History 309I -- Midterm Examination Study Guide

Identifications  [You should be prepared to identify and state the importance of the following terms:]
 

sex temperament                Talcott Parsons                appetites/affections        "Modern Gender order"            self-made man
Agnes                                   sexual objectification       patriarchy                         "perverse masochism"             homosociality
Oedipal complex                 partible inheritance          role theory                         conjugal authority                      individualism
essentialism                        feminization                       Theodor Reik                    penis-envy                                 producerism
civil society                          Barbary Coast                  gender transgression       sex-roles                                    Richard Baxter
Thomas Hall                        sermons                             rough-and-tumbles           Undutiful children                       apprenticeship
fornication                            Matrons jury                       cult of sentiment                habits of industry                      flesh-pleasing
hegemonic masculinity       sexual identity                   functional-structuralism     American Gothic                      The Luck
"having words"                    "dangerous classes"        "heroic artisan"                  gender production                    Sigmund Freud
 
 

Essay questions [You should be prepared to write a 4-5 paragraph essay in answer to the following:]

1.  Trace the development of theories on gender development, from Freud through Foucault and other "postmodernists."  How have theorists explained the biological, personality, social, functionalist, and performative (or "display") aspects of being male?

2.  Explain the role of sexuality in the emergence of a "proper gender order" in the colonial period.  What importance did sex, sexuality, sexual identity and behavior play in this period, and how was this "proper gender order" both encouraged and enforced?

3.  Examine the role of "masculinity" in the development of status differences between men in early national period America.  How did Americans' ideas of what it meant to be a "manly" man reflect changing social and economic conditions?

4.  Compare and contrast the ways in which men could express their emotions in socially acceptable ways in the following periods and regions:  colonial New England, early National period U.S., pre-civil war Southern backcountry, and California in the 1840s and 1850s.

5.  Identify four major forms of cultural expression of concerns about manhood and masculinity in American from the colonial period through the 1840s.  Explain how each cultural form worked to define manhood and masculinity.

6.  Explain the role of violence in the development of ideas about gender in America to the 1840s.  Under what conditions might "respectable men" resort to violence as appropriate ways to express their identities as men?  Were there periods during which "polite society" discouraged the expression of violent manliness?

7.  Examine the ways in which autonomy, individualism and manliness contributed to the development of an "American character" in the period before the Civil War.