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Rating: 
Summary: Wonderful book
Review: I thoroughly enjoyed reading Ms. Perdue's book about the Cherokee Women. It is a well researched volume. It opened my eyes to a lot about the life of the Cherokees, both men and women. I highly recommend this book to anyone interested in the Native American cultures. Ms. Perdue makes what could be a boring subject into a great read. The book held my attention and piqued my interest in the lives of Native Amercian women from the past and today.
Rating: 
Summary: Well-written; some interpretation problems
Review: In her well-written Cherokee Women: Gender and Culture Change, 1700-1835, historian Theda Perdue argues that "the story of most Cherokee women is not cultural transformation...but remarkable cultural persistence." This is not to say, she argues, that these women did not experience significant changes in their status and condition, especially if one looks at the "decline" of Native Americans only in terms of land losses and military defeats. If, however, historians looks at "other indices of cultural change, including production, reproduction, religion, and perceptions of self, as well as political and economic institutions," then a different image emerges of Cherokee women over time: one of cultural persistence. Perdue does not deny that contact with Europeans had a profound, and ultimately negative, impact on the lives and well being of native peoples, including women of the seven Cherokee clans. She is particularly lucid in describing how the deer skin trade, military alliances and the insistence by whites of negotiating only with males in treaty making and land deals diminished much of the influence women had in terms of trade, material possessions and political status.
Perdue interprets the changes in Cherokee life for men and women, beginning in the 18th century, as a cultural retooling, in which men became predominantly involved in external affairs of the tribe (war, military alliances, commercial enterprises, treaties) and women maintained internal power and status within the tribe. "While women became dependent on men in some respects," she notes, "men also relied increasingly on women to plant corn, perpetuate lineages, and maintain village life." She goes on to state that the deerskin trade may actually have enhanced the power of women within their Cherokee communities "by removing men for much of the year." Additionally, for most of their yearly sustenance, male hunters still relied on the bounty of agricultural production, which remained almost exclusively the domain of females. Finally, Perdue argues that despite the encroachment of whites, the male takeover of tribal political leadership and institutions by the late 18th century, and relocation to the west by 1839, "a distinct culture survived removal, rebuilding, civil war, reconstruction, allotment and Oklahoma statehood." As proof of the survival and persistence of this culture, Perdue briefly points to the continuing significant role of women at the end of the 20th century. Thus, she concludes that the fate of Cherokee women has not been one of cultural declension, but one of "persistence and change, conservatism and adaptation, tragedy and survival."
Much of Perdue's interpretation of persistence and survival of women's culture within the Cherokee clans is quite persuasive. However, her treatment of the growing external role of men with regard to leadership and war and the corresponding decline in female power and influence on tribal matters of extreme (and ultimately devastating) importance to the Cherokees is problematic. By arguing that the male takeover of political power and control of land allowed women to consolidate internal, domestic power within the tribes seems to make a virtue out of an inescapable necessity. This is not to refute Perdue's recognition of the important spheres women continued to control; nevertheless, her contention that the external pressures of the U.S. government's "civilization program," land sessions, wars and eventual removal did not result in "declining status and lost culture" may be significantly overstated. For example, she asserts that although men dominated most aspects of commercial relations with whites, "women did occupy one position that had long-term implications for the Cherokees-they became wives of traders." While marriage to whites may in fact have been an effective method of survival and adaptation for Cherokee women, Perdue's use of this trend as evidence of cultural persistence is questionable. Similarly, Perdue argues that when Cherokee wives of British soldiers at the besieged Ft. Loudoun in 1760 provided supplies and intelligence to their husbands, they "acted according to long-established standards of behavior for married women." These women saw themselves not as part of "an abstract Cherokee nation," but as "members of clans and lineages," of whom their red-coated husbands were part. This assertion refutes her earlier statement that husbands were not kinsmen of their wives, they were outsiders to her clan. Furthermore, the fact that these native women were willing to defy their own people in a time of war in order to help the enemies of the tribe may also be seen as evidence of waning tribal cohesion.
Rating: 
Summary: AND I THOUGHT THE CRUSADES OF FEMINISM WERE OVER.......
Review: Through a great desire for truth of the cherokee history, I would of rather had an experience in picketing on a local feminism rally for "Red Rights". Insightful and wity were my initial reactions (not to discredit her eloquence) but the repetative nature of relaying her thesis was a bit tedious. I am a great fan of oral tradition when it passive-aggressively reiterated. The persuasion lacks when it is shoved down your throat. Equilibrium of cherokee culture was identified under irrational means of a chip on Perdue's shoulder. To elaborate on the up-side, it is full of actuality (in disguise).
Rating:
Summary: AND I THOUGHT THE CRUSADES OF FEMINISM WERE OVER.......
Review: Through a great desire for truth of the cherokee history, I would of rather had an experience in picketing on a local feminism rally for "Red Rights". Insightful and wity were my initial reactions (not to discredit her eloquence) but the repetative nature of relaying her thesis was a bit tedious. I am a great fan of oral tradition when it passive-aggressively reiterated. The persuasion lacks when it is shoved down your throat. Equilibrium of cherokee culture was identified under irrational means of a chip on Perdue's shoulder. To elaborate on the up-side, it is full of actuality (in disguise).
Rating:
Summary: AND I THOUGHT THE CRUSADES OF FEMINISM WERE OVER.......
Review: Throuugh a great desire for truth of the cherokee history, I would of rather had an experience in picketing on a local feminism rally for "Red Rights". Insightful and wity were my initial reactions (not to discredit her eloquence) but the repetative nature of relaying her thesis was a bit tedious. I am a great fan of oral tradition when it passive-aggressively reiterated. The persuasion lacks when it is shuved down your throat. Equilibrium of cherokee culture was identified under irrational means of a chip on Perdue's shoulder. To elaborate on the up-side, it is full of actuality (in disguise).
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