Course Syllabus

History 40 - 2226 - Women in American History

Hartnell College - Online - FALL 2021

Instructor: Jennifer Grohol

Email: jgrohol@hartnell.edu

Office Hours: M/W 3:30 - 4:30 pm using Zoom and by appointment.

Course Description

In this course, we will put women at the center of the story. The course traces a number of different interrelated themes from pre-Columbian societies to the present: the changing conditions and ideas about unpaid housework and paid work; relations between different groups of women and the way relations of power have shaped these interactions; the ongoing political struggle to gain increased civil and political rights; and changing notions of “proper” roles for women, especially regarding sexuality. We will consider which ideas and assumptions within American culture have changed and which have stayed the same, and how these cultural factors have related to the material conditions through which people experience their daily lives. 

Required Reading

  • Online articles: This is a zero-cost class. That means that you will not be buying a textbook for our course. Instead, you will be reading weekly articles that are placed online; you will find links to these articles posted online in our weekly modules in Canvas. 
  • Primary Documents: we will occasionally read primary documents; you can find these documents online on Canvas. 

Assignments

Class grades will be divided into a variety of categories:

Activity 

Point Value

Midterm and Final (Each is a five-page essay) 

100 (50 points each)

Small writing assignments (such as discussion posts)

120 (12 discussion forums)

Online Reading Quizzes (multiple choice questions taken through Canvas)

20 (2 reading quizzes)

Other assignments such as film reviews and journal entries (which may include extra credit)

50

 

The grades are broken down into 10 percentage point intervals:

A=90-100 points

B=80-89 points

C=70-79 points

D=60-69 points

F=0-59 points

As the class progresses, I will put detailed instructions online for each of these assignments.

Late assignments: For every day that an assignment is late, the total possible points for that assignment will drop by 10%.

  • This means that if the assignment is 1 day late, the total possible points you can earn is 90%. 
  • If it is 2 days late, the total possible points you can earn on the assignment is 80%
  • If it is 3 days late, the total possible points you can earn on the assignment is 70%. 
  • After 10 days you will not be able to receive any points for the assignment. 

If you are going to be out of town the day that an assignment is due, you are always welcome to turn the assignment in early. Please note that I can not accept any assignments after the last day of class. That means that if your final exam is turned in late, it will not be accepted. 

Please note that I do not round grades up or down at the end of the semester. This means that if your grade is right on the cusp (say a 79.9%) I will not round your grade up to a B. Conversely, if your grade is 80.1%, I will not round your grade down to C. 

Assignment Expectations

There is a 10-page minimum writing requirement for this course. These 10 pages will be spread throughout the various writing assignments. It is very important that students adhere to the minimum length requirement for each assignment (students are of course encouraged to write more than the minimum). Each midterm and final exam must be at least 5 pages in length (of written text) any work submitted that is less than this requirement will not receive a passing grade. Each assignment has a helpful grading rubric that students are encouraged to review before submission. In addition, each assignment will require you to use the sources provided in our class including the textbook and other online provided material. Please do not use outside sources (such as Wikipedia) for any of your writing assignments. 

Resources

Hartnell College offers a wealth of opportunities for students who are seeking help. Hartnell offers free academic support to students through the Tutorial Service located in Building A, room 214.  Their website is http://www.hartnell.edu/academics/lsc/tutorial_center.html

Additional student support may be available to you from affordable textbooks to financial aid and scholarships. Please visit the Hartnell website (www.hartnell.edu/students ) for programs and services that may be of value to you. In addition, should personal issues interfere with your academic success, please consider consulting Crisis Counseling Service (www.hartnell.edu/crisis) or phone 770-7019 for personal/confidential counseling service.

