Annotated bibliography of all secondary sources consulted. An annotated bibliography uses MLA format and contains a brief 3-5 sentence description under each entry explaining the argument presented in that particular source. As well, one of these sentences should state exactly how the source was/was not useful in developing your project/argument. It’s fine to cite parts of critical books, such as particular chapters used/read. Please include only scholarly academic sources. The following link provides more information about annotated bibliographies, including sample entries. Please note, that for this exercise, you will simply describe the argument and its use value for the project.
[Submitted 5 December 2010]
Blecki, Catherine La Courreye, and Karin A. Wulf, eds. Milcah Martha Moore's Book: a Commonplace Book from Revolutionary America. University Park, PA: Pennsylvania State UP, 1997. Print.
Moore’s commonplace book, a handwritten manuscript, resides in the Edward Wanton Smith Collection in the Quaker Collection Library at Haverford College; it is not available on microfiche. The modern critical edition, edited by Blecki and Wulf, makes my project possible. The careful transcription work, the extensive and exhaustive biographical, cultural, historical, and history of the book scholarship provides the backbone of my conference paper. The strong emphasis on friendship and same-sex relationships encouraged me to explore and extend their argument by classifying these relationships as explicitly female homosocial, as well as operating on the lesbian continuum.
Blecki, Catherine La Courreye. “Reading Moore’s Book: Manuscripts vs. Print Culture and the Development of Early American Literature.” Milcah Martha Moore's Book: A Commonplace Book from Revolutionary America. Ed. Catherine La Courreye Blecki and Karin A. Wulf. University Park: Pennsylvania State UP, 1997. 59-106. Print.
Blecki meticulously details the manuscript culture of Moore’s time, and the origins and use of the commonplace book genre by Moore and her contemporaries. The role Moore played as editor, compiler and transcriber of MMMB is examined, revealing the careful and precise structure of the text. Comparison of Moore’s commonplace book to her published Miscellanies, Moral and Instructive in terms of function and goals allows Blecki to claim that “Moore’s Book is her true literary and cultural success” (69). The role and use of prose and poetry in MMMB are given equal attention by Blecki, and the theme of friendship in the entries is explored thoroughly, which I used for my project.
Brayman, Hackel H., and Catherine E. Kelly. Reading Women: Literacy, Authorship, and Culture in the Atlantic World, 1500—1800. Philadelphia: U of Pennsylvania P, 2008. Print.
The introduction provided me with a concise summary of current (feminist) scholarship and its struggles concerning defining the woman reader, and her literacy (reading and writing). Instead of searching for THE female writer, one should research and locate specificity rather than generalizations or idealizations. They repeat the call to expand the “archive” of women’s writings by thinking creatively about sources and evidence (3). The importance and necessity of a “transnational, transatlantic context” (6) is confirmed for those studying the early modern world. The transatlantic context appears in MMMB, as Moore includes excerpts from Graeme Fergusson’s journal that she kept while traveling in England. Moore herself is a transatlantic creature, born in Madeira and later relocated to Philadelphia, with family members on three different continents.
Hayes, Kevin J. A Colonial Woman's Bookshelf. Knoxville: U of Tennessee P, 1996. Print.
Hayes provides the answer to the question, “In what contexts and for what reasons did early American women read?” in his book, but most importantly, it is colonial women that receive his attention. Chapters one (“Reading Women”) and two (“Devotional Books”) provided both the norms and deviations of American colonial women’s reading habits and the lopsided and gendered relationship between reading and writing literacies. Hayes also addresses manuscript culture and its role in colonial America. I was excited to find Graeme Fergusson used as an example in chapter one, as Hayes provides information about her library (over 400 volumes, 130 of which she borrowed and/or was lent from literary male friends). My argument that the women of MMMB are unruly, in terms of reading and writing practices, would have been impossible without the research by Hayes.
Logan, Lisa M. “The Importance of Women to Early American Study: A Social Justice.” Early American Literature 44.3 (2009): 641-48. MLA International Bibliography. Web. 10 Sept. 2010.
Logan presents the worrying trend she perceives in current scholarship: that gender is now passé, and “gender” really means “women” (641). Her argument includes the assertion that “feminist early American studies is also the practice of social justice” (642) which, if abandoned could (re)silence women’s voices in literature. Logan’s urging of scholars to study as actual people demands an interdisciplinary approach, which allows for a richer exploration of our history and literature. Though I did not use Logan’s article in my paper, I kept her ideas and advice from this article in the back of my mind throughout the semester long project.
Mulford, Carla. “Writing Women in Early American Studies: On Canons, Feminist Critique, and the Work of Writing Women into History.” Tulsa Studies in Women’s Literature 26.1 (2007): 107-18. Project MUSE. Web. 22 Aug. 2010.
