Syllabus for History 79, last taught Spring 1999

To Return to Professor Dinan's Home Page, click here.

The goal of this course is to provide an overview of the roles of women in early modern European society. Over the course of the semester we will examine four principal themes.
First, how do times of radical change (political, social or economic) liberate and/or restrict women. Second, how are women defined as symbols of disorder and order in early modern Europe. Third, how have women’s roles in the family changed over time? Finally, what is power and how do men and women access it differently? Beyond this we will investigate more intensively critical events which have changed the lives of women and discuss how women acted in response. It is assumed that all students have had an introductory course in the history of Europe (namely, History 1). Any student lacking this background, or anyone wishing to better understand the political / economic context of this course, should see the me immediately and I will suggest a text to read to help you better understand the historical background for this course.

A second purpose of this course will be to develop the critical reading, thinking and writing skills of students. This course will contain both lecture periods and discussion periods; it is imperative that all students come to class prepared to discuss the week’s reading. Small groups of students will make weekly presentations about the reading assignments to stimulate class discussion. There will be three papers due over the course of the semester. Two short papers (5-6 pages) discussing the assigned readings on a particular topic and may include reference to a particular film, and one longer (10-12 page) paper on a topic of your choice that will use class readings and external sources. There will also be a cumulative final exam.

The final exam may only be taken late in cases of medical or family emergencies. Papers that are handed in late lose one letter grade for each day late. This class meets only twice a week, therefore, students are permitted three unexcused absence in this course; four or more unexcused absences will result in the failure of the student.

GRADE DISTRIBUTION:
Short paper 1 20% Final exam 20%
Short paper 2 20% Class participation 10%
Long paper 30%

REQUIRED TEXTS:
The Memoirs of Glückel of Hameln.
Molière, The School for Wives and The Learned Ladies.
Ozment, Steven. Magdalena and Balthasar: An Intimate Portrait of Life in Sixteenth-Century Europe.
Wiesner, Merry. Women and Gender in Early Modern Europe.
Wollstonecraft, Mary. A Vindication of the Rights of Women.
Course Reader, all additional sources and articles appear in the reader.

Class Schedule:
Week One Introduction
1/20 Introduction to History 80

Week Two Women and the Renaissance
1/25 Lecture: Gender, Family and Deviance
Readings Letter of Laura Cereta
Documents of marginal and poor women in the Renaissance

1/27 Class Discussion
Readings Joan Kelly, ”Did Women Have a Renaissance?”
Michael Rocke, “Gender and Sexual Culture in Renaissance Italy”
Stanley Chojhacki, “Daughters and Oligarchs: Gender and the Early Renaissance State”

UNIT I RELIGION AND MAGIC
Week Three Women and the Protestant Reformation
2/1 Lecture: From Cloister to Kitchen
Readings Ozment, Magdelena and Balthasar, 136-151
Memoirs of Glückel of Hamelm, 5-10, 40-45, 95-99

2/3 Class Discussion
Readings Wiesner, Chapter 6 “Religion”
Natalie Zemon Davis, “City Woman and Religious Change”
Merry Wiesner, “Ideology meets the Empire: reformed convents and the Reformation”

Week Four Women and the Catholic Reformation
2/8 Class time for paper analysis. You must bring a final draft of Paper 1

2/10 Lecture: Convents and Confraternities
Readings Teresa of Avila, The Book of Her Life, Chapters 1-5
Teresa of Avila, The Way of Perfection, Chapters 1-4, 9, 17
SHORT PAPER 1 DUE 2/10

Week Five Poverty and Religion
2/15 Class Discussion
Luisa Ciamitti, “One Saint Less: The Story of Angela Mellini, a Bolognese Seamstress”
Susan Dinan, “Confraternities as a Venue for Female Activism”
Allyson Poska, “When Love Goes Wrong: Getting Out of Marriage in Seventeenth-Century Spain”

2/17 Class Discussion
Readings Robert Jutte, "Poor Relief and Social Discipline in 16th Century Europe.”
Natalie Zemon Davis, “Poor Relief, Humanism and Heresy”
Ruth Liebowitz “Virgins in the Service of Christ”
Week Six Magic and Witchcraft
2/22 Lecture: Early Modern Witch Hunts
Readings: Selections from the Malleus Maleficarum

