Abstract This paper examines the impact of the ComstockLode on Virginia City and on the women of this mining town. The author points out the change in the experiences of women's traditional rural roles--middle class women, working women and prostitutes. The paper cites the diversity of women of the Comstock.
From the Paper "When discussing the documented history of Virginia City, Nevada, from ... to ... , scholar Susan Armitage noted that, although mining has always been considered men's work, the task of building and maintaining mining communities has always required ..."
Tags:comstocklode, virginia city, women, gender roles
Abstract The paper discusses how in director Orson Welles cinematic masterpiece "Citizen Kane", the character of Charles Foster Kane (Welles) experiences many traumatic events that are linked to an obsession with his mother. It looks at how out of all these events, Kane's marriage to Susan Alexander, played by Dorothy Comingore, is the most disturbing, for it reflects some very dark motives on the part of Kane, the "spoiled rich kid" who inherited a fortune via the ComstockLode. It shows how Kane's marriage to Susan, who was forced to live in a world that revolved around Kane and his obsessive behavior, collapses and makes her a free woman. It evaluates how Kane used Susan as a scapegoat in order to heal the wound left by his abandonment as a child, and through Susan's abandonment of Kane, his self-image and his massive ego are destroyed.
From the Paper "The ultimate symbol of Kane's obsessive behavior occurs in the scene where Susan finally confronts her husband in the bedroom, where the famous "snowball" glass orb sits on Susan's dressing bureau. After she tells him that their marriage is over and leaves the bedroom, Kane smashes everything in the room--except the glass "snowball" which reminds him of his childhood in Colorado and his mother. This object encapsulates everything Susan stands for--her loneliness, rejection and the abuse thrown upon her by the insane Charles Foster Kane."
Abstract This paper focuses on the political aspects surrounding contraception and abortion in the 19th century. The author of this paper discusses the Comstock law which referred to the legislation introduced and passed by Anthony Comstock in 1870 that prohibited the mailing of birth control information and products. This paper also examines the foundation and impact of the anti-abortion movement in the United States.
From the Paper "Beginning in the 1830s, Brodie found reproductive control became a commercial enterprise in the expanding market economy of Jacksonian America. Information about the safety, morality, and effectiveness of various methods became a part of public "discourse." The archives contain a wealth of advice published in books and pamphlets, an extraordinary diversity of advertisements for products, drugs and literature, of business and credit-rating records dealing with reproductive control entrepreneurs, of druggists' records and catalogs."
Abstract This paper examines the life, work, and leadership of Margaret Sanger, an advocate for women's rights and, in particular, reproductive rights. It looks at her selfless fight to legalize contraception in an era in which many were ready to hear such a message, but many others were ardently opposed to her work and to the possibility that women might, indeed, gain greater rights in American society.
From the Paper "Sanger believed that it was the right of everyone to have enough information about birth control to make their own decisions about the morality and practicality of using it and began a magazine titled The Woman Rebel that attacked the restrictions placed on the circulation of information about contraception by the an 1873 piece of federal legislation called the Comstock Law. This highly restrictive law made it a crime to distribute any device or medicine that could be used as a contraceptive or abortificient or any information about birth control or abortion or even to cite in print the name of any sexually transmitted disease. The law also banned doctors and nurses from providing such information to their patients."
Tags: reproductive, rights, contraception, comstock, law
