O Sisters Ain’t You Happy?: Gender, Family, and Community Among the Harvard and Shirley Shakers, 1781-1918 (Women and Gender in Religion)

Amazon.com Price: $34.95 (as of 02/05/2019 14:56 PST- Details)

Categories: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Description

Compelling, in-depth analysis of Shaker villages that sheds light on how communal attitudes helped to disencumber Shaker women. Drawing on archival material from Shaker members, observers, and apostates, noted historian Suzanne R. Thurman offers a scholarly yet eminently readable study of life in two of the oldest, most prominent American Shaker villages: the Harvard and Shirley communities of Massachusetts. While she delves into the complex fabric of Shaker social life, Thurman challenges traditional perceptions of gender roles throughout the community. Shaker spiritual and social ethics, she points out, strongly favored women. Celibacy and an androgynous theology, for example, allowed androgynous social roles to adapt. Some other key factor was once the energetic arena of nineteenth-century reformers and intellectuals in nearby Boston. With admirable detail, Thurman documents the relationship that grew between these forward thinkers and the Believers. Their influence, she argues, enlightened Shaker consciousness and empowered their women of Harvard and Shirley with opportunities denied them on the planet at large. The creator also explores links, particularly economic, between Shakers and the gr

Related products

Home » Shop » Books » Subjects » Arts and Photography » History and Criticism » History » Asia » Japan » General » O Sisters Ain’t You Happy?: Gender, Family, and Community Among the Harvard and Shirley Shakers, 1781-1918 (Women and Gender in Religion)

Recent Products