Unruly Women of Paris: Images of the Commune

Gay L. Gullickson

Published by Cornell University Press 1996

Unruly Women of Paris

Images of the Commune

Gay L. Gullickson

https://doi.org/10.7591/9781501725296

Overview
Contents

About this book

In this vividly written and amply illustrated book, Gay L. Gullickson analyzes the representations of women who were part of the insurrection known as the Paris Commune. The uprising and its bloody suppression by the French army is still one of the most hotly debated episodes in modern history. Especially controversial was the role played by women, whose prominent place among the Communards shocked many commentators and spawned the legend of the pétroleuses, women who were accused of burning the city during the battle that ended the Commune.

In the midst of the turmoil that shook Paris, the media distinguished women for their cruelty and rage. The Paris-Journal, for example, raved: "Madness seems to possess them; one sees them, their hair down like furies, throwing boiling oil, furniture, paving stones, on the soldiers." Gullickson explores the significance of the images created by journalists, memoirists, and political commentators, and elaborated by latter-day historians and political thinkers. The pétroleuse is the most notorious figure to emerge from the Commune, but the literature depicts the Communardes in other guises, too: the innocent victim, the scandalous orator, the Amazon warrior, and the ministering angel, among others.

Gullickson argues that these caricatures played an important role in conveying and evoking moral condemnation of the Commune. More important, they reveal the gender conceptualizations that structured, limited, and assigned meaning to women as political actors for the balance of the nineteenth and well into the twentieth century.

Author / Editor information

Gullickson Gay L. :

Gay L. Gullickson is Associate Professor of History at the University of Maryland.

Reviews

"Gullickson offers a persuasive account based on an almost exhaustive marshaling of the relevant evidence.... a contribution to our fuller understanding of the Commune and its role in reinforcing gender stereotypes."

Lynn Hunt, University of Pennsylvania:

"Gullickson does what few have attempted before: to trace the ways images of women first took shape in contemporary writings and cartoons, including those by women themselves, and then made their way over the years into the writings of politicians and historians. A definitive and fascinating interdisciplinary study of the highest quality."

Topics

Frontmatter Publicly Available Download PDF	i
Contents Publicly Available Download PDF	vii
Illustrations Publicly Available Download PDF	ix
Preface Publicly Available Download PDF	xi
Introduction: Rereading the Commune Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	1
Synopsis: La Commune de Paris Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	14
1. The Women of March 18 Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	24
2. Remembering and Representing Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	57
3. The Symbolic Female Figure Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	74
4. The Femmes Fortes of Paris Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	120
5. Les Petroleuses Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	159
6. Women on Trial Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	191
7. The Unruly Woman and the Revolutionary City Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	218
Notes Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	229
Selected Bibliography Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	263
Index Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	277

(Deutsch)

Language: English
Publisher: Cornell University Press
Audience: General/trade;
Pages
- Main content: 304
Illustrations
- Other: 23 halftones, 1 map
Keywords: West European History; Womens Studies

eBook

Published: September 5, 2018
ISBN: 9781501725296