The Department of Supportive Programs and Services (DSPS) facilitates academic accommodations for students with documented disabilities at Hartnell College. If you have, or suspect you may have, a disability that impacts your education, please contact the DSPS Office to determine your eligibility for accommodations. DSPS can be reached at (831) 755-6760, or via email at dsps@hartnell.edu.  Accommodations for a semester begin when the accommodation letter is received by the instructor.  Many accommodations are provided within Canvas, including extended time on tests/quizzes, in the delivery of online classes. Students are encouraged to plan ahead. Their website is: http://www.hartnell.edu/students/dsps/

Class Policies

This is a college-level History course, as such, you will be expected to dedicate at least nine hours a week to this course. This will include reading, crafting reading responses, studying for the exam, and other assignments.

ANYONE WHO IS NOT PREPARED TO DEDICATE THIS TIME TO THE COURSE IS NOT RECOMMENDED TO TAKE THIS CLASS. 

Attendance: Regular participation in our course is very important. Anyone that stops participating in the course by missing two weeks of class may be dropped from the course.  Note - for an online class, this means if you miss 2 week's worth of assignments, you may be dropped for non-participation. 

Academic Honesty: Plagiarism, or cheating, is unacceptable. Any student found plagiarizing any part of another’s work will receive a grade of 0 for that assignment and face further disciplinary actions, such as a meeting with the Vice President of Student Services. If you have any questions about properly citing sources please do not hesitate to ask, I am happy to help you.

Non-Negotiable: The classroom is an environment where every participant must be respectful to the teacher and students. Any derogatory language addressed to the teacher or students or any other person or group is not permissible.

Syllabus Emergency Statement

EMERGENCY NOTIFICATION:  In the event of a life-threatening emergency call 911.
·         To report a non-life-threatening incident, safety hazard, or suspicious activity please contact campus security at 755-6888
·         To obtain campus status information, call the campus safety and facilities emergency status bulletin telephone number: 831-796-6222. From a campus line, simply dial 6222

Please visit Hartnell's emergency reporting link here: http://www.hartnell.edu/reporting-emergencies

Students: If you receive an emergency notification, please tell your instructor immediately. 

During a campus emergency, you will generally be told to do one of two options, SHELTER IN PLACE or EVACUATE. When either of these are given, vehicle traffic coming onto campus will likely be turned away. Students are required to obey the directions of staff in a timely fashion.   
EVACUATION: Please note the exit(s) in the room. In the event of an alarm or safety threat, uniformed Hartnell personnel equipped with two-way radios--including security, and maintenance staff--have up-to-date information; they also have the authority to order either shelter-in-place or immediate building evacuation.  For evacuation, immediately heed their directions by proceeding calmly and quickly to an exterior assembly area as indicated by trained staff.  Please stay back at least 200 feet from any building until the “all clear” command is issued.

SHELTER IN PLACE: In the event of a safety threat, instructors and staff will lock classroom doors and direct occupants to stay clear of windows. Occupants are requested to remain quiet.  During this time, DO NOT access any exits unless directed by first responders or staff.  A shelter in place order is also used for severe environmental threats like a thunderstorm.

Run, Hide, Fight  Active Shooter Response 

In the event of an Active Shooter Event, there are three things you need to know in order to survive: Run, Hide, Fight. Please review the video in the link. 

If you see suspicious behavior on campus, please tell someone. Our Campus Safety officers are trained to investigate suspicious incidents. 

EMERGENCY PREPAREDNESS:  The first 72 hours of a disaster are often the most difficult, but this period can be less stressful if everyone has extra supplies on hand.  The college has a limited amount of emergency supplies, so students and staff should have on-campus their own portable emergency kit including snacks, water, and prescription medication; this is especially important for those who may need to shelter on campus.  For more information go to https://www.sf72.org/

Students: If you have knowledge of an emergency on campus, share it immediately. If you see something suspicious or potentially hazardous, let someone know.

Student Learning Outcomes

  1. Explain and apply concepts and events in U.S. History through current analytical categories of race, class, gender, sexuality, and ethnicity.
  2. Demonstrate an understanding of the processes, peoples, and events in the multicultural histories of women in the United States from the Indigenous past to the present.
  3. Employ historical research methods to address historical questions using primary and secondary sources.

