Analysis Of Revolutionary Mothers By Carol Berkin

The American Revolution was a war fought on home ground throughout the colonies that gave burdens to colonist. This war brought scarcity and danger into the lives of every American living in New England, and throughout the book Revolutionary Mothers Carol Berkin, the author, shows us that women, of all ethnicities, cultures, and classes were called upon to play more of a part in the war than just the housewives. Berkin travels back in time for this book to the Revolutionary War and explores diverse roles of these revolutionary women. What everyone else saw was how the women managed different parts of their husband’s jobs while they were out battling on the home front. Some of the women took it a step farther to become nurses and cooks in the

Most of the time when authors talk or write books about the Revolution the main focus is mostly on the notable men of the era such as George Washington or Paul Revere. Sometimes they would even talk about battles like Valley Forge; or the other famous events like the Boston Tea Party that was a result from Parliaments’ efforts to gain money from the colonist through taxes. Instead of doing talking about this Berkin feels that it should be told “as a story of both women and men” and that’s what she does throughout the rest of the book. She takes different women’s perspectives and recapturing these experiences from ordinary colonial women who lived during an extraordinary time. This is a new and fascinating addition Carol Berkin’s uses to help us understand a different outtake of the birth of our

While the men were out battling for independence the women stayed home and did the men’s old jobs and tried to grow as one themselves. The women she used helped this argument because the book covers the roles of prominent women, poor women, African American women/slave women, and Native American women--and it even talks about the role of British women. Using many different types of women allowed Carol Berkin’s to fully cover every different aspect that different women faced during this harsh time. During that era, it was quite difficult for the women, but they challenged those traditional customs everyone saw and pushed those gender and racial roles during the revolutionary period. In pushing those roles women participated by boycotting British goods, producing goods for soldiers, spying on the British, and serving in the armed forces disguised as men. When they boycotted the British goods, they started off by spinning their own clothing and slowly transitioned from making their own clothing to spinning uniforms for the continental army so they could be clothed and warm for battle. Then women became more interested in being involved in the war but was