Nineteenth-century New Brunswick society was dominated by white, Protestant, Anglophone men. Yet, during this time of state formation in Canada, women increasingly helped to define and shape a provincial outlook.
I wish to keep a record
is the first book to focus exclusively on the life-course experiences of nineteenth-century New Brunswick women. Gail G. Campbell offers an interpretive scholarly analysis of 28 women's diaries while enticing readers to listen to the voices of the diarists. Their diaries show women constructing themselves as individuals, assuming their essential place in building families and communities, and shaping their society by directing its outward gaze and envisioning its future. Campbell's lively analysis calls on scholars to distinguish between immigrant and native-born womenand to move beyond present-day conceptions of such women's world. This unique study provides a framework for developing an understanding of women's worlds in nineteenth-century North America.
Table of Contents:
Acknowledgements
Preface
List of Diarists
Introduction
Chapter 1: The Diarists
Chapter 2: Reading 19th Century Diaries: the Historian’s Perspective
Chapter 3: The Life Course in Demographic Context: Women’s Experience
Chapter 4: Three Generations: Women of their Time and Place
Chapter 5: From Innocent Flirtation to Formal Courtship
Chapter 6: The World of the Family
Chapter 7: Households of Independent Women
Chapter 8: Sociability and Social Networks
Chapter 9: Schooling and Scholars
Chapter 10: A Sustaining Faith
Chapter 11: Work in the Home
Chapter 12: Beyond the Bounds of Family: Paid Work
Chapter 13: Politics and Social Reform
Chapter 14: A Cosmopolitan Outlook
Chapter 15: In the Midst of Life
Conclusion
Afterword
Appendix
Bibliography
About the Author :
Gail G. Campbell is Professor Emerita of History at the University of New Brunswick.
Review :
‘This is a volume that is a must read for those who are engaged in the history of New Brunswick and for those who themselves are trying to tease out the stories of women in the nineteenth- century settler world of North America.’
- Jane Errington (Acadiensis, August 2017) "These diaries present an engaging sense of history from below, as lived and felt by its participants…Consistently well documented, this study nicely positions the lives of these New Brunswick women within the larger context of nineteenth-century women’s history."
- Carole Gerson (The Canadian Historical Review Vol 99:2: June 2018)
