porque uno de los compromisos eticos y morales que asumi cuando decidi hacer cine era tratar de romper el cliche tradicional que tiene el cine sobre la mujer, estereotipo con el cual es dificil que las mujeres pensantes puedan identificarse (Burton-Carvajal 78, my emphasis). The basis of film is monumental literary psycho-biography of Sor Juana, Sor Juana Ines de la Cruz, o las trampas de la fe (1982), by Octavio Paz. Stephanie Merrim contends in her introduction to Feminist perspectives on Sor Juana Ines de la Cruz (1991) that Paz's work has widened parameters for feminist study on this notable woman: Sor Juana Ines de la Cruz at once represents a milestone and a watershed in critical reception of Baroque writer's works: as it rounds off both Paz's own intellectual endeavors and critical tradition surrounding Sor Juana, study also paves way for a more enlightened feminist understanding of its subject.... [T]he work avoids ideological blunders regarding its female subject, be they overt or implicit, so rife in other critical studies. (16) Merrim takes necessary steps of problematizing his analysis, yet she also acknowledges its success in dispelling earlier psychologistic readings that were overtly negative and sexist in their assessment of Sor Juana. (2) Merrim's largely favorable treatment of Paz provides an unintentional apology for Bemberg's sole reliance on his work, a fact that may otherwise be unpalatable to many feminists to extent that her feminist film does not utilize in anyway work by feminist scholars such as Dorothy Schons, Rosario Castellanos, Anita Arroyo, or Marie-Cecile Benassy-Berling, all of whom, between 1925 (Schons) and 1982 (Benassy-Berling)--i.e. before screenplay for film was written--have contributed greatly to a biographical, cultural, literary and historical understanding of Sor Juana from a feminist critical perspective. Despite this deficiency, Bemberg uses work of Paz to inserta clear and direct feminist message into her film, explicitly highlighting Sor Juana's struggles as a woman in a restricted patfiarchal environment. Consequently, Iris recognition of Sor Juana as a revolutionary and singular figure, most notably for her position as a woman intellectual in a male-centered and male-dominated universe, becomes motive and driving force of Bemberg's feminist recovery. …

La Grande Mademoiselle at the Court of France 1627-1693 (review)

Book Reviews247 Reviews Vincent J. Pitts. La Grande Mademoiselle at the Court of France 1627-1693. Baltimore: John Hopkins University Press, 2000. ISBN: 0-8018-6466-6. Pp. 367. $42.00. Vincent J. Pitts has written a remarkably thorough and accessible biography of Anne-Marie-Louise d'Orléans, also known as La Grande Mademoiselle , a cousin to Louis XIV. His account offers a rich and fascinating context in which to situate this "heroine ofthe Fronde" in the classic age ofabsolutism. Proceeding with care and precision, Pitts divides his study chronologically, spanning Mademoiselle's lifetime (1627-1693). The greatest strength ofhis work lies in its combination of a detailed critical study of a notable woman and a composite view ofthe intellectual and literary history ofher age. Pitts's study emphasizes Mademoiselle's perceptions of court life as evidenced by her Mémoires, letters, literary portraits, essays, and short stories . Pitts warns his readers that his book is not objective. Rather, "it attempts to see matters as Mademoiselle saw them, giving people and events the importance Mademoiselle assigned them, and to 'intervene' to offer appropriate background, suggest a modern insight, or correct any glaring errors of chronology in Mademoiselle's recollections" (xii). Viewed through Mademoiselle's writings, Pitts's text begins with an examination ofher childhood and continues with her insights into the ministries of Richelieu and Mazarin; her participation in the Fronde, eariiing her the lasting mistrust of Louis XIV; her deep disillusionment with her father (Gaston d'Orléans) and her betrayal at his hands; and her five long years of exile (Chapters 1-4). Pitts then traces Mademoiselle's return to the court and her effort to ingratiate herselfwith the inner circle ofqueen, king, cardinal, and younger brother; he details her complicated relationship with her stepmother and half sisters; and he concludes with her famous love affair and failed engagement to Antonin de Lauzun, a mere officer of the king's guard (Chapters 5-8). Throughout the study, Pitts shows Mademoiselle's struggle to maintain her independence of choice, especially in matrimonial matters. Mademoiselle's life and writings offer a running commentary on events as seen at the highest levels ofthe aristocracy, providing a unique perspective on seventeenth-century France. Mirrored in her writings are issues of class, gender, and misalliance; the evolution ofaristocratic resistance to the centralizing power of the state; the dissention and disarray within the royal family; and the clash between the public and private spheres. Her observations of Louis XIVs most successful years give rise to reflections on the paradox of her own time: women who had played a leading role in public life were subjected to abuse in private. As Pitts's account makes clear, Mademoiselle, strong as she may have been seen from the outside (she was called the "Second Maid of Orléans" after her heroic deeds during the Fronde), was a mere pawn in the court factions. Her attempts to control her own destiny, so clearly illustrated by the affaire Lauzun, were doomed to failure. Nonetheless, she takes pains to demonstrate that she remained in control of her life. 248Women in French Studies French literary specialists might be disappointed that the extracts from Mademoiselle's Mémoires and other works are offered only in translation, but their disappointment should be tempered by the precise and helpful notes at the end of each chapter as well as a comprehensive bibliography and index. Carefully nuanced and wide-ranging in its frame ofreference, Pitts's analysis sheds new light on our understanding of Mademoiselle's contribution to the history and literature of her time. Pitts crafts his writing with such suspense that he will seduce specialists and non-specialists alike. Vanessa H. ArnaudUniversity of California, Los Angeles Aimée Boutin. Maternal Echoes:The Poetry ofMarcelineDesbordes-Valmore and Alphonse de Lamartine-Newark: University of Delaware Press and London: Associated University Presses, 2001. ISBN: 0-87413-727-6. Pp. 246. This is a ground-breaking comparative analysis oftwo leading poets ofthe first generation of French romantics, Marceline Desbordes-Valmore and Alphonse de Lamartine. Although many studies of gendered writing situate women writers over and against their male counterparts, Boutin instead traces a matrilineal geneaology in...

