2017 Berkshire Conference on the History of Women, Genders and Sexualities

June 01 - 04, 2017

This panel explores the politics of home for American women in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. The home as both idea and physical space shaped women’s political activities at the turn of the century. During a period of immense social, cultural, and economic change, women continued to struggle against pervading nineteenth-century gender norms that positioned their identities and influence solely within the domestic sphere. Women of diverse backgrounds – from elite African American women in the South to working-class immigrant women in mid-western and eastern cities to Native American, Chinese, and Mormon women in the West – worked within the ideology of domesticity to fight against the limitations imposed on them. Finding the home to be meaningful and useful in their struggles for greater equality, these women created social movements centered on the improvement of home that had much larger consequences. Indeed, major social issues like racial violence and ethnic assimilation revolved in part around the idea and space of home. By exploiting their "natural" connection with home, women inserted themselves into these important national debates. Writing about home in the popular domestic literature genre was only the beginning; women engaged the politics of home through many different forms of popular culture. Focusing on women’s use of popular culture – particularly widespread print media like newspapers, magazines, and novels – this panel reveals how the home, which is so often considered a decidedly conservative and oppressive space, was for many American women a catalyst for activism and social change.