Gentlemen and Amazons : The Myth of Matriarchal Prehistory, 1861-1900 / Cynthia Eller.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Eller, Cynthia, Author.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Women, Prehistoric.

Religion, Prehistoric.

Matriarchy.

Matrilineal kinship.

Patriarchy.

Feminist theory.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (291 p.)

Edition:

1st ed.

Place of Publication:

Berkeley, CA : University of California Press, [2011]

Language Note:

English

Summary:

Gentlemen and Amazons traces the nineteenth-century genesis and development of an important contemporary myth about human origins: that of an original prehistoric matriarchy. Cynthia Eller explores the intellectual history of the myth, which arose from male scholars who mostly wanted to vindicate the patriarchal family model as a higher stage of human development. Eller tells the stories these men told, analyzes the gendered assumptions they made, and provides the necessary context for understanding how feminists of the 1970's and 1980's embraced as historical "fact" a discredited nineteenth-century idea.

Contents:

Front matter

Contents

Illustrations

Acknowledgments

1. The Travels and Travails of Matriarchal Myth

2. Amazons Everywhere: Matriarchal Myth before Bachofen

3. On the Launching Pad: J. J. Bachofen and 'Das Mutterrech'

4. The Matriarchal Explosion: Anthropology Finds Mother Right (and Itself)

5. Making Matriarchal Myth Work: Communists and Feminists Discover the Mother Age

6. Mother Right on the Continent

7. Struggling to Stay Alive: Anthropology and Matriarchal Myth

8. Matriarchal Myth in the Late Nineteenth Century: Why Then? Why Not Before?

Notes

Bibliography

Index

Notes:

Description based upon print version of record.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Description based on online resource; title from PDF title page (publisher's Web site, viewed 24. Apr 2020)

ISBN:

9786613291813

9781283291811

1283291819

9780520948556

0520948556

OCLC:

756484686