Leslie Cordero
AML 4101
Dr. Lisa Logan
17 November 2008
Private versus Public Disclosure: How Submissiveness and Secrecy dictate the private Nun’s tale in Six Months in a Convent
Published in March of 1835, Rebecca Theresa Reed’s Six Months in a Convent not only brought back the reformation (a movement in which Martin Luther addressed the nobility and authority of the German empire on the necessity of a reform of the Roman church) but redefined it within its own societal context. While critics maintain that Martin Luther’s treatise and Rebecca Reed’s narrative can hardly sustain a worthy comparison, others say that many similarities (excommunication) in how the occurrences unfolded and how they resulted exist. Although Luther’s denunciation and excommunication - issued by Leo X in the 16th century - was a grave and vital component of the Reformation’s culmination, the burning of the Ursuline Convent by a group of working-class Protestant rioters and the publication of Reed’s narrative in the 19th century proved equally, if not more so, hazardous since “others have threatened its author, and those who should undertake its publication, with a worse excommunication and denunciation than was inflicted upon Luther for his temerity” (12). Confined in an era that enforced and idealized the virtues of True Womanhood (piety, purity, submission, and domesticity), the question then becomes: did Rebecca Reed neglect to fulfill the duties of True Womanhood or was she, in fact, subservient of a patriarchal society? Essentially, the pressure of safeguarding information constricted novices, superiors and other women in Rebecca Reed’s Six Months in a Convent to eventually define them – against their own instincts – as “patrons” of the patriarchal hierarchy.
Daniel A. Cohen, in “Miss Reed and the Superiors: The Contradictions of Convent Life in Antebellum America,” argues that while convents united ambitious women in search of “autonomy, sorority, leadership, and accomplishment” (170) into a distinct “separate sphere” that was enforced to adopt these virtues, others proclaimed that promoting women into “separate spheres” stripped them of their female, antebellum American identities. In renouncing their positions as mothers, daughters, wives, etc. and submitting themselves wholly to the will of God and the sanctity of the church, women unintentionally submitted their claim to privacy as well as their claim to informational disclosure. Defining what remains private and what becomes public is crucial in understanding the way in which narratives like Rebecca Reed’s and Maria Monk’s Awful Disclosures of the Hotel Dieu Nunnery work within a counter-reformed and socially driven society. In congruence with the church’s intentions, how they set about in accomplishing their goals, and how the [Protestant] public viewed them demarcated that very definition. Women, in such instances, have no primal authority – in either the Protestant community or the Roman Catholic sect – in declaring the exposure of any relevant source of information. It was only when the authority of a male in higher power was given, that women of such obligation were entitled to disclose “public” information.
The narrative begins in the summer of 1826 when Reed has her first encounter with two young ladies of the Roman Catholic order. Barely thirteen, incorrigible, and ignorant of history and the ways of the world, rearing Reed’s interests towards the convent wasn’t difficult after the excessive attention and flattery provided by the solemnly intriguing nuns. Against the wishes and desires of her Protestant father and friends, she eagerly decides to enter the convent as a pupil. Made clear in the narrative, Reed was only allowed by her father the ability to enter the convent after he was reassured by the Sisters that Reed would not be instilled with Roman Catholic ideologies. After a lengthy “interview” process, Reed was accepted by the Bishop as a pupil of the Mount Benedict Nunnery and encouraged by a Mr. R. to secrete “scripture proofs of the infallibility of the Romish Church; as, ‘Thou art Peter, and upon this Rock I build my church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it;’ and ‘whose sins ye remit they are remitted.’ ‘He that will not hear the church, let him be to thee as an heathen man and a publican’” (57).
Later in the narrative, as Reed begins to walk the reader, or public, through the rituals of surpassing the stages of nunnery, she states that during the time of her vocation she was baptized with the name St. Mary Agnes Teresa. It is important to note that each of the girls, or novices, were given the name “Mary” followed by a saint. This is a symbol of equality amongst all women who submit themselves to patriarchal reign, in which they equally share the burden of secrecy within the church. Upon entering the convent, each women possessed her own testimony, her own ambitions, her own will. Ignorantly declaring an ode to the church, , each woman relinquished the power of her individual voice and essentially her individualistic identity. In his article, Cohen states the following:
“Boston Ursulines called upon young novices to renounce their ‘own ideas, imperfect desires and self-will’ and urged them to cultivate a spirit of ‘profound humility,’ ‘self-denial,’ ‘self-contempt,’ and ‘self annihilation.’ Even fully-professed nuns were, as historian Margaret Susan Thompson has explained, ‘supposed to be docile, submissive, self-effacing, and unworldly” (150).
