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First Generations: Women in Colonial America | 
 enlarge | Author: Carol Berkin
Publisher: Hill and Wang
Category: Book
List Price: $16.00
Buy Used: $7.34
You Save: $8.66 (54%)
New (18) Used (19) from $7.34
Avg. Customer Rating:  2 reviews
Sales Rank: 48091
Media: Paperback
Edition: 1st Pbk. Ed
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 256
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.5
Dimensions (in): 8.3 x 5.5 x 0.7
ISBN: 0809016060
Dewey Decimal Number: 305.42097309032
EAN: 9780809016068
ASIN: 0809016060
Publication Date: July 1, 1997
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
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| Editorial Reviews:
Amazon.com
This study of American women in the 17th and 18th centuries by historian Carol Berkin gives close attention to the lives of several women like Mary, who was brought to Virginia as a slave in 1622. She married another African, Antonio, and over the course of their 40-year marriage, they earned their freedom and established a 250-acre plantation before moving to Maryland in search of new land. Other black women were not so lucky and, as time progressed, laws restricting black freedom were codified. This study uses legal and other types of records to illuminate the lives and experiences of these and other black, white, and Native American women.
Product Description
Carol Berkin's multicultural history reconstructs the lives of American women in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries-women from European, African, and Native backgrounds-and examines their varied roles as wives, mothers, household managers, laborers, rebels, and, ultimately, critical forces in shaping the new nation's culture and history.
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| Customer Reviews:
Excellent Women's History August 22, 2000
18 out of 18 found this review helpful
So many history books are dry and difficult to read. This was the exact opposite. Carol Berkin breathes life into the dim periods of early Colonial American history. Although she often has little more details than land records, birth, marriage, and death dates (and in some cases, not even that) Berkin is able to paint a vivid picture of what it might have been like for the strong women who, willingly or not, helped to create America. Berkin is an equal opportunity historian -- each chapter of her book focuses on a particular strata of female colonial society: Native America women, African American women, poor white immigrant women, and wealthy women. In this way, the reader gets a full picture of the diverse cultural groups that existed from the earliest days of Colonial America. There are also some real surprises (I wont spoil them for you) which leads the reader to believe that life in Colonial America was much more complex and unpredictable than you might have thought. This book was both educational and entertaining and I highly recommend it.
Excellent Study, Encompassing Many Regions, Groups March 23, 2000
14 out of 14 found this review helpful
Carol Berkin offers informative essays on women in different ethnic and regional cultures of colonial America. The life story of a woman from each of the groups considered lends character and definition to this excellent scholarly work. African-American women, Native American women, and Anglo-American women in New England and the Chesapeake are among those considered. As New Amsterdam became New York, women of Dutch descent experienced major changes in their legal rights. Berkin's treatment of this transition from Dutch to English law exemplifies her fascinating and informative style.The study ends with a discussion of women's lives during the American Revolution, including the moving stories of women who lost their fortunes or their lives in that struggle. The biographies of martyrs, however, do not eclipse a good discussion of the everyday lives of women during the conflict. Berkin also examines how the logic of democratic revolution, strangely, did not extend to women's rights. Berkin has made an indispensable contribution to colonial history, women's history and ethnic history.
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