2/24 Class Discussion
Readings Wiesner, Chapter 7 “Witchcraft”
Christina Larner, “Was Witch-hunting Women Hunting?”
Lydal Roper, “Oedipus and the Devil”
UNIT TWO THE FEMALE LIFECYCLE
Week Seven Marriage and Family
2/29 Lecture: Marrriage, Children and Widowhood
Readings Ozment, Magdalena and Balthasar, 2-55, 89-109, 161-164
Memoirs of Glückel of Hameln, 32-39, 86-89, 146-154, 222-230
Film The Return of Martin Guerre

3/2 Class Discussion
Readings Sherrin Marshall Wyntges, “Survivors and status: widowhood and family in early modern Netherlands”
Chrisitane Klapisch Zuber, “The Cruel Mother”
Lyndal Roper, “Blood and Codpieces” masculinity in the early modern German town”
Week Eight
3/7
Reading
Reproduction and the Body
Lecture: Birth, Disease and Disorder
Ozment, Magdalena and Balthasar, 112-121
Memoirs of Glückel of Hameln, 47-56, 136-142, 209-217

3/9 Class Discussion
Readings Wiesner, Chapter 2 “The female life-cycle”
Evelyn Berriot-Salvadore, “The Discourse of Medicine and Science”
David Harley, “Ignorant Midwive: A Persistent Stereotype”
SHORT PAPER 2 DUE 3/9

Week Nine
Week Ten SPRING BREAK
Sexuality and Prostitution
3/21 Lecture: Sex and Crime
Readings

3/23 Class Discussion
Readings Sara F. Matthews Grieco, “The Body, Appearance and Sexuality”
Judith Brown, “Lesbian Sexuality in Medieval and Early Modern Europe.”
Lyndal Roper, “Discipline and Respectability: Prostitution an the Reformation Augsburg “

UNIT THREE: WOMEN IN THE PUBLIC SPHERE
Week Eleven Gendered Labor
3/28 Women and Work
Readings The Memoirs of Glückel of Hameln, 154-174, 177-180
Ozment, Magdelena and Balthasar, 70-78

3/30 Class Discussion
Readings Wiesner, Chapter 3 “Women’s economic role”
Olwen Hufton, “Women, Work and the Family”
Mary Elizabeth Perry, “In the Hands of Women”
Lecture: Educational Opportunities for Women

Week Twelve Women as Political Rulers in the 16th Century
4/4 Lecture: Queen Elizabeth I: Chastity and Order
John Knoxe, The First Blast of the Trumpet Against the Monstrous Regiment of Women, excerpts
Elizabeth I, Speeches from 1566, 1588, 1601, excerpts
Film Elizabeth
4/6 Class Discussion
Readings: Wiesner, Chapter 8, “Gender and Power”
Paula Louise Scalingi, “The scepter or the distaff: the question of female sovereignty, 1516-1607
Carol Levin, “Power, Politics and Sexuality: Images of Elizabeth I”
Week Thirteen The Literate Woman
4/134/15
Lecture: The Enlightenment and Women’s Education
Moliere, “The Learned Ladies “
Mary Wollstonecraft, A Vindication of the Rights of Woman, excerpts
Class Discussion
Wiesner, Chapter 4 “Literacy and Learning”
Londa Schiebinger, “The Public Route Barred”
Peter Petschauer, “Improving educational opportunities for girls in eighteenth-century Germany”
Week Fourteen The Enlightenment
4/18 Class Discussion
Dena Goodman, “Women and the Enlightenment”
Dena Goodman, “Enlightened Salons: the convergence of female and philosophic ambitions”
Sara Maza, “The Diamond Necklace Affair Revisited”

4/20
Week Fifteen
4/25 NO CLASS
Enlightenment and Revolution
Lecture: Liberté, Egalité and Franternité?
Readings4/27
Readings: Testimony of women active in the October Days
“The Declaration of the Rights of Women”Class Discussion
Lynn Hunt, “The many bodies of Marie-Antoinette: political pornography and the problem of the feminine in the French Revolution
Barrie Rose, “Feminism, women and the French Revolution”
Olwen Hufton, “Counter-Revolutionary Women”
LONG PAPER DUE 4/27