This article was helpful in terms of background information for my project, especially since my project centers around the commonplace book and this was my first encounter with genre. Mulford presents a brief history on issues and changes within the early American literary canon formation, and the role feminist theory played in these changes. The expansion and validation of previously ignored, non-traditional format of women’s writing (letters, diaries, commonplace books, manuscripts) has changed the way in which we look at early American literature. And yet, as Mulford concludes, “Much has yet to be done toward the work of writing women into history” (116).
Myles, Anne G. “From Monster to Martyr: Re-Presenting Mary Dyer.” Early American Literature 36.1 (2001): 1-30. JSTOR. Web. 24 August 2010.
This article acted as a catalyst for my project, without it, there would be no Bonds of Intimacy conference paper and blog. Originally read as part of a class assignment on Anne Hutchinson, I was struck by Myles’s claim that Mary Dyer, in dying for her religious beliefs, is looking back to her friend Hutchinson and in doing so, creates a lesbian scene in seventeenth century America operating on the lesbian continuum. Before this article and class discussion, I had never heard of the lesbian continuum except for a brief mention in a previous graduate course that I had apparently forgotten about. Also striking about the article is Myles’s earnest search for a usable past as a lesbian and a Quaker – for her, the Dyer and Hutchinson texts worked on both a personal and academic level and I was struck by her passion and openness. Throughout my project, I have tried to emulate Myles’s search for a usable past because I too want to believe that the female homosocial and lesbian continuum played a role in our literary and historical past.
Rich, Adrienne. "Compulsory Heterosexuality and Lesbian Existence." Signs 5.4 (1980): 631-60. JSTOR. Web. 01 Sept. 2010.
This essay was a necessary and enjoyable read, as Rich defined compulsory heterosexuality and the lesbian continuum, terms which I needed to know in order to proceed with my project. Keeping in mind the time period in which Rich wrote this work helped contextualize much of her essay, as the gay rights movement has made progress in the past twenty years. Rich’s assertion that the existence of lesbians “has been crushed, invalidated, forced into hiding and disguise” (632) forced me to look and defend vigorously my finding of the female homosocial and presence of the lesbian continuum within MMMB.
Shields, David S. Civil Tongues & Polite Letters in British America. Chapel Hill: U of North Carolina P, 1997. Print.
The work by Shields concentrates on “the role of private society in invoking civility in British America” (xiv). After reading the introduction, and skimming through chapter two (“Belles Lettres and the Arenas of Metropolitan Conversation”) and chapter four (“Tea Tables and Salons”), I came to the conclusion our projects were too unrelated. This is unfortunate, because the book is excellent. I did encounter Graeme Fergusson in chapter four, “The Garden of Sensibility,” but it dealt with women’s connections to the pastoral and the garden. I hope to include Shield’s claim that the garden was a site disturbed by the “immoderate passion of men” (130) and Graeme Fergusson’s poetry explores these disturbances, but only if it is easily incorporated into the idea of the female homosocial space in MMMB.
Schweitzer, Ivy. Perfecting Friendship: Politics and Affiliation in Early American Literature. Chapel Hill: U of North Carolina P, 2006. Print.
I utilized sections of Schweitzer’s introduction, chapter one (“Smoke and Mirrors: A History of Equality and Interchangeability in Friendship Theory”) and three (“Hannah Webster Foster’s Coquette: Resurrecting Friendship from the Tomb of Marriage”). Her book provided essential historical contextualization on the eighteenth century ideal of friendship, which found its roots in the Aristotelian classical mode, though subject to American influence and adaptation. The ways in which minorities (women, people of color, and Native Americans) adapted and subverted the friendship model is detailed in her book. Most important to my project was the argument that scholars/critics too often equate homosocial with homosexuality; this provided a way to introduce my use of the lesbian continuum, to argue against such binaries (hetero/homosexual).
Smith-Rosenberg, Carroll. “The Female World of Love and Ritual: Relations between Women in Nineteenth Century America.” Signs 1.1 (1975): 1-29. JSTOR. Web. 07 Sept. 2010.
Even though I knew Smith-Rosenberg uses primary sources from the nineteenth century, and I was working with the eighteenth century, I read her landmark essay in hopes of discovering what the female homosocial looked like in American literature and I was not disappointed. What surprised me the most is the existence of this authorized and accepted “female world” in our history and literature; before her essay, I had no idea such a world existed. Her stress on the importance of historical context is something I took to heart, in addition to the use of a cultural and social lens rather than a psychoanalytical approach. Due to the constraints of the conference paper, I chose not to include Smith-Rosenberg’s markers of female rituals in my project, but if given the opportunity, I would like to apply her theories to the memorial poetry in MMMB (those written by women, for women).
Stabile, Susan M. Memory's Daughters: The Material Culture of Remembrance in Eighteenth-Century America. NY: Cornell UP, 2004. Print.