In an attempt to cultivate submission, docility, and self-effacement women were ultimately viewed as dead to the material world. If this were true for every ambitious woman in search of accomplishment, then did each of those women fail to abide by their establishments’ own moral code? Furthermore, when is it one’s duty to disclose information and where exactly is the line between private and public? If one is witness to an immoral happening, is it not just to expose that very immorality despite of the patriarchal system one has submitted to? For example, page ninety-three of the narrative explains a situation in which Reed was allowed to spend private time with the daughter of Mrs. G (a supposed “friend” within the convent). Upon Reed’s request, after being lavished with gifts and engaged in petty conversation, her companion was to deliver a message specifying Reed’s desire to receive visits from her closest “protestant” friends. However, the message was never delivered “as I have since learned I was deceived in regard to the friendship of Mrs. G.” In said situation, one wonders whether or not the decision to deceive Reed was entirely the intention of Mrs. G, or was she simply submissively following orders instructed to her by a higher power.
On the other hand, the one character, Sister Mary Francis, who strove to fight against patriarchal oppression, failed in all attempts. Prior to Mary Francis’ subtle attempt to escape from the convent, she disclosed to Reed that she would, in fact, be leaving the Ursulines to reside with a different order. When Reed, or Sister Mary Agnes Teresa (as was her ordained name) sat through harsh scrutiny and improper questioning by the Bishop, she inadvertently mentioned that she knew of Sister Mary Francis’ escape from the nunnery and insinuated that she was considering a similar departure. Upon hearing this claim, the Bishop grew irate and exclaimed,
“‘Ah! I know all; confess to me what she told you, and do not dare to deceive me; you cannot deceive God.’ I told him nearly all that had passed between Mary Francis and myself. He said that Mary Francis was not a fit subject for any order, and they were obliged to send her away; that she was deranged, and I had done very wrong in listening to an insane person” (140).
Nineteenth century “separate sphere” ideology (a system that defines a male sphere that is "public” or one concerned with government, trade, business, and law as well as a "private" sphere, encompassing the realm of home, family, and child-rearing) in congruence with True Womanhood (a system in which a set of virtues heightens a woman’s value) stems into what was considered a woman’s private “sphere” and what Catholicism deemed secret, and by when and whom information was dispersed. Is it as simple as private equals “good” and public equals “bad” for women? If this serves true, then women serve merely as tools, in which men of power can manipulate to carry out and reach their own incentives.
“She wrote a letter to my father, of the contents of which I was then ignorant, but have since learned it contained offers of two or three quarters’ schooling, free of expense. My father says he treated it with contempt; and his answer by the bearer was briefly this: ‘he wished me to have nothing to do with the institution; that my friends would prefer my going to a Protestant seminary.’ At my next interview with the Superior, she however told me, my father had become reconciled to my remaining with them two or three quarters; after which time, he would inform them whether he could consent to have me stay there longer, as a teacher of music” (69).
Aware of her father’s initial negation to the church, Reed’s desire to remain submissive and not give way to her own curiosity, neglected to inquire the veracity of the message. The Bishop was aware of the lack of teacher’s within the convent (thus, providing incentive to manipulate the girls’ interest in officiating their vows to the order) and, although only implicated by the text that the Superiors had orders to bring in new instructor‘s amongst the women, they remained dutiful in assuring the task was accomplished by whichever means necessary. Total submissiveness required unquestioning obedience.
In 1520, Martin Luther felt it his duty to denunciate the Roman Catholic sect and expose the injustices in which he was witness to. Whether, partly or entirely fiction, Rebecca Reed’s narrative strove to achieve that same purpose. Convents not only serve as institutions of spiritual and mental growth, but also as spiritual factories that contained research, writing, and other sources of information. When the convent at Mount Benedict in Charlestown, Mass was finally burned down by a fierce group of Protestant men, not only was that gate of information closed, but the women, in a sense, got their voices back. The novel, although emits a discrepancy of veracity, gave light to the individual stories of those who were finally liberated.
