Merry Wiesner-Hank Book Review

Anne Orthwood’s Bastard: Sex and Law in Early Virginia by John Ruston Pagan highlights the paradoxical nature of life in the colonial times and how it aided the creation of American law. The four cases that resulted from the fornication between Anne Orthwood and John Kendall gave present historians a vivid image of how English settlers modified English traditions and began to create customs of their own. Furthermore, it was able to reveal some of the cultural, economical and political values in the colony of Virginia such as tobacco and unfree labor. They helped reveal the reasons why legal systems were created in the first place by documenting the prolongation of social order as well as the preservation of self interest. Anne Orthwood’s Bastard

The values and traditions that women were expected to hold changed extravagantly in the 700 years between the deaths of Lucretia and Perpetua. Through their respective documents, “Rape of Lucretia,” and “The Martyrdom of Saints Perpetua and Felicitas,” we can see the change of ideals in the form of expecting Roman women to do chores and stay at home, while the Roman/Christian women are expected to hold their faith and Christian values dear.

In 1641, a law stated that women found guilty of adultery were punished by death, men would receive only a whipping for the same crime (Vann 1). It was viewed as a greater harm to society if a woman was to birth an illegitimate child for the action was viewed as a greater moral offense. Girls were required to preserve their virginity until marriage. Afterwards, “it was considered a husband’s duty to ensure his wife’s fidelity by preventing all situations that could awaken her sensuality” (Brabcová 3). Women were not to have sex or have children but as soon as they were married it was expected for them to bear children for the family. During this time “A woman's most important commodity was her virginity,” (Murphy 1). It was important to society that women were virgins before marriage and when married they were to have many children.

In almost every Count that has ever been reigned in the middle ages, there is no leader like Count Charles, who takes a risky approach to governing a land with the idea of religion as an important aspect of his position. Count Charles, aka “Blessed Charles the Good” is well known for feeding the poor, promoting peace and security, but religion is definitely a big influence to his reign as the Count of Flanders. At first, before doing any research on Count Charles’ religious ruling, I would already believe that Charles is a spiritual nobleman that everyone would admire because of how devastated Flanders felt when they heard about his death in 1127. Fortunately, my thoughts on Count Charles

Michel Foucault was a French philosopher, philologist and social theorist. He made discourses on the relationship between power and knowledge and about how they are utilized as a form of social control through social establishments. This essay talks about Michel Foucault’s discourse on sexuality. He put forward his theory of the history of sexuality. He talked about how the experts began examining sexuality in a scientific manner in order to learn the “truth” of sex.

Give a brief description of the main features of the Viking expansion – raiding and trading routes, major settlements and conquests and discuss the different images of Vikings as traders and raiders and why the expansion stopped.

Firstly, what was the women, in particular, in the eyes of husbands and fathers in the family? In early modern Europe, many people believe in that, the most appropriate place for women was the family which gives them certain responsibilities like obedient daughters, wives, and widows. Many books and theories included that women should marry and constitute their own family. These kinds of thoughts were strengthened by medical assessment about '' the biological nature of women, who were thought to be at risk of severe physical and mental illness if they did not engage in regular sexual relations.'' General belief in that time was that women were sexually more greedy, which came in sight in ribald

A general rule is that respect for women is only found in a society in which monogamy is the rule. We must distinguish between the affected idolatry which was enjoyed by the customs of chivalry and the equality which was upheld by the Church. The doctrine of the spiritual equality of women, the sanctity of the marriage, and the rules of consanguinity, divorce and remarriage, though sometimes perverted to ambitious purposes, nevertheless were powerful engines influencing the Roles of Women in the Middle Ages, and raising their condition in the

In search of religious freedom a group of devout Christians sailed across the ocean only to come across a new land, radically different from the one they left behind. From the initial journey, to the formation of the colonies, and finally their complicated relationship with “non-believers” Puritans strongly held religious convictions has played a key role in all of this.

Regardless of a colony’s religious situation, whether they allowed complete freedom of worship or were occupied by strict religious laws, all thirteen colonies were affected by a movement called the Great Awakening. Generally, the Great Awakening is characterized by a fervent revival in religion practice.Although, this movement had a major impact on most aspects of colonial life, it is important to note the effect it had on religion and how that in turn affected the political life of the colonist. Because of The Great Awakening, many ministers lost authority the authority they held over because more people were taking to studying the Bible in their own homes. This idea would have larger implications for the future. Colonists were seeing themselves

In the 1600s many emigrants from England came to settle in North America. Most of the English at the time were Christian, and one of the several reasons to explore was to spread the word of God. Most of the documents mention how the new colonists must serve their God and keep themselves holy and to not indulge in temptations that would stray them from their original goals. However, by the 1700s the distinct group that settled in the New England region was split into two groups. The split of the two groups came from gold diggers, the temptation of gold overweight their original goal, thus causing the group to split into two groups, the Christians and the Gold Diggers.

This paper examines whether the poet Anne Bradstreet managed to write autonomously even though she was part of the patriarchic Puritan community. As considering all works of her life would go beyond the limits of this paper, the focus is only on her first publications. Therefore, a short definition of autonomy and gender are given. Secondly, information about the Puritan community as well as Anne Bradstreet is provided. Next, several poems of Anne Bradstreet’s first publications, The Tenth Muse as well as ‚The Author to her book‘ are analyzed in relation to the evidence of autonomy. Finally, the paper concludes by analyzing to what extent Anne Bradstreet accomplished to write autonomously based on the preliminary research.

In the fourteen century, men were always the superior, head of the household, the breadwinner, but women were always inferior, they would stay at home, do the house work, cook, and never would have a job. Well, times have changed. Women are reaching an equal status to men in political, social and economic matters It’s part of the idea called Feminism. In many ways the Wife of Bath displays many characteristic of women in the 21st century. Instead of being directed by men, she views herself as an independent person. Throughout her introduction of the tale, and the story itself, we see the Wife of Bath as an experienced, intellectual woman, who despite living in a world of patriarchal power, provides for herself financially, emotionally, and physically. As a feminist icon, she confronts serious social issues that illustrate the subjugation women faced.

LGBT/ same-sex marriage is one of the most heated and controversial debates in our current society. Unlike the past thousands of years whereas marriage was defined as a legal union between a man and a woman, now the concept of marriage has been extended to a broader context. “Homosexuality” in most cultures is viewed as a disgrace, and it is often considered as a great sin from a religious aspect. But now our society has evolved, we gained clarity and reasons. We are now able to acknowledge and accept people who are different whereas we use to enslave and discriminate people who were a little different. But still, it seems we have a long way to

“People are always ready to see the lesbian as wearing a felt hat, her hair short, and a necktie; her mannishness is seen as an abnormality indicating a hormonal imbalance” (De Beauvoir, 479). With this quote French feminist writer, Simone the Beauvoir, starts her chapter on “The Lesbian” in her book The Second Sex (1949). It is peculiar that the stereotype of the masculine lesbian can still be found in contemporary popular culture and literature, yet slightly altered to a more contemporary version. This chapter will explain what lesbian literature is, give some historical background on how lesbian literature developed from 600BC to present day, and show various lesbian identities and stereotypes that recur in lesbian fiction. As stated in