Women's History Commons^™

"They Would Do As They Pleased, As They Had The Power": Gender Violence And The American Settler-Colonial Project, 1830-1890, Noelle Iati

Women's History Theses

This thesis investigates the role of gender violence and sexual terror in westward settler expansion of the United States in the nineteenth century. I posit that gender violence was not simply a symptom of war and colonization, but an integral piece of the American colonization strategy. Using studies of three locations during three different periods, I have found that the local, territorial, state, and federal governments all actively deployed sexual assault and other forms of gendered terror as methods of removing Indigenous peoples to reservations and rancherías, opening their lands to settlement and resource exploitation for the purpose of acquiring …

A New Force In Politics: The Suffragists' Experience In Connecticut, Carole Artigiani Nichols

Women's History Theses

A great deal has been written on the women's rights movement of the early twentieth century from the perspective of its national leadership and the national suffrage organizations. Less research has focused on suffrage activities on the state level. The purpose of this essay is to examine the efforts of women in Connecticut to extend their political power; to analyze their ideas, goals, and tactics; to make some observations about feminist leadership; and to investigate the activities of politically-minded women in the years immediately following their enfranchisement.

As a result of this study, we may question the characterization of suffrage …