Inadvertently, Protestant men proved a double standard during the commencement of the Mount Benedict riot. If a woman did not comply with the duties she was expected to fulfill as “an angel in the house” and genteel wife, she was held in contempt and reprimanded by the same patriarchal society that validated her initially. Cohen states:
“One or two other scraps of evidence suggest that local Protestant men may have not only wanted to protect or liberate the convent women but also to discipline them. In part, the motif of female captivity simply provided members of the mob with a convenient excuse to vent their ethnic and sectarian prejudices. Yet one suspects that it may also have signaled a deeper reluctance to acknowledge that American women might actually prefer the unconventional ‘separate sphere’ of Mount Benedict to the patriarchal households in which most of them had been raised - or even to the newfangled ‘separate sphere’ being carved out by many antebellum women in their own homes” (163).
The very reasons Reed chose to join the convent initially (seclusion, and escape), were the reasons why many women later left the convents.
By the end of Reed’s narrative, however, she successfully managed to escape the convent after realizing that the ideals she had adopted upon entering were mere misconceptions, or rather illusions. Those very illusions which she initially believed to sustain her happiness, ultimately dampened her quest. Thus proving that submission to secrecy within a patriarchal system denounced women’s inherent ability to live. No person, groups or institutions posses the cardinal right to dictate to any individual, despite their creed, sex, race, social status, etc to deprive an individual of their fundamental right to pursue happiness, liberty and peace.
Friday, December 5, 2008
A very rough draft...
Leslie Cordero
AML 4101
Dr. Lisa Logan
17 November 2008
Private versus Public Disclosure: How Submissiveness and Secrecy dictate the private Nun’s tale in Six Months in a Convent
Published in March of 1835, Rebecca Theresa Reed’s Six Months in a Convent not only brought back the reformation - a movement in which Martin Luther addressed the nobility and authority of the German empire on the necessity of a reform of the Roman church - but redefined it within its own societal context. While critics maintain that Martin Luther’s treatise and Rebecca Reed’s narrative can hardly sustain a worthy comparison, others say that many similarities in how the occurrences unfolded and how they were acted upon exist. Although Luther’s denunciation and excommunication in the 16th century was a grave and vital component of the Reformation’s culmination, the burning of the convent and the publication of Reed’s narrative in the 19th century proved equally, if not more so, hazardous since “others have threatened its author, and those who should undertake its publication, with a worse excommunication and denunciation than was inflicted upon Luther for his temerity” (12). Confined in an era that enforced and idealized the virtues of True Womanhood (piety, purity, submission, and domesticity), the question then becomes, did Rebecca Reed neglect to fulfill the duties of true womanhood or was she, in fact, subservient of a patriarchal society? Essentially, the pressure of safeguarding information constricted novices, superiors and other women in Rebecca Reed’s Six Months in a Convent to eventually define them – against their own instincts – as “patrons” of the patriarchal hierarchy.
Daniel A. Cohen, in “Miss Reed and the Superiors: The Contradictions of Convent Life in Antebellum America,” argues that while convents united ambitious women in search of “autonomy, sorority, leadership, and accomplishment” (170) into a distinct “separate sphere” that was enforced to adopt these virtues, others proclaimed that promoting women into “separate spheres” stripped them of their female, antebellum American identities. In renouncing their positions as mothers, daughters, wives, etc. and submitting themselves wholly to the will of God and the sanctity of the church, women unintentionally submitted their claim to privacy as well as their claim to informational disclosure. Defining what remains private and what becomes public is crucial in understanding the way in which narratives like Rebecca Reed’s and Maria Monk’s Awful Disclosures of the Hotel Dieu Nunnery work within a counter-reformed and socially driven society. In congruence with the church’s intentions, how they set about in accomplishing their goals, and how the [Protestant] public viewed them demarcated that very definition. Women, in such instances, have no primal authority – in either the Protestant community or the Roman Catholic sect – in declaring the exposure of any relevant source of information. It was only when the authority of a male in higher power was given, that women of such obligation were entitled to disclose “public” information.
