View source for 426--Week 7 Questions/Comments--Tuesday

== The Book in General ==

So I know, I tend to gripe and complain about something in each reading we do.  However, I feel its part of the discussion of the work.  So this time, my complaint is that the book is very repetitive.  I feel like I'm reading the same thing over and over.  I guess that's the point though, to show how Confederate white men were made to feel a little less masculine here and a little less there.  And how women entered into the public sphere here and there, and then how the emergence of free blacks blurred the Confederate white man mansculinity head of household line even more. --Ashley Wilkins

I have to admit, it was kind of interesting to have Mrs. Thomas's journal thoughts in the Whites's work.  I say this because I read part of her journal for another class and it was nice to see some familiarity in the work.  It took a while to remember why it was familiar until I was cleaning up the house earlier today and found a piece of paper being used as a bookmark in the phone book and it was the cover page to the journal exert of Mrs. Thomas's journal that I had read in a previous class.  I have no idea where the rest went, probably in the recycling bin, but it was like a light being switched on moment. --Ashley Wilkins

One of the main themes I noticed throughout the first four chapters was the reliance on religion.  The women realize they can not control what is going on in the front and have to rely on their faith to get them through it.  Confederate women also believe that God will bring them justice against the Yankees, even when the Confederates are losing.  It was interesting to see how much their faith was a part of their life. -- Kari W.

I also noticed the women’s reliance on religion.  Perhaps they developed this reliance in the pre-war years.  Given the male-dominated society they belonged to, a women's relationship with God may have been one of the only things they had control over.  –Andrew B

I agree with Andrew, though Whites supports Kari's argument in chapter 3. I think that their faith in Christianity made it easier for women to resign to their roles as subordinates. They could accept their husbands' infidelity or deaths or their family's sudden fall out of society or wealth due to their husbands' absence with a "Christian Resignation." - Celia

I liked how Whites addressed several general historical misconceptions throughout.  One of the biggest I noticed was that historians only seems to study women in "gender studies" and African-Americans in "race studies."  I also saw the reliance of southern women on religion during the war years.  Perhaps it was the Civil War that popularized and mainstreamed religion.--Amanda

== Introduction ==

Sorry, had to add another heading because I wanted to make a comment about the Introduction.  Whites line about the "great southern slaveholding planters" really struck me because it is something that is notable in the divisions of American history.  In the normal scope of conversation we talk about Washington, Jefferson and Madison as these great men who did great things for our country and yet we ignore, for the most part, the fact that they participated in an institution that we find morally repugnant.  All of these other slaveholders are viewed as distasteful because a majority of what we know about them is that they were planters and slaveholders.  Perhaps this lack of knowledge about these men leads us to make many of the assumptions that the author enumerates about the reasons we think that the South made the decision to secede from the Union. -Lacey

I found the definition of “free manhood” particularly interesting in Whites’ introduction. The idea that both Northern and Southern men believed they were defending “free manhood” points directly to how heavily masculinity was tied to the Civil War. Northerners were arguing that Southerners undermined the notion of free manhood by the enslavement of black men, while Southerners argued that to defend slave owning men was only the beginning of truly understanding their defense of an entire system of patriarchal leadership and control. – Mary Beth

I really enjoyed Whites description of how the dominant people (white men, with the "view from no where") were actually socially defined by their subordinates (ie. women, children, slaves). Along these same lines, White also talks about how white southern men defined their manhood through the institution of slavery. This immediately made me think back to our last book. I wonder, to what extent was the manhood of white Southern men defined through the norm of sexually exploiting slave women? My guess would be that the sexual exploitation of slave women was a huge part in defining the masculinity of white Southern men. -- Rebecca

What struck me about White's introduction was her discussion of men's history and how it has lergely been ignored and simply assumed to be a part of the general history. I have often wondered why historians assume that men constitute the general history and women a separate history. White's contention that men are as gendered as women is a good one and something which I believe needs to be addresses more often. --Sarah Gardner

