Draw upon the course readings from at least seven weeks throughout the semester and lecture material to write an essay that describes how the women we have discussed throughout the semester “misbehaved” and defied gendered expectations through their words and/or actions from the colonial era to the present day.

History

Description

In 1976, historian Laurel Thatcher Ulrich reconstructed the lives of a group of Puritan women in colonial New England, women who minister Cotton Mather referred to as the “hidden ones.” These women remained hidden from history because they lived in ways that strictly conformed to Puritan ideals of chastity, piety, and obedience. In light of what she found, Laurel Thatcher Ulrich concluded that “well behaved women seldom make history.”

Draw upon the course readings from at least seven weeks throughout the semester and lecture material to write an essay that describes how the women we have discussed throughout the semester “misbehaved” and defied gendered expectations through their words and/or actions from the colonial era to the present day.

How did/have their respective communities, and American society more broadly, understood (or misunderstood) and responded to their behavior? How have laws, social customs, race/ethnicity, socio-economic status, and religion facilitated and/or shaped these women’s lives, their defiant acts, and responses to their conduct?

Provide the author’s name, reading/article title, and page number when quoting any material from the reading.

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