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Breaking Habits: Identity And The Dissolution Of Convents In France, 1789-1808, Corinne Gressang
Breaking Habits: Identity And The Dissolution Of Convents In France, 1789-1808, Corinne Gressang
Theses and Dissertations--History
This dissertation uses the concept of identity to investigate the ways religious women navigated the French Revolution. Even as their religious identities were thrown into question, these women’s religious commitments remained important to them. As the French revolutionaries began to reform aspects of the ancien régime, the Catholic Church came under attack. The fate of priests, monks, and nuns came into question. Traditionally, religious women cared for orphans, the sick, and the poor, educated young girls, housed widows, rehabilitated prostitutes, and provided a respectable alternative community for aristocratic women. Despite every effort by the revolutionaries to dissolve their patterns of …