Emerging Feminism from Revolution to World War (Volume IV) (History of Women in the West)

The fourth volume in the ambitious project of the French historians Duby and Perrot to present the history of women from the antiquities till now proves that strong ambitions are worth pursuing. After antiquity, the Middle Ages, and the early modern period, this fourth volume deals with the nineteenth century. The final volume about the twentieth century is already published and with that a true masterpiece is done...This volume is fascinating, mainly because it gives such an extensive and comprehensive overview of the discourses of femininity and gender, and of all the arguments which have been used in relation to these themes in everyday knowledge, public debates, and social policies. -- Trudie Knijn Contemporary Sociology A History of Women in the West is a collection of thoughtful essays by leading European and American scholars...After so many centuries of confinement, drudgery, anonymity and speculation about whether or not women qualify as human, how fine to come to Volume IV and such bracing chapters as 'Daughters of Liberty and Revolutionary Citizens' and 'Stepping Out!' -- Elizabeth J. Sherman Washington Times A History of Women in the West is ambitious in conception and impressive in realization. -- Jessica Mann Literary Review