The Local Parish as a Female Institution: The Experience of All Saints Episcopal Church in Frontier Minnesota
In recent years historians have begun exploring the feminization of religion in nineteenth-century America. While much of the published debate has centered on the particular definition presented by Ann Douglas in her study, The Feminization of American Culture, other scholars have adopted the term b...
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| Format: | Electronic Article |
| Language: | English |
| Check availability: | HBZ Gateway |
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| Fernleihe: | Fernleihe für die Fachinformationsdienste |
| Published: |
Cambridge Univ. Press
1986
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| In: |
Church history
Year: 1986, Volume: 55, Issue: 3, Pages: 307-322 |
| Online Access: |
Volltext (JSTOR) Volltext (lizenzpflichtig) Volltext (lizenzpflichtig) |
| Parallel Edition: | Non-electronic
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| Summary: | In recent years historians have begun exploring the feminization of religion in nineteenth-century America. While much of the published debate has centered on the particular definition presented by Ann Douglas in her study, The Feminization of American Culture, other scholars have adopted the term but applied it in different ways. Douglas based her argument on a small sample of liberal Protestant female writers and clergymen in New England whom she saw as giving cultural expression to a new popular theology. She did not explore its impact upon any particular congregation, and much of the controversy surrounding her thesis has focused on the narrow base upon which she made expansive claims. The concept of a feminized church, however, has attracted a number of scholars. Some, like Gerald Moran, have found evidence of the process much earlier in New England, while Mary Ryan and others have explored church membership during the Second Great Awakening of the early nineteenth century. The research continues the Northeastern focus, however, in terms of both geography and denomination. Thus historians still have no sense as to the universality of these trends. In addition, the focus has remained on church membership and cultural perceptions of women's religious role. We have precious little information on how women translated ideas about their role into the life of an ongoing religious institution. |
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| ISSN: | 1755-2613 |
| Contains: | Enthalten in: Church history
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| Persistent identifiers: | DOI: 10.2307/3166820 |