The narrative begins in the summer of 1826 when Reed has her first encounter with two young ladies of the Roman Catholic order. Barely thirteen, incorrigible, and ignorant of history and the ways of the world, rearing Reed’s interests towards the convent wasn’t difficult after the excessive attention and flattery provided by the solemnly intriguing nuns. After a lengthy “interview” process, Reed was finally accepted by the Bishop as a pupil of the Mount Benedict Nunnery and encouraged by a Mr. R. to secrete “scripture proofs of the infallibility of the Romish Church; as, ‘Thou art Peter, and upon this Rock I build my church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it;’ and ‘whose sins ye remit they are remitted.’ ‘He that will not hear the church, let him be to thee as an heathen man and a publican’”(57).
Later in the narrative, as Reed begins to walk the reader, or public, through the rituals of surpassing the stages of nunnery, she states that during the time of her vocation she was baptized with the name St. Mary Agnes Teresa. It is important to note that each of the girls, or novices, were given the name “Mary” followed by a saint. This is a symbol of equality amongst all women who submit themselves to patriarchal reign, in which they equally share the burden of secrecy within the church. Upon entering the convent, each women possessed her own testimony, her own ambitions, her own will. Ignorantly declaring an ode to the church, each woman lost her voice and essentially her individualistic identity. In his article, Cohen states the following:
“Boston Ursulines called upon young novices to renounce their ‘own ideas, imperfect desires and self-will’ and urged them to cultivate a spirit of ‘profound humility,’ ‘self-denial,’ ‘self-contempt,’ and ‘self annihilation.’ Even fully-professed nuns were, as historian Margaret Susan Thompson has explained, ‘supposed to be docile, submissive, self-effacing, and unworldly” (150).
Therefore, when is it one’s duty to disclose information and where exactly is the line between private and public? For example, page ninety-three of the narrative explains a situation in which Reed was allowed to spend private time with the daughter of Mrs. G (a supposed “friend” within the convent). Upon Reed’s request, after being lavished with gifts and engaged in petty conversation, her companion was to deliver a message specifying Reed’s desire to receive visits from her closest “protestant” friends. However, the message was never delivered “as I have since learned I was deceived in regard to the friendship of Mrs. G.” In said situation, one wonders whether or not the decision to deceive Reed was entirely the intention of Mrs. G, or was she simply submissively following orders instructed to her by a higher power.
Nineteenth century “separate sphere” ideology in congruence with True Womanhood, stems into what was considered a woman’s private “sphere” and what Catholicism deemed secret, and by when and whom information was dispersed. Is it as simple as private equals “good” and public equals “bad” for women? If this serves true, then women serve merely as tools, in which men of power can manipulate to carry out and reach their own incentives.
“She wrote a letter to my father, of the contents of which I was then ignorant, but have since learned it contained offers of two or three quarters’ schooling, free of expense. My father says he treated it with contempt; and his answer by the bearer was briefly this: ‘he wished me to have nothing to do with the institution; that my friends would prefer my going to a Protestant seminary.’ At my next interview with the Superior, she however told me, my father had become reconciled to my remaining with them two or three quarters; after which time, he would inform them whether he could consent to have me stay there longer, as a teacher of music” (69).
Aware of her father’s initial negation to the church, Reed’s desire to remain submissive and not give way to her own curiosity, neglected to inquire the veracity of the message. The Bishop was aware of the lack of teacher’s within the convent and , although only implicated by the text that the Superiors had orders to bring in new instructor‘s amongst the women, they remained dutiful in assuring the task was accomplished by whichever means necessary. Total submissiveness required unquestioning obedience.
In 1520, Martin Luther felt it his duty to denunciate the Roman Catholic sect and expose the injustices in which he was witness to. Whether, partly or entirely fiction, Rebecca Reed’s narrative strove to achieve that same purpose. Convents not only serve as institutions of spiritual and mental growth, but also as spiritual factories that contain research, writing, and other sources of information. When the convent at Mount Benedict in Charlestown, Mass was finally burned down by a fierce group of Protestant men, not only was that gate of information closed, but the women, in a sense, got their voices back. The novel, although emits a discrepancy of veracity, gave light to the individual stories of those who were finally liberated.