==Chapter 1==

I found it incredibly fascinating the loyalty and devotion these women had to their husbands.  I still find it hard really understand a world where women did not have even the right to decide what use their own body would be put to.  These women had none of that choice that we have today, and some of them knew that their husbands were unfaithful to them with their slaves.  And yet, they were almost entirely supportive of their husbands going off to war to fight for their independence and seemed to have genuinely missed their prescence.  They wrote all of these shortcomings off as being a part of a man's perogative.  There is no way on earth I would stand for any of it besides the going off to war in most cases. -Lacey

I agree it is amazing, I don't think I could have the same devotion and know that my husband was unfaithful to me. Most of these woman did not know anything different, they had no choice to miss they life they had prior to the war since that was all they knew to be good in the world. When their men left they missed the life where they were supposed to be taken care of, where there husbands were there to protect them. Yet at the same time I can imagine that most of these women were proud of their men. -- Kellye Sorber

I found Whites’ emphasis on the threat of northern invasion on Southern masculinity and “liberty” to be particularly interesting. As one writer put it, “the forcible denial of the South’s right to regional autonomy would lead directly to reducing the free southern man to a position lower than the lowest member of the southern social order, the black slave.” White goes on to pose the significance of this northern threat to southern, non-slaving holding whites to argue that such a threat not only challenged slavery, but all male households, thus creating a unity amongst southern men against northern threat. I think it was extremely important for White to mention non-slave holding men in order to emphasize that the threat from the north was not only about slavery, but about an entire system of patriarchy. – Mary Beth

It is almost understandable why women supported the war, whether they believed in the instituion of slavery (as Cornwall did) or not (Thomas). Whites' big argument in this chapter (which I thought was a very good one) was that the southern men fought to uphold their place as male household heads and their white masculinity. This meant that white men believed that the abolition of slavery jeopordized their role in the hierachy of the South. White women, whether they supported the war or not or slavery or not, had to support their men. Sure, there was love and patriotic spirit and loyalty involved, but a major reason for supporting their men was because they depended on the men for support and protection, and this support and protection depended on the white males maintaining the social hierarchy. This chapter was very thought-provoking and though I have read about the southern white man's fight to ensure his spot in the social heirarchy, it was interesting to see how the white woman fit into the picture- Celia

Although this first chapter encompasses the role of southern white males and their wives, I found the argument of why southern men of the lower social hierarchy and did not own slaves defend the interests of the small percentage of the Southern elite.  I personally keep forgetting that most males in the South were not economically able to have slaves.  However, Whites' argument is that slave ownership was the aspiration in the system that was grounded in white liberty in black slavery.  There was also the notion that if white men fell, they might fall enslaved to the revolting black slaves.  Therefore, the argument here is that the independence of all male householders was to hold slaves. --Joe C.

I thought that the discussion of the power Southern women had over their sons was very interesting. Despite the subordinate role of women in society, they did have power over one large portion of the male population, their sons. That said, they were expected to act in a certain way towards them and support them in their involvement in the war effort. However, their position of power over their sons allowed them to have political power and act as patriots by encouraging their sons to support the cause. I did not expect mothers to have that much sway over their sons, especially not in relation to war. --Sarah Gardner

==Chapter 2==
I think one of the most interesting culture shifts of the Civil War is the focus from Northern or Southern survival in terms of what they produce economically to  a focus on how much one can produce to aid the war effort.  Especially in the South, I think that this shift to internal mobilization had a large impact on the way the culture progressed as the war dragged on.  Men of influence could no longer focus on making money, plantation owners and small farm owners were off fighting and women were now, not only running farms and plantations, but they were involved in wartime production as well.  -Kelly W.

Going off of what was said before, I find it very interesting that while the women were able to become amazingly independent in stepping up and supporting their off-to-war husbands, they still found it necessary to have every proceeding of their various meetings opened and closed with the prayer of a male minister. Was this something that the women felt they could not do themselves? There are various prayers that can be said by the layperson, after all... -Cash

I agree with Kelly's analysis of the overall picture of the Southern plantation owner and how they're influence was limited by the war.  Although, its interesting that the author compares this to Augusta, Georgia which had one of the largest manufacturing centers in the South.  Whites also demonstrates that industrial development in Augusta weakened the influence of the elite southern class at the outbreak of war, rather than in the mobilization period.  As soon as the war began to consume the cotton industry and wealthy plantation owners were unable to keep up with the demand, they encountered their loss of power and influence. --Joe C.

