Second to None: A Documentary History of American Women. Volume 2, From 1865 to the Present

by Ruth Barnes Moynihan (Editor), Laurie Crumpacker (Editor), Cynthia Russett (Editor)

At the beginning of the twentieth century it was still necessary for women to ask lawmakers, "Are women persons?" The rights and treatment of women in their homes, workplaces, and government were issues that men in power often preferred to ignore. But women refused to remain silent. This volume of Second to None, like volume 1, presents a multiplicity of voices, demonstrating that there is not a representative American woman, but many women worth remembering. Here are women who are shapers of history, as well as its victims. In diaries, letters, speeches, songs, petitions, essays, photographs, and cartoons they describe, rejoice, exhort, complain, advertise, and joke, revealing women's role as community builders in every time and locale and registering their emergence into the public spheres of political, social, and economic life. The documents also demonstrate the value of gender analysis, for women's differences—in age, race, sexual orientation, class, geographical or ethnic origin, abilities or disabilities, and values—are shown to be as important as their commonalities. Volume 2 contains 122 selections, ranging from a tract by Elizabeth Cady Stanton to the testimony of Anita Hill. Both volumes include section introductions that set the historical stage and comment on the significance of the selections.

365 pages, Paperback

Published June 1, 1994

Reviews

[Olivia Duax · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was probably the best textbook I have ever read. I really enjoyed the fact that the book was a culmination of real women of the time. It was amazing hearing from women about their lives, not just analyzing what it was like after the fact.