The Feminist Thought of Sarah Grimké

by Grimke, Sarah; Lerner, Gerda

• ISBN13: 9780195106046
• ISBN10: 0195106040
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 1998-01-29
• Publisher: Oxford University Press

Summary

Sarah Grimke, feminist activist and abolitionist, was one of thenineteenth century's most prescient feminist thinkers. She was the firstAmerican woman to write a coherent feminist argument, and her writings and workchampioning the emancipation of woman still remain a powerful influence on therise of feminist consciousness. However, Sarah Grimke has long been given shortshrift as a woman of no real historical significance aside from the herassociation with her sister, abolitionist Angelina Grimke. In The FeministThought of Sarah Grimke, Gerda Lerner places Sarah's work in the context of thelong history of feminist thought, showing that she was indeed a significantfeminist figure and clearly ahead of her time. Focusing on Sarah's essays andletters to journals, newspapers, and contemporaries, and including illuminatingarticles by Lerner herself, Sarah is finally given full credit for hercontributions to the feminist and abolitionist movements in pre-Civil WarAmerica. As Lerner explains, "That Sarah's work came to us in snippets andfragments, handwritten on paper cut out of a notebook, embedded in themanuscript collection of her brother-in-law, unnoticed and forgotten for over ahundred years is typical of what happened to the intellectual work of women,"not indicative of her accomplishments as a major feminist thinker.The Feminist Thought of Sarah Grimke not only sheds light on Sarah Grimke asfeminist thinker, theorist, and activist, it powerfully accents Gerda Lerner'spioneering efforts in the universal recognition of the feministconsciousness.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments	ix	(2)
Note on Editing	xi
Introduction	3	(46)
DOCUMENTS	49	(108)
headnotes by Gerda Lerner
1. Sarah and Angelina Grimke to Queen Victoria, October 26, 1837	49	(5)
2. SMG to Augustus Wattles, February 15, 1852	54	(2)
3. SMG to the Editors, Christian Inquirer, February 10, 1852	56	(5)
4. SMG to the Editor, The Lily, April 1852	61	(4)
5. SMG to the Editors, New York Tribune, May 31, 1852	65	(4)
6. SMG to Augustus Wattles, April 2, 1854	69	(4)
7. SMG to Augustus Wattles, May 31, 1854	73	(2)
8. SMG, Manuscript essay: The Education of Women	75	(17)
9. SMG to Harriot Hunt, May 23, 1855	92	(4)
10. SMG to Sarah Wattles, August 12, 1855	96	(4)
11. Gerda Lerner, A Problem of Ascription	100	(7)
12. SMG, Manuscript essay: Marriage	107	(9)
13. SMG to Jeanne Deroin, May 21, 1856	116	(7)
14. SMG to Gerrit Smith, October 1, 1856	123	(9)
15. SMG, Manuscript essay: Sisters of Charity	132	(17)
16. SMG, Letter draft to George Sand	149	(3)
17. SMG to Sarah Wattles, December 27, 1856	152	(5)
ARTICLES	157
Gerda Lerner
18. The Grimke Sisters and the Struggles Against Race Prejudice	157	(18)
19. The Political Activities of Antislavery Women	175