Women's History: A Guide to Sources at Hagley Museum and Library

(Hardback)

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Description

Traditionally, scholars have used Hagley to study the history of business and technology, but in the 1990s, they have begun to use Hagley's collections to examine such issues as gender and the workplace, domesticity, female entrepreneurs, engendering business, gender and consumption, and fashion in the women's clothing industry. This guide reinterprets the Hagley collections within the context of women's history, making them more accessible to researchers in Women's Studies. The volume describes over 300 manuscript, archival, and pictorial collections, covering in six topical chapters such subjects as 18th and 19th century women in France and America, the leisure class, employment and entrepreneurship, the culture of consumption, and benevolence, reform, religion, and politics. The volume opens with an introductory essay tracing the changes in historical literature and describing the ways in which Hagley's collections speak to recent scholarship in women's history. Each of the six topical chapters opens with an introduction relating the relevant collections to the historical literature and then provides detailed series descriptions, including collection name, inclusive dates, quantity and accession number, a historical or biographical sketch, and a scope and content note.

Reviews

"This new guide by archivist Lynn Ann Catanese reveals the rich sources for studying women's history in the Hagley Museum and Library collections, providing an enticing invitation and indispensable aid to scholars in a range of research areas. This intelligently produced work will certainly meet the Hagley's goal of attracting researchers....[W]e must all be grateful to Lynn Ann Catanese for the meticulous research and thoughtful design that went into creating this outstanding reference....Catanese's excellent guide will facilitate scholars finding the formerly hidden gems about women's history in the extensive and complex array of research collections at Hagley."-The Journal of American History
This new guide by archivist Lynn Ann Catanese reveals the rich sources for studying women's history in the Hagley Museum and Library collections, providing an enticing invitation and indispensable aid to scholars in a range of research areas. This intelligently produced work will certainly meet the Hagley's goal of attracting researchers....[W]e must all be grateful to Lynn Ann Catanese for the meticulous research and thoughtful design that went into creating this outstanding reference....Catanese's excellent guide will facilitate scholars finding the formerly hidden gems about women's history in the extensive and complex array of research collections at Hagley.-The Journal of American History
This volume reveals rich collections of letters, household accounts, and business records, as they relate to women, dating from the 18th century to the present....interested readers will find much more than the financial history of American women.-Choice
"This volume reveals rich collections of letters, household accounts, and business records, as they relate to women, dating from the 18th century to the present....interested readers will find much more than the financial history of American women."-Choice

Author Bio

LYNN ANN CATANESE is an archivist at Hagley Museum and Library and specializes in women's history.