Book Review Essay

Book Review Essay

Linda Holz

OC 552

History of American Women

Stephanie Johnson

November 11, 2006

The book I chose to write about is called America’s Women: 400 Years of Dolls, Drudges, Helpmates, and heroines written by Gail Collins. The company who chose to produce this copy is referred to as HarperCollins Publishers Inc. The publishing took place in New York, NY with the first perennial edition published in 2004, and is Gail’s first edition.

Two areas will be considered in this book review. The first centers on the way the book connects to the concepts presented in the course (and textbook). This was done in a number of ways as derived from specific instances or occurrences that happened throughout the book. It began with the colonists who came voluntarily and those who did not, as well as a description of their daily lives. This included specific people who were pivotal in the development of the land. In colonial times it was a woman named Margaret Brent who virtually ran the colony of Maryland. The Revolutionary war was mentioned as well, which led to African American women and the Civil War. This is a time when slavery was at its height but for a brief time as the south began to lose the war. The book brought out a person named Harriet Tubman who had escaped slavery and made nineteen trips back over the border to help others attain their freedom. During the war she was a spy and scout for the Union Army.

Some other concepts of the book centered on the settlement house movement in Chicago where Jane Adams established Hull House, built the first playground, started a nursery school, and led demonstrations against bad health conditions. Then World War II gave work opportunities to women because the men were not around to do them. A thousand women pilots flew sixty million miles to prove this point. The suffrage movement, the way women’s lives were altered by dress fashions, theories on sex and courtship, and the ever-changing attitudes toward education, politics, and work were covered in the book adding to the concepts set out for the course.

Each concept related in the book was presented in chronological order, allowing for each