Freedom's Women

Black Women and Families in Civil War Era Mississippi African American women both accepted and defied conventional definitions of private and public spheres. As freed women and men tried to minimize interference by their former owners, practically everything considered private became a public issue: marriage, mobility, parenthood, housing, and control over a women's sexuality. Experiences such as pregnancy, nursing, the preparation of meals, and washing clothes, considered private issues by freed women, became areas of heated debate between employers and employees. Hardcover; 288 pages.