Colonial Women
November 3, 2013
Word Count:
Colonial Women Women in America today are drastically different than the colonial women of yesterday. I as a women of today, cannot imagine the type of life that they lived. From preparing and processing food from scratch to sewing and mending clothes by hand. Try to imagine maintaining a household without the local market close by to purchase cleaning supplies, food and so forth; for me this just gives me a headache thinking about it! Not to mention they had little value in the eyes of their husbands and community. After reading First Generations, Women in Colonial America, by Carol Berkin it is easy to say that women have come a long way from our earlier colonial women ancestors. In America today there is still a high number of domestic abuse cases on women and children. Domestic abuse is not only physical, but mental, emotional, spiritually, and verbal abuse. Simply put, domestic abuse can be described as oppression from another human being. However, there are laws against any kind of abuse today. Colonial women did not have help for the type of abuse that they were experiencing back then, and this could possibly be the reason that they went back to their offenders. Women in colonial times had very little rights, especially after they were married. Once married they lost any voice they might have had. They were subject to much oppression as told throughout Carol Berkins book (Berkin). They were fully dependent on their husbands to provide food, shelter, and religious guidance to their families. They had no voice in politics, church or even their home and children. The women were not even able to sit next to the men during a church service and they had to enter the sanctuary through separate doors than the men (Berkin). Carol Berkin’s portrayal of colonial women and how they suffered at the hands of their husbands and society was very good, and she did this by explaining how unjustly they were treated.
Word Count:
Colonial Women Women in America today are drastically different than the colonial women of yesterday. I as a women of today, cannot imagine the type of life that they lived. From preparing and processing food from scratch to sewing and mending clothes by hand. Try to imagine maintaining a household without the local market close by to purchase cleaning supplies, food and so forth; for me this just gives me a headache thinking about it! Not to mention they had little value in the eyes of their husbands and community. After reading First Generations, Women in Colonial America, by Carol Berkin it is easy to say that women have come a long way from our earlier colonial women ancestors. In America today there is still a high number of domestic abuse cases on women and children. Domestic abuse is not only physical, but mental, emotional, spiritually, and verbal abuse. Simply put, domestic abuse can be described as oppression from another human being. However, there are laws against any kind of abuse today. Colonial women did not have help for the type of abuse that they were experiencing back then, and this could possibly be the reason that they went back to their offenders. Women in colonial times had very little rights, especially after they were married. Once married they lost any voice they might have had. They were subject to much oppression as told throughout Carol Berkins book (Berkin). They were fully dependent on their husbands to provide food, shelter, and religious guidance to their families. They had no voice in politics, church or even their home and children. The women were not even able to sit next to the men during a church service and they had to enter the sanctuary through separate doors than the men (Berkin). Carol Berkin’s portrayal of colonial women and how they suffered at the hands of their husbands and society was very good, and she did this by explaining how unjustly they were treated.