A recent H-Law
review reminded me to spotlight
Cheryl Hicks's prize-winning book
Talk with You Like a Woman: African American Women, Justice, and Reform in New York, 1890-1935 (UNC Press, 2011). Hicks is an associate professor of history at the University of North Carolina, Charlotte.
Here's an overview from the Press:
. . . Cheryl Hicks brings to light the voices and
viewpoints of black working-class women, especially southern migrants,
who were the subjects of urban and penal reform in
early-twentieth-century New York. Hicks compares the ideals of
racial uplift and reform programs of middle-class white and black
activists to the experiences and perspectives of those whom they sought
to protect and, often, control.
In need of support as they
navigated the discriminatory labor and housing markets and contended
with poverty, maternity, and domestic violence, black women instead
found themselves subject to hostility from black leaders, urban
reformers, and the police. Still, these black working-class women
struggled to uphold their own standards of respectable womanhood.
Through their actions as well as their words, they challenged prevailing
views regarding black women and morality in urban America. Drawing on
extensive archival research, Hicks explores the complexities of black
working-class women's lives and illuminates the impact of racism and
sexism on early-twentieth-century urban reform and criminal justice
initiatives.
And a blurb:
"This creative, cross-disciplinary book will make significant
contributions to African American and women's history, as well as
sociology and legal studies. Hicks brings a fresh perspective to
under-researched topics and much-needed revision to long-held
assumptions about the dynamics of class and moral reform issues among
African Americans."
--Tera Hunter
Here's a snippet of the H-Law review, by Lisa Dorr:
Hicks uses the records of reformers and the criminal justice system to
make her case, inviting criticism that the women she analyzes, because
of their presence in reform institutions, are not representative of the
experiences of the majority of African Americans in New York at the
time. She counters this challenge by suggesting that the experiences of
these women reflect the common dilemmas that working-class women
faced. While winding up in prison might not have been the most common
result, the details in the case files nonetheless put the lives of
working-class black women under the microscope, giving us the fuller
picture of the struggles, strategies, and strivings of these women.
Read on
here.
