Material culture is not a subject which has to date attracted much attention from historians, whose usual source material is the written word. This volume shows just how illuminating the study of artifacts, and documentation concerning the acquisition and meaning of artifacts can be for the study of history in any period. Ranging from the use of clothing as votive offerings in ancient Greece to the function of reproductive technology in the 20th century, the scope of this volume is excitingly dismissive of traditional chronologies and disciplinary boundaries. Gender historians will not be surprised to find the historical meaning of many artifacts to be permeated by gender difference.

This collection of original essays explores the historical and cultural diversity of the experience of gender reversal over an exceptional geographical and chronological range. Topics cove- red include anthropology, history, literature.Gender reversal is a perennial theme in the cultures of both East and West. It emerges in classical Chinese theatre, in the ceremony consecrating the Japanese emperor, and in Hindu mythology; in the ancient Greek rites of Dionysos, in medieval Christian thought and in the culture of the American Indians.The original essays in Gender Reversals and Gender Cultures explore the historical and cultural diversity of the experience of gender reversal over an exceptional geographical and chronological range. The contributors bring a unique mixture of perspectives to bear on the subject, with backgrounds in anthropology, history, literature, political science, comparative religion and women's studies. They reveal the complex relation of gender reversal to taboo, and show how differing attitudes reveal much about particular cultures.

The eight essays collected in this volume examine the practice of gender history and its impact on our understanding of European history. Each essay takes up a major methodological or theoretical issue in feminist history and illustrates the necessity of critiquing and redefining the concepts of body, citizenship, class, and experience through historical case studies. Kathleen Canning opens the book with a new overview of the state of the art in European gender history. She considers how gender history has revised the master narratives in some fields within modern European history (such as the French Revolution) but has had a lesser impact in others (Weimar and Nazi Germany).Gender History in Practice includes two essays now regarded as classics?"Feminist History after the 'Linguistic Turn'" and "The Body as Method"--as well as new chapters on experience, citizenship, and subjectivity. Other essays in the book draw on Canning's work at the intersection of labor history, the history of the welfare state, and the history of the body, showing how the gendered "social body" was shaped in Imperial Germany. The book concludes with a pair of essays on the concepts of class and citizenship in German history, offering critical perspectives on feminist understandings of citizenship. Featuring an extensive thematic bibliography of influential works in gender history and theory that will prove invaluable to students and scholars, Gender History in Practice offers new insights into the history of Germany and Central Europe as well as a timely assessment of gender history's accomplishments and challenges.

This volume presents new perspectives on the history of higher education for women in the United States. By introducing new voices and viewpoints into the literature on the history of higher education from the early nineteenth century through the 1970s, these essays address the meaning diverse groups of women have made of their education or their exclusion from education, and delve deeply into how those experiences were shaped by concepts of race, ethnicity, religion, national origin. Nash demonstrates how an examination of the history of women’s education can transform our understanding of educational institutions and processes more generally.