Habits of Compassion: Irish Catholic Nuns and the Origins of New York's Welfare System, 1830-1920 (Women, Gender, and Sexuality in American History)

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Synopsis
The Irish-Catholic Sisters accomplished tremendously successful work in founding charitable organizations in New York City from the Irish famine through the early twentieth century. Maureen Fitzgerald argues that their championing of the rights of the poor—especially poor women—resulted in an explosion of state-supported services and programs. Parting from Protestant belief in meager and means-tested aid, Irish Catholic nuns argued for an approach based on compassion for the poor. Fitzgerald positions the nuns' activism as resistance to Protestantism's cultural hegemony. As she shows, Roman Catholic nuns offered strong and unequivocal moral leadership in condemning those who punished the poor for their poverty and unmarried women for sexual transgression. Fitzgerald also delves into the nuns' own communities, from the class-based hierarchies within the convents to the political power they wielded within the city. That power, amplified by an alliance with the local Irish Catholic political machine, allowed the women to expand public charities in the city on an unprecedented scale.
Copyright:
2006

Book Details

Book Quality:
Publisher Quality
Book Size:
312 Pages
ISBN-13:
9780252072826
Related ISBNs:
9780252030345
Publisher:
University of Illinois Press
Date of Addition:
Copyrighted By:
the Board of Trustees of the University of Illinois
Adult content:
No
Language:
English
Has Image Descriptions:
No
Categories:
History, Nonfiction, Religion and Spirituality, Social Studies, Politics and Government, Sociology
Reading Age:
13–18
Submitted By:
Bookshare Staff
Usage Restrictions:
This is a copyrighted book.

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