Results by title
3 books match the query 'Gordon, Linda'
Heroes of Their Own Lives
The Politics and History of Family Violence--Boston, 1880-1960Linda Gordon
University of Illinois Press, 2002
In this unflinching history of family violence, Linda Gordon traces policies on child abuse and neglect, wife beating, and incest from 1880 to 1960. Gordon begins with the so-called discovery of family violence in the 1870s, when experts first identified it as a social rather than personal problem. From there, Gordon chronicles the changing visibility of family violence as gender, family, and political ideologies shifted and the women’s and civil rights movements gained strength. Throughout, she illustrates how public perceptions of issues like marriage, poverty, alcoholism, mental illness, and responsibility worked for and against the victims of family violence, and looks at the link between family violence and larger social problems.
Powerful and moving, Heroes of Their Own Lives offers an honest understanding of a persistent problem and a realistic view of the difficulties in stopping it.
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The Moral Property of Women
A History of Birth Control Politics in AmericaLinda Gordon
University of Illinois Press, 2002
Now in paperback, The Moral Property of Women is a thoroughly updated and revised version of the award-winning historian Linda Gordon’s classic study, Woman’s Body, Woman’s Right (1976). It is the only book to cover the entire history of the intense controversies about reproductive rights that have raged in the United States for more than 150 years. Arguing that reproduction control has always been central to women’s status, Gordon shows how opposition to it has long been part of the entrenched opposition to gender equality.
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Women, the State, and Welfare
Edited by Linda Gordon
University of Wisconsin Press, 1990
Women, the State, and Welfare is the first collection of essays specifically about women and welfare in the United States. As an introduction to the effects of welfare programs, it is intended for general readers as well as specialists in sociology, history, political science, social work, and women’s studies. The book begins with a review essay by Linda Gordon that outlines current scholarship about women and welfare. The chapters that follow explore discrimination against women inherent in many welfare programs; the ways in which welfare programs reinforce basic gender programs in society; the contribution of organized, activist women to the development of welfare programs; and differences of race and class in the welfare system. By giving readers access to a number of perspectives about women and welfare, this book helps position gender at the center of welfare scholarship and policy making and places welfare issues at the forefront of feminist thinking and action.
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