| Masterless Mistresses: The New Orleans Ursulines and the Development of a New World Society, 1727-1834 Contributor(s): Clark, Emily (Author) |
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ISBN: 0807858226 ISBN-13: 9780807858226 Publisher: Omohundro Institute and University of North C OUR PRICE: $40.38 Product Type: Paperback - Other Formats Published: April 2007 Annotation: Clark follows the history of the Ursuline nuns of New Orleans through its years as a French colony, then a Spanish one, then as part of the U.S. after the Louisiana Purchase. The French Ursulines gained prominence in New Orleans through the social services they provided, which also allowed them a self-sustaining level of corporate wealth. The unmarried nuns contravened both the patriarchal republican order of the slaveholding American South and the Protestant construction of femininity that supported it. Clark's analysis joins the French and Spanish colonial history of Louisiana with the English colonial history of the settlers along the Atlantic to create a more complete picture of the whole of early America. |
| Additional Information |
| BISAC Categories: - History | United States - State & Local - South (al,ar,fl,ga,ky,la,ms,nc,sc,tn,va,wv) - History | United States - Colonial Period (1600-1775) - Religion | Christianity - History |
| Dewey: 271.974 |
| LCCN: 2006033612 |
| Series: Published by the Omohundro Institute of Early American Histo |
| Physical Information: 1" H x 6.1" W x 9" (0.95 lbs) 304 pages |
| Themes: - Cultural Region - Deep South - Geographic Orientation - Louisiana - Chronological Period - 1800-1850 - Chronological Period - 18th Century - Locality - New Orleans, Louisiana - Religious Orientation - Catholic - Religious Orientation - Christian - Sex & Gender - Feminine - Chronological Period - 19th Century - Cultural Region - Mid-South |
| Descriptions, Reviews, Etc. |
| Publisher Description: During French colonial rule in Louisiana, nuns from the French Company of Saint Ursula came to New Orleans, where they educated women and girls of European, Indian, and African descent, enslaved and free, in literacy, numeracy, and the Catholic faith. Although religious women had gained acceptance and authority in seventeenth-century France, the New World was less welcoming. Emily Clark explores the transformations required of the Ursulines as their distinctive female piety collided with slave society, Spanish colonial rule, and Protestant hostility. The Ursulines gained prominence in New Orleans through the social services they provided--schooling, an orphanage, and refuge for abused and widowed women--which also allowed them a self-sustaining level of corporate wealth. Clark traces the conflicts the Ursulines encountered through Spanish colonial rule (1767-1803) and after the Louisiana Purchase, as Protestants poured into Louisiana and were dismayed to find a powerful community of self-supporting women and a church congregation dominated by African Americans. The unmarried nuns contravened both the patriarchal order of the slaveholding American South and the Protestant construction of femininity that supported it. By incorporating their story into the history of early America, Masterless Mistresses exposes the limits of the republican model of national unity. |
Contributor Bio(s): Clark, Emily: - Emily Clark is assistant professor of history at Tulane University. |