Kinship and Collectivity in Eighteenth- and Nineteenth-Century American Women's Fiction

This thesis examines eighteenth- and nineteenth-century American women's literary response to the emergent modern family. This social ideal decreed that the 'proper' family consisted of a married couple and their biological children living under a single roof. The father was to function as this unit's primary breadwinner, the mother was to tend house and raise their children, and the children themselves were to enjoy the loving, highly-personalized attention they needed to become solid republican citizens. The authors I study highlight two main aspects of this arrangement: first, that children occupy its most privileged position, and second, that women occupy its most oppressive one. In answer, many of these authors keep their heroines children ; others explore alternatives to the nuclear family. Yet whatever their strategy, none of these women sustain their communal revisions; rather, they call on their successors to continue their imaginative search.

Name thesis:degree_name

Ph.D.

Level thesis:degree_level

Dissertation

Discipline thesis:degree_discipline

English

Grantor

University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

Year dc:date

2015

Author dc:creator

• Tedrowe, Melissa Ann

Contributors dc:contributor

• Baym, Nina

• Women's Studies

Language dc:language

eng

Identifier

(MiAaPQ)AAI3044239

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:www.ideals.illinois.edu:2142/81383