| Edition |
Revised and expanded edition. |
| Description |
xvi, 432 pages : illustrations ; 24 cm |
| Note |
Originally published: New York : Schocken Books, 1986. |
| Bibliography |
Includes bibliographical references (pages 416-426) and index. |
| Contents |
Who, where, and when: an introductory overview -- Ports of entry, paths of settlement -- Causes and effects -- Personal note -- Part 1: Body And The Soul -- 1: Fatalistic conceptions -- Fertile foreigners: birthrates -- Ambivalence and attempts to limit pregnancy -- Search for information -- 2: Those uncontrolled births -- Childbirth customs -- Make a miracle: delivery experiences -- Midwives and medicos -- Prenatal precautions versus fatalist acceptance -- 3: In sickness and in health -- Between hope and fear: views of medicine -- Bathtubs, open windows, and the possibility of prevention -- Ancient magic and modern snake oil -- Superior old world ways -- Every woman a nurse: health education -- 4: Immigrant way of death -- Soon angels: infant and child mortality -- Mothers' and other adult death -- Saying farewell: immigrant funerals -- 5: Religion here and hereafter -- New world, new ideas -- Minority views: Jews and Mormons -- Money and morality -- Freedom versus security: variants of faith -- Part 2: Ambivalence In Morality -- 6: Courting customs -- Family matter: chaperons, matchmakers, and the old world ways -- On their own: practical courtships by immigrant couples -- New world weddings -- Wasting your chances: pressure to marry -- 7: Marriage, divorce, and desertion -- Special stresses of immigrant marriage -- Unthinkable: divorce -- Desertion: poor man's vacation -- 8: Illicit sex -- Premarital pregnancy -- Adultery and unfit motherhood -- Deadly scandal: venereal disease in the Victorian age -- Prostitution, formal and freelance -- Part 3: Domesticity: The Old And The New -- 9: Fruit of the land -- Every letter a grocery list: adjustment amid abundance -- Missing from the menu: nostalgia and shortage -- To the last ounce of rice: food buying -- Cook as gardener, gatherer, and hostess -- 10: Hovels, homes, and hope -- Teeming tenements -- Crowded country cabins -- Moving up the housing ladder -- |
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11: Cleaning, child care, and clothing -- New ways of old work -- Housekeeping variations -- Child care and the placing out of orphans -- To be American is to look American: clothing -- Ambivalence in appearance -- Part 4: Contributions Of These Women -- 12: Supporting families -- Some stunning statistics: unacknowledged income producers -- Dutiful daughters and indigent immigrants -- Paving the way to the American dream: girls supporting families -- 13: Work and wages -- Oldest employers: textile and garment industries -- Other typical jobs: candy, cigars, and flowers -- From laundry to foundry: more women at work -- Boardinghouse boss -- 14: Ways of work -- Wages, hours, and other aspects of the working world -- Unemployment, industrial illness, and death in the workplace -- Unions, strikes, and solidarity -- Are you happy?: attitudes toward work -- 15: Foreign domestics -- American tradition: the immigrant household worker -- Learning and saving: the job's advantages -- Down side of servitude -- Academic attempts to professionalize housework -- 16: Homes on the range -- Frontier fear: from prairie fire to fatal freeze -- Native, newcomer, and war -- Subduing the wild: the female farmer -- From butter to blueberries: other farming -- Part 5: Complexities Of It All -- 17: Travails of travel -- When the wind blows: early emigration by sail -- Steamships and some special hazards for women -- Lost and alone: ignorance, indifference, and fraud -- Optimistic expectations and pleasant journeys -- Leaving Europe: packing as the least vital preparation -- 18: Standards and double standards -- Effects of bureaucracy, war, and quotas -- White slavery and protection versus freedom -- 19: Ocean apart: separation and its effects -- Male emigration: desertion, bigamy, and marital strain -- Through pogrom and war: managing alone -- Part 6: Ties That Bind -- 20: From old and male to young and female: changes in family relations -- Many men, fewer women: sex ratios in immigrant culture -- Growing egalitarianism: new husband/wife roles -- Children and parents, sons and daughters -- Immigrant elderly, stepchildren, and surrogate mothers -- Americanized adults: relationships between siblings -- 21: Woman's place in the new world -- Late marriage, fewer children: mother/daughter differences -- Ordained by God and state: definitions of women -- Maiden names and more: Americanization and the status of women -- Part 7: Content And Discontent -- 22: Views of the new world -- Variants in the pace of becoming and American -- Not for everyone: those who returned to Europe -- Broken dreams: the disillusioned -- Good country for working people: a finalization -- Notes -- Selected bibliography -- Books and articles -- Archival documents -- Major government documents -- Index. |
| Summary |
From the Publisher: From 1840 to 1930 the United States received the greatest number of immigrants in its history. Of these immigrants, four of every ten were female. While much has been written about the American immigrant experience, the stories of immigrant women have remained largely untold. Doris Weatherford's Foreign and Female offers a vivid account of life in America for European female immigrants, many of whom were our grandmothers and great-grandmothers. Drawing from the letters and diaries of immigrant women, the author records what life was like for female newcomers to America: how they lived, what they ate, how they worked, how they married, and much, much more. Delving even further, Foreign and Female records the inner thoughts and concerns of these women, revealing their views on a range of subjects, including marriage, divorce, childbirth, and religion. Although the experiences of immigrant women differed from region to region and from situation to situation, Foreign and Female accurately describes what life was like for a variety of women - on the farm, in the factory, in the city, out West, and in the home. |
| Subject |
Women immigrants -- United States -- Social conditions.
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Women immigrants -- United States -- History -- 19th century.
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Women immigrants -- United States -- History -- 20th century.
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| ISBN |
0816031002 (acid-free paper) |
|
9780816031009 (acid-free paper) |
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