Women called to witness : evangelical feminism in the nineteenth century / Nancy A. Hardesty.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Hardesty, Nancy.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Evangelicalism--United States--History--19th century.

Evangelicalism.

Revivals.

History.

Women in Christianity.

United States.

Women in Christianity--United States--History--19th century.

Revivals--United States--History--19th century.

United States--Church history--19th century.

Church history.

Physical Description:

xiii, 207 pages ; 24 cm

Edition:

Second edition.

Place of Publication:

Knoxville : University of Tennessee Press, [1999]

Summary:

In Women Called to Witness, Nancy A. Hardesty locates the roots of American feminism in the evangelical revivals that emerged during the Second Great Awakening of the early nineteenth century. She thus challenges the conventional wisdom that any movement for women's rights is a secular one because religion is inherently oppressive toward women. First published in 1984 and now revised and updated, this book focuses particularly on the followers of Charles Grandison Finney, an evangelist whose revivals spread from upstate New York eastward to New England and westward to Ohio. The author shows that in Finney's brand of revivalism, personal and social salvation were inseparably linked, and thus the evangelical strategies used in spreading the Christian gospel were readily adapted to various social crusades, including temperance, abolition, and eventually suffrage. Hardesty shows that such leaders as Frances Willard, Sarah and Angelina Grimke, Lucy Stone, and Elizabeth Cady Stanton all had links to the Finneyite revivals. All were active in the various reforms the revivals spawned.

In exploring these women's lives and their religious involvements, Hardesty demonstrates how bonds of sisterhood were forged and how those bonds nurtured the quest for equality, in the home, the church, and society.

Contents:

Woman of the century

The whole age must cooperate

Cure for "betweenity"

"Be ye holy!"

Religion is something to do

Directly to the Bible

The unction makes the preacher

Aim at being useful

The bonds of sisterhood

Females who have deviated from the paths of virtue

To touch it was contamination

Mutual submission, active discipleship.

Notes:

"First edition published by Abingdon Press, 1984"--T.p. verso.

Includes bibliographical references (pages [177]-191) and index.

ISBN:

1572330589

1572330481

OCLC:

40174251