Stabile’s scholarship provided half of my foundation for my thesis – the feminization of the commonplace book genre by women during the eighteenth century allowed me to argue MMMB exists as an unruly, female homosocial text, both as a physical object, and in terms of its contents. Stabile also relocates the archive to its domestic origins; this, combined with the focus of her research, functions to reveal the central role women played in early national history. The section describing the process of Deborah Norris Logan’s daily writing activities, from making her own ink, struggling to properly cut her quills and find ones that fit her hand, waking up before dawn and staying up past the household’s bedtime to find time to write without distraction, to the necessity of a mobile desk-station provided invaluable insight into the complexity of women’s writing during this time period (Logan is the niece of Hannah Griffitts).
Wulf, Karin A. "Milcah Martha Moore's Book: Documenting Culture and Connection in the Revolutionary Era." Milcah Martha Moore's Book: A Commonplace Book from Revolutionary America. Ed. Catherine La Courreye Blecki and Karin A. Wulf. University Park: Pennsylvania State UP, 1997. 1-57. Print.
Wulf provides valuable insight into the world of Moore, Griffitts, Wright, and Graeme Fergusson, emphasizing the important role women’s literacy, the American Revolution, and religion (Quaker culture) played in the creation of Moore’s commonplace book. The necessity of knowing “specific historical and literary contexts” (2) is made clear through her essay – Moore’s commonplace book might share some character traits in common with other manuscripts of the time, but it is also a product of a specific time, place, editor and authors. My project relies heavily on the extensive research conducted by Wulf, especially concerning the function of the commonplace book to document and preserve relationships, as well as the intimacy afforded by its manuscript format. These “interlocking circles” allowed for my assertion of a female homosocial presence in MMMB.
I am including a list of books and book chapters that I had on my “to read” list but failed to do so for this project, due to time constraints. If given the opportunity to transform this conference paper into a journal article, I will resume my research through these sources first. Perhaps this list will spark someone else’s research itch.
- Kelly, Catherine E. “Reading and the Problem of Accomplishment.” Reading Women: Literacy, Authorship, and Culture in the Atlantic World, 1500—1800. Ed. Heidi Brayman Hackel and Catherine E. Kelly. Philadelphia: U of Pennsylvania P, 2008. 124-43. Print.
- Kelly, Mary. “Crafting Subjectivities: Women, Reading, and Self-Imagining.” Reading Women: Literacy, Authorship, and Culture in the Atlantic World, 1500—1800. Ed. Heidi Brayman Hackel and Catherine E. Kelly. Philadelphia: U of Pennsylvania P, 2008. 55-71. Print.
- Miller, Nancy K. “Changing the Subject: Authorship, Writing, and the Reader.” Feminist Studies/Critical Studies. Ed. Teresa de Lauretis. Bloomington: Indiana UP, 1986. 102-20. Print.
- Mulford, Carla, Angela Vietto, and Amy E. Winans. “Introduction.” American Women Prose Writers to 1820. Detroit: Gale Research, 1998. xvii-xxx. Web. 10 Sept. 2010.
- Showalter, Elaine. Sister’s Choice: Tradition and Change in American Women’s Writing. Oxford: Oxford UP, 1994. Print.
- Smith-Rosenberg, Carroll. “Writing History: Language, Class, and Gender.” Feminist Studies/Critical Studies. Ed. Teresa de Lauretis. Bloomington: Indiana UP, 1986. 31-54. Print.
- Stabile, Susan M. “Female Curiosities: The Transatlantic Female Commonplace Book.” Reading Women: Literacy, Authorship, and Culture in the Atlantic World, 1500—1800. Ed. Heidi Brayman Hackel and Catherine E. Kelly. Philadelphia: U of Pennsylvania P, 2008. 217-43. Print.
- Stabile, Susan M. Memory's Daughters: The Material Culture of Remembrance in Eighteenth-Century America. NY: Cornell UP, 2004. Print.
- While I read the introduction and chapter two, “Pen, Ink, and Memory,” and skimmed chapter one, “The Architecture of Memory,” I was unable to read chapter three, “Among Her Souvenirs” and chapter four, “In Memoriam.” Also, the conclusion, “The Ruins of Time” was skipped, due to time constraints.
- Ulrich, Laurel Thatcher. Good Wives: Image and Reality in the Lives of Women in Northern New England 1650—1750. New York: Vintage Books, 1991. Print.
- Winterer, Caroline. “The Female World of Classical Reading in Eighteenth-Century America.” Reading Women: Literacy, Authorship, and Culture in the Atlantic World, 1500—1800. Ed. Heidi Brayman Hackel and Catherine E. Kelly. Philadelphia: U of Pennsylvania P, 2008. 105-23. Print.
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