“a truly magnificent book … a leap forward”
Reforming Men and Women
Gender in the Antebellum City
Before the Civil War, the public lives of American men and women intersected most frequently in the arena of religious activism. Bruce Dorsey broadens the field of gender studies, incorporating an analysis of masculinity into the history of early American religion and reform. His is a holistic account that reveals the contested meanings of manhood and womanhood among antebellum Americans, both black and white, middle class and working class.
Urban poverty, drink, slavery, and Irish Catholic immigration—for each of these social problems that engrossed Northern reformers, Dorsey examines the often competing views held by male and female activists and shows how their perspectives were further complicated by differences in class, race, and generation. His primary focus is Philadelphia, birthplace of nearly every kind of benevolent and reform society and emblematic of changes occurring throughout the North. With an especially rich history of African-American activism, the city is ideal for Dorsey’s exploration of race and reform.
Combining stories of both ordinary individuals and major reformers with an insightful analysis of contemporary songs, plays, fiction, and polemics, Dorsey exposes the ways race, class, and ethnicity influenced the meanings of manhood and womanhood in nineteenth-century America. By linking his gendered history of religious activism with the transformations characterizing antebellum society, he contributes to a larger quest: to engender all of American history.
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Praise for Reforming Men and Women
“a magnificent book”
“Here is truly gendered history, one that takes women and men equally seriously as subjects. Reforming Men and Women will raise the bar for all future studies of social activism, whether in the antebellum or any other era. This is a truly magnificent book, one that provides a leap forward not only in the history of the antebellum era but also in the analysis of gender relations and conventions.”
— Nancy Hewitt, Professor of History at Rutgers University and author of Radical Friend
“exciting and creative”
“Bruce Dorsey’s Reforming Men and Women: Gender in the Antebellum City is an exciting and creative examination of reform activity in the early nineteenth century…. Dorsey brilliantly demonstrates the tremendous impact of gender on social issues such as slavery, temperance, poverty, and immigration, and just how deeply it affected the lives of men and women in the antebellum city.”
— Erica Armstrong Dunbar, National Book Award Finalist author of Never Caught: The Washingtons’ Relentless Pursuit of Their Runaway Slave, Ona Judge
“complex, subtle, and ultimately convincing”
“The publication of Reforming Men and Women marks an important advance in the historiography of American gender history…. The arguments here are complex, subtle, and ultimately convincing…. What makes all this work so well is Dorsey’s fine prose.”
— Amy S. Greenberg, prize-winning author of A Wicked War: Polk, Clay, Lincoln, and the 1846 U.S. Invasion of Mexico