Notable Women in American History: A Guide to Recommended Biographies and Autobiographies

Introduction Notable Women Appendix A: Notable Women by Date of Birth Appendix B: Notable Women by Country of Birth Appendix C: Notable Women by Title, Occupation, or Main Area of Interest Index

Chaste and Filial Women in Chinese Historical Writings of the Eleventh Century

In the eleventh century, Chinese historians made significant advances in their craft. They also promoted certain moral views that differed from those of their predecessors. In particular, they seem to have adopted a distinctive perspective on women. This is most apparent when one compares the accounts of Notable Women included in the Xin Tang shu with those written for a similar chapter of the Jiu Tang shu a century previously. The present paper takes some of these accounts as a point of departure for an examination of this issue, its background, and related matters, giving special focus to the work of Ouyang Xiu.

Women in U.S. history: a resource guide

Discover the best books, Web sites, audiovisual items, and other materials to research notable women of the United States. Learn about women from Colonial times to the present day who have made strides in many fields of endeavor including the arts, literature, politics, religion, science, and sports. Materials listed feature women from all regions of the country and from many American cultural groups. The guide concentrates on materials published or produced during the 1990s, and its final section outlines the field of women's history in terms of its historiography, theory and methodology, and its place in education.

The Changing Role of Women in Finance

Finance is a gun. Politics is knowing when to pull the trigger.' In these few words the taciturn Mafia boss Don Lucchese in The Godfather Part III highlights the inextricable link between money and power, which together represent most significant influences on society and gender throughout history. Until the 1960s the very title for this article would have been regarded as a contradiction in terms. With few notable exceptions, women and finance did not mix, largely because they were not given the opportunity to do so. Today, women represent a significant force for change in the financial services industry, both as a target market for financial products and as key employees within the financial institutions. To place the power of financial institutions in an economic context, pension funds and life assurance funds together own about two-thirds of the UK stock market, with a further tranche owned by other collective retail funds, such as unit trusts and open-ended investment companies. As a result, the investment companies that manage these funds effectively control British industry, and are the channel through which the funding for future businesses must flow. The simple fact is, therefore, that the boards of British companies are answerable on a more regular basis to private fund managers than they are to financial regulators or the government itself.