Class Schedule

*Please note that the schedule is subject to change 

Week 1 - Introduction and Why Study Women's History? (Aug. 30 - Sept. 5)

Key Question: What is Women’s History?

    • Introduction to the class and administrative business
    • Why study Women's History? 
    • History of Gender Studies programs in America

Recommended:

  1. Contact the instructor via email and introduce yourself and ask for accommodations if you will be using the testing center or have other learning needs. 
  2. Sign up for free academic assistance at the Access Resource Center. 

 

Week 2 - European-Native American Cultural Contact (Sept. 6 - 12) 

Key Questions: What cultures and technologies were already present in America before Europeans arrived? How did colonists and Native Americans adapt to each other’s presence? 

    • Pre-Columbian Indian civilizations
    • Borderlands
    • Iroquois
    • The myth of Pocahontas   
    • Spanish, French, and English colonization  
    • Native American women resist cultural genocide 

Recommended:

  1. Visit the academic assistance center and find out more about their services. 
  2. Relationships within the borderlands were hardly binary; for further information to complicate your understanding of human relations, please read: Captives and Cousins: Slavery, Kinship, and Community in the Southwest Borderlands, by James F. Brooks

 

Week 3 - Women During the Colonial Era (Sept. 13 - 19) 

Key Question: What were the religious, cultural, and economic differences between the different regions throughout the colonies? 

    • Women in New England societies
    • White women as Indentured Servants
    • Women's Labor in the Spanish Mission System
    • Women's labor under slavery

Recommended:

  1. If you have any questions about the material please do not hesitate to contact me

 

Week 4 - Marriage, Sexuality, and Family in Colonial America (Sept. 20 - 26)

Key Question: What was acceptable women’s gender roles during the Colonial Era? 

    • Women’s health risks during the Colonial Era
    • Women’s rights and responsibilities regarding marriage during this era
    • Interracial marriage in Colonial America
    • The socioeconomic gap between rich and poor

 

Week 5 - Personal and Public Politics in the Age of Revolutions (Sept. 27 - Oct. 3)

Key Questions: How did women participate during the Revolutionary Era?  

    • Native American involvement during the Revolution 
    • African American women during the American Revolution
    • Debora Sampson
    • Shifting gender roles during the Revolution 
    • Sexual violence during the American Revolution

Recommended: Read Revolutionary Mothers: Women in the Struggle for America’s Independence by Carol Berkin. 

 

Week 6 - Sexuality, Rights, and Activism in a New Nation (Oct. 4 - 10) 

Key Questions: How did the American Revolution affect the institution of marriage in the United States? How did the Revolution affect the status of black, white, and Native American women in America? What political rights did women gain in the Early Republic Era? 

    • Freedoms Gained and lost after the Revolution
    • Marriage and sexuality in the Early Republic
    • Republican Womanhood 
    • Lesbian women and the Early Republic

 

Week 7 - Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl (Oct. 11 - 17) 

Key Questions: How did gender roles differ for black and white women? How did slavery negatively impact black women? How did slavery negatively impact white women?  

    • Read Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl
    • Slave women and medical test subjects
    • Slavery and the making of our modern capitalistic system

DUE: Midterm

 

Week 8 - Antebellum Race and Racism (Oct. 18 - 24)

Key Questions: How did black women fight for their rights during the Antebellum Era? How did women participate in the Undergrounds Railroad? 

    • Slave women before the Civil War
    • Women runaway slaves
    • Sojourner Truth  
    • Harriet Tubman 
    • Anti-miscegenation laws in the United States 

Recommended: Read Kill the Indian, Save the Man: The Genocidal Impact of American Indian Residential Schools by Ward Churchill. 

 

Week 9 - The Civil War and its Aftermath (Oct. 25 - 31) 

Key Questions: How did women participate politically in the Civil War?  How did white women's experience differ depending on their class and if they lived in the North or the South during the war? How did black women push for agency after the war? 

