Texas Through Women's Eyes

Book excerpt: "This is social history at its very best...The wide selection of firsthand accounts found in this text draw the reader in, and most are absolutely fascinating...This volume will make a significant contribution to the field of Texas women's history, and I predict it will be the one book to which scholars and the reading public turn for information on twentieth-century Texas women."-Elizabeth Hayes Turner, Professor of History, University of North Texas Texas Women broke barriers throughout the twentieth century, winning the right to vote, expanding their access to higher education, entering new professions, participating fully in civic and political life, and planning their families. Yet these major achievements have hardly been recognized in histories of twentieth-century Texas. By contrast, Texas Through Women's Eyes offers a fascinating overview of women's experiences and achievements in the twentieth century, with an inclusive focus on rural women, working-class women, and women of color. Judith N. McArthur and Harold L. Smith trace the history of Texas women through four eras. They discuss how women entered the public sphere to work for social reforms and the right to vote during the Progressive era (1900-1920); how they continued working for reform and social justice and for greater opportunities in education and the workforce during the Great Depression and World War II (1920-1945); how African American and Mexican American women fought for labor and civil rights while Anglo women laid the foundation for two-party politics during the postwar years (1945-1965); and how second-wave feminists (1965-2000) promoted diverse and sometimes competing goals, including passage of the Equal Rights Amendment, reproductive freedom, gender equity in sports, and the rise of the New Right and the Republican party. The authors take particular account of the interactions between genders and the hierarchies of race and ethnicity as they synthesize information from published histories with their own original research into women's lives. They also include a wealth of first-person accountsùwomen's letters, memoirs, and oral histories. This lively combination will appeal to a wide audience.