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Cover of American Feminism Key Source Documents 1848–1920

American Feminism: Key Source Documents 1848–1920

Edited by Janet Beer; Anne-Marie Ford; Katherine Joslin

  • Published: 11 Nov 2004
  • DOI: 10.4324/9780415219457
  • Set ISBN: 9780415219457

Set Contents

Health, Birth Control and Prostitution


Feminism takes as its central premise the seemingly sensible idea that women ought to have power in their own lives and influence over the lives of others. Power to do what and influence over whom are perennial questions. If nineteenth-century women were to exercise power over their lives, what more natural place to begin than with the female body? It would seem, then as now, that the female body should be an uncontested area for female control.

Volume Contents

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    Front Matter
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    Introduction: The Female Body By Katherine Joslin
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    69
    ‘The Elixir of Life, or Why do We Die?’ New York, Woodhull and Clafin, 1873* By Victoria C. Woodhull
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    70
    ‘A Question of Rest for Women During Menstruation,’ 1877* By Mary Putnam Jacobi
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    71
    ‘Male Continence,’ The Oneida Community, Oneida, New York, Office of the American Socialist, 1877* By John Humphery Noyes
  • ‘The Human Element in Sex,’ London, J.&A. Churchill, 1894* By Elizabeth Blackwell
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      Dedication
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      Introduction
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      I
      The Distinctive Character of Human Sex
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      II
      Equivalent Functions in the Male and Female
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      III
      On the Abuses of Sex—I. Masturbation
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      IV
      The Abuses of Sex—II. Fornication
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      V
      The Development of the Idea of Chastity
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      VI
      Medical Guidance in Legislation
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    73
    ‘Bicycling for Ladies,’ Preface and Chapter 1, New York, Brentano’s, 1896* By Maria E. Ward
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    74
    Police Records of Prostitution from 1907–1908 in A Record of the Enforcement of the Laws of Prostitution*
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    75
    ‘The Modern Woman,’ Metropolitan Magazine, 1912, Washington, Congressional Record, September 17, 1913* By Helen Keller
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    76
    ‘The Woman Voter and the Eugenic Ideal,’ written circa 1915, Microfilm, New Haven, Research Publications, Inc., 1977* By Doctor. Anna E. Blount
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    77
    ‘The Problem of Unrest,’ SNE, volume 31, n.d.* By Marie C. Stopes
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    78
    ‘Family Limitation,’ Fifth Edition, 1916* By Margaret Sanger
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    79
    ‘Birth Control,’ A.R. Elliott Publishing Company, 1916* By S. Adolphus Knoff
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    80
    ‘Plain Words to Plain People,’ n.d.* By Katharine C. Bushnell
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    81
    ‘Eliminating Vice from the Small City,’ Chicago, n.d.* By Virginia Brooks
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    Paul L. Blakely, and Austin O’Malley, ‘Race Suicide, Birth Control,’ New York, New York Press, n.d.* By M. P. Dowling
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      Conscious Birth-Restriction By Paul L. Blakely
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      Birth-Control: An Open Letter
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      The “Committee on Birth-Control” By Austin O’Malley
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    83
    ‘Wage Earning Children in Hull House Maps and Papers,’ Boston, Thomas Y. Crowell, 1895 By Florence Kelley; Alzina P. Stevens
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    84
    ‘The School Children of the Stockyards District,’ Reprinted from the Transactions of the Fifteenth International Congress on Hygiene and Demography, held at Washington D.D., September 23–28, 1912, Washington Government Printing Office, 1913* By Caroline Hedger
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    85
    The Massachusetts Bureau of Statistics of Labor in Collaboration with the Women’s Education and Industrial Union of Boston, ‘Household Expenses,’ Boston, Wright and Potter Printing Company, 1900*
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    86
    ‘Increased Social Control in A New Conscience and an Ancient Evil,’ New York, Macmillan, 1912 By Jane Addams
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    87
    ‘The Traffic in Women,’ 1911, in Red Emma Speaks edited by Alix Kates Shulman, New York, Random House, 1972 By Emma Goldman
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    88
    ‘The Beautiful’ in How to Win: A Book for Girls, New York, Funk & Wagnalls, 1886 By Miss Frances E. Willard
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    89
    ‘Women and Social Service,’ Address before the Boston Equal Suffrage Association for Good Government, November 14, 1907 By MRS. Charlotte Perkins Gilman
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    90
    ‘Does a Man Support his Wife? And Who Supports the Children?’ New York, National American Woman Suffrage Association, n.d.* By Emmeline Pethick Lawrence; MRS. Charlotte Perkins Gilman