    • Wealth and poor white women before the Civil War
    • The Sanitary Commission 
    • White women during the Civil War
    • Women’s political presence during the Civil War
    • Black women during the war
    • Black women and the push for citizenship after the war

 

Week 10 - Women in the Wild West and The Gilded Age (Nov. 31 - 7)

Key Questions: How did women help build the "Wild West"? How did women participate in the Gold Rush? How did industrialization change the lives of women in America? What kinds of jobs did different women have access to at this time? How did gender roles change with a changing economy? 

    • Chinese women in California  
    • The "Dame Shirly" Letters
    • American expansion into the West
    • Mexican-American women during the Mexican-American War
    • How prostitutes helped tame the West
    • Wealth and poor white women during the Gilded Age
    • Women's Christian Temperance Movement
    • Black women during the Gilded Age
    • Mexican-American women during the Gilded Age

Recommended: 

  1. Read Roaring Camp: The Social World of the California Gold Rush, by Susan Lee Johnson.  
  2. Read Perfection Salad: Women and Cooking at the Turn of the Century by Laura Shapiro.

 

Week 11 - Political Participation and Activism (Nov. 8 - 14)

Key Questions: What factors led to the passage of the 19th Amendment? Is there such a thing as the "women's vote"? In what ways did women participate in politics in the early 20th century? How did birth control impact women's lives in the early 20th century? 

    • Alice Paul
    • The 19th Amendment
    • Arguments against women's enfranchisement  
    • Black women and the vote
    • Birth control in the early 20th century 

Recommended: Read The Ideas of the Woman Suffrage Movement: 1890-1920 by Aileen S. Kraditor. 

 

Week 12 - Women during World War 1 and the "Roaring 20s" (Nov. 15 - 21)

Key Questions: How did women participate in the war effort? How did the "flapper" challenge entrenched gender roles? How did mass-marketing affect gender roles? How did black women contribute to the Harlem Renaissance? How did the rise of nationalist movements throughout the nation impact Mexican-American women? 

    • Women and the Homefront during World War 1 
    • Flappers  
    • Black women in the 1920s 
    • Mexican-American women during the war 
    • Rise of the Eugenics movement and involuntary female sterilization
    • Women's participation in the Ku Klux Klan  

Recommended: 

  1. Read Slave in a Box: The Strange Career of Aunt Jemima by M. M. Manring. 

 

Week 13 - Women during the 1930s and World War 2 (Nov. 22 - 28)

Key Question: How did federal relief efforts impact women during the Great Depression? How did the Depression impact different groups of women throughout the country?  How did women’s lives change during the war effort?

    • The Dust Bowl
    • Migrant Okies and the Grapes of Wrath  
    • Black women during the Depression
    • Women pushed back into the house after the war
    • Asian women during the war effort 
    • Rosie the Riveter
    • Japanese internment
    • Social push to move women into the house after the war
    • Rise of the post-war lesbian rights movement

Recommended: 

  1. The Second Sex by Simone De Beauvoir.

 

Week 14 -  Feminist Ideals and its Challengers in Post War America (1950s - 1960s) -  (Nov. 29 - Dec. 5) 

Key Question: How did social conservatism affect women in the 1950s?  In what ways did women challenge social conservatism in the post-war era?  

    • The gender roles of Leave it to Beaver
    • LGBT community during the 1950s
    • New Challenges for African-Americans 
    • The Bracero Program
    • Mexican-American women's push for education
    • The Beats
    • The Kinsey Report 

 

Week 15 - The Road to Equality (1960s - present)  (Dec. 6 - 12)

Key Questions: How did women participate in the Civil Rights Revolutions? Why did the Equal Rights Amendment fail? What challenges do American women face in the new millennium? How had COVID exposed entrenched gender inequality in the United States? 

    • African-American women and the black Civil Rights movement 
    • The Feminine Mystique
    • Women's Political Participation in the 21st century 
    • Feminist branding in the new millennium
    • White feminism
    • Feminism and social media
    • Looking forward: what was the whole point of this class?

Recommended: 

  1. Review for final

 

Week 16- FINAL EXAM (Dec. 13 - 17)  - HAVE A GREAT WINTER BREAK!!!