Women's Voices
Selected and introduced by Sarah A. Morgan Smith
This collection of documents continues the Ashbrook Center’s extended series of document collections covering major periods, themes, and institutions in American history and government. It is the second volume in the religion in American history and politics series, one of the subsets within the overall Ashbrook collection. Given the centrality of religion in American history, these ideas and conflicts were also core elements of that broader history. This volume looks at one dimension of American religious history: the words and deeds of American religious women. It shows how at every stage of American history they were present, testifying and working, even as the importance of their work was often unacknowledged. Indeed, one of the most powerful themes of the collection is faithful perseverance in the face of opposition, and the power of such perseverance to move mountains.
Documents Include:
- Mary Rowlandson, The Sovereignty and Goodness of God, 1682
- Mother Ann Lee, Testimonies, c. 1780
- Rebecca Gratz, Report on the Necessity of Jewish Education, 1835
- Ann Eliza Young, “The Revelation on Celestial Marriage: Trouble Among the Saints,” 1875
- Hannah Whithall Smith, “Holiness Camp Meetings,” 1903
- Jane Addams, “Personal Reactions During the War,” 1922
- Flannery O’Connor, “The Catholic Novelist in the Protestant South,” c. 1964
- Marilynne Robinson, “The Tyranny of Petty Coercion,” 1999
- Amina Wadud, “Citizenship and Faith,” 2005