This chapter really struck me by the utter dependence all women had on their men. On the other hand, elite women were able to become a bit more independent with their societies while the common women were completely under the dependence of the rich and the government.  These women sacrificed everything for the war: their husbands, sons, their free time to making clothing, and their homes for impromptu hospitals.-Joyce

==Chapter 3== 

I found it interesting that although all these women now had the power to be the head of the household while their husband was fighting, they chose to remain subordinate to men.  It was almost like they couldn't imagine living any other way.  While some women jumped at the opportunity to become independent, most just criticized the men who stayed behind, or "town fathers", for not taking care of them like their husbands did. -- Kari W.

Why change the only life you know? It was very difficult for these women to change their way of thinking and take over as head of the household. It was almost easier to just remain subordinate. -- Kellye Sorber

Yes, it must have been hard for the women and for everyone in general to imagine a life in which women were not subordinate.  It would have been like speaking a new language.  It is always easier to revert back to your first language.  The dominance of men was the foundation for everything in their society.  The family, the community, their economy, everything functioned around this idea.  Those women given more independence didn’t recognize this as an opportunity; it stood against everything they had known their entire life.  –Andrew B

I liked the part about Turner Clanton who offered to sell meal below market value to the struggling wives of soldiers. I was surprised at how the lower class women had the nerve to respond sarcastically, criticizing Clanton for not doing enough. They expected him to provide more kinds of food, not just meal, and also to deliver it. I guess they were pissed off, since their society was based on this contract that men were dominant and protective and the women were dependent and obedient. All of a sudden the men were not holding up their part of the bargain and it seems like the women were pretty irritated. -- Rebecca

I found chapter 3 to be very interesting. I had never really considered the different impacts that men going to war would have on women of the upper and lower classes. I was also somewhat surprised by the treatment wives of common confederate soldiers received from upper class wives of planters, especially as their spouses were fighting together for the Confederate cause. That wealthy women would turn to their dependence on men to highlight their status over poor white women, clearly illustrates the amount of dependence women had on men in the Southern society. I believe that this chapter illustrates that for women in Augusta, Georgia, class often came before gender. --Sarah Gardner

I agree with Kellye's comment that subordination was all these women knew in life.  However, when the Augusta Ladies's society attempted to make clothing paid for solely by fundraising (until they were forced to ask for Confederate money) was their way to be proactive agents in their society.  Ultimately, the society did have to ask for money and with the state employed clothing factory, the women were once again subordinated with their dependence on men and on the government.--Joyce M

==Chapter 4==
I feel like this chapter really emphasized the devastating effect the Civil War had on families and the social hierarchy in the South.  White families were at their most vulnerable and to make things even better, blacks were no longer enslaved, endangering the position of white men within the community.  Women, once again it seems, also had to do twice as much work as usual.  They had to, not only cater to their wounded and emotionally unstable husbands, but they also had to look after the farms and plantations and continue the roles they acquired during the war, while trying to make sure their husbands didn't feel emasculated (Ashley in ''Gone With the Wind,'' anyone?) -Kelly W.

Yes! I also kept thinking of Gone With The Wind whilst reading this chapter, and not just the Ashley character. The women throughout were realizing that they no longer had the power and status that they had held during the war. They knew it was coming, however. Going back to chapter two, on page 49, it is explained that "the existence of this society and its duties, will terminate with the war." However, realizing it and coming to terms with it are two different things. Much like Scarlett at the end of GWTW, these women had to be wondering wherever they shall go, whatever they shall do. -Cash

And frankly Scarlett, I don't give a damn. -Cash

lol -- Rebecca

I'm not only reminded of Ashley, but also the return to Tara and realization that working was the only way to survive.  However the book doesn't have the same portrayal as the movie, of the helpless belles struggling in the fields.  Realistically I don't think white women made such a fuss.  But, it was a movie after all.--Amanda