Preferred Name
Tess Evans
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 4.0 License.
Date of Graduation
Spring 2017
Document Type
Thesis
Degree Name
Master of Arts (MA)
Department
Department of History
Advisor(s)
Philip D. Dillard
Gabrielle Lanier
Emily Westkaemper
Abstract
This thesis project investigates how northern American women in the nineteenth-century defied civility and what the consequences were. Primary and secondary source research of poetry, prose, letters, government documents, and personal accounts reveal that these women were able to step out of the domestic sphere to create a new world for themselves without the aid of males. This paper and accompanying online exhibit, Civil War Successes, explores how defying the notions of a civil woman paved the way for an earlier women’s movement than the twentieth-century. A nation torn apart by civil war saw women creating outlets for their thoughts, inspiring others, as well as liberating and acculturating African Americans in the South Carolina Sea Islands.
Recommended Citation
Evans, Tess, "Defying civility: Female writers and educators in nineteenth-century America" (2017). Masters Theses, 2010-2019. 509.
https://commons.lib.jmu.edu/master201019/509