Inadvertently, Protestant men proved a double standard during the commencement of the Mount Benedict riot. Cohen states:
“One or two other scraps of evidence suggest that local Protestant men may have not only wanted to protect or liberate the convent women but also to discipline them. In part, the motif of female captivity simply provided members of the mob with a convenient excuse to vent their ethnic and sectarian prejudices. Yet one suspects that it may also have signaled a deeper reluctance to acknowledge that American women might actually prefer the unconventional ‘separate sphere’ of Mount Benedict to the patriarchal households in which most of them had been raised - or even to the newfangled ‘separate sphere’ being carved out by many antebellum women in their own homes” (163).
The very reasons Reed chose to join the convent initially (seclusion, and escape), were the reasons why many women later left the convents.
AML 4101
Dr. Lisa Logan
17 November 2008
Private versus Public Disclosure: How Submissiveness and Secrecy dictate the private Nun’s tale in Six Months in a Convent
Published in March of 1835, Rebecca Theresa Reed’s Six Months in a Convent not only brought back the reformation - a movement in which Martin Luther addressed the nobility and authority of the German empire on the necessity of a reform of the Roman church - but redefined it within its own societal context. While critics maintain that Martin Luther’s treatise and Rebecca Reed’s narrative can hardly sustain a worthy comparison, others say that many similarities in how the occurrences unfolded and how they were acted upon exist. Although Luther’s denunciation and excommunication in the 16th century was a grave and vital component of the Reformation’s culmination, the burning of the convent and the publication of Reed’s narrative in the 19th century proved equally, if not more so, hazardous since “others have threatened its author, and those who should undertake its publication, with a worse excommunication and denunciation than was inflicted upon Luther for his temerity” (12). Confined in an era that enforced and idealized the virtues of True Womanhood (piety, purity, submission, and domesticity), the question then becomes, did Rebecca Reed neglect to fulfill the duties of true womanhood or was she, in fact, subservient of a patriarchal society? Essentially, the pressure of safeguarding information constricted novices, superiors and other women in Rebecca Reed’s Six Months in a Convent to eventually define them – against their own instincts – as “patrons” of the patriarchal hierarchy.
Daniel A. Cohen, in “Miss Reed and the Superiors: The Contradictions of Convent Life in Antebellum America,” argues that while convents united ambitious women in search of “autonomy, sorority, leadership, and accomplishment” (170) into a distinct “separate sphere” that was enforced to adopt these virtues, others proclaimed that promoting women into “separate spheres” stripped them of their female, antebellum American identities. In renouncing their positions as mothers, daughters, wives, etc. and submitting themselves wholly to the will of God and the sanctity of the church, women unintentionally submitted their claim to privacy as well as their claim to informational disclosure. Defining what remains private and what becomes public is crucial in understanding the way in which narratives like Rebecca Reed’s and Maria Monk’s Awful Disclosures of the Hotel Dieu Nunnery work within a counter-reformed and socially driven society. In congruence with the church’s intentions, how they set about in accomplishing their goals, and how the [Protestant] public viewed them demarcated that very definition. Women, in such instances, have no primal authority – in either the Protestant community or the Roman Catholic sect – in declaring the exposure of any relevant source of information. It was only when the authority of a male in higher power was given, that women of such obligation were entitled to disclose “public” information.
The narrative begins in the summer of 1826 when Reed has her first encounter with two young ladies of the Roman Catholic order. Barely thirteen, incorrigible, and ignorant of history and the ways of the world, rearing Reed’s interests towards the convent wasn’t difficult after the excessive attention and flattery provided by the solemnly intriguing nuns. After a lengthy “interview” process, Reed was finally accepted by the Bishop as a pupil of the Mount Benedict Nunnery and encouraged by a Mr. R. to secrete “scripture proofs of the infallibility of the Romish Church; as, ‘Thou art Peter, and upon this Rock I build my church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it;’ and ‘whose sins ye remit they are remitted.’ ‘He that will not hear the church, let him be to thee as an heathen man and a publican’”(57).
Later in the narrative, as Reed begins to walk the reader, or public, through the rituals of surpassing the stages of nunnery, she states that during the time of her vocation she was baptized with the name St. Mary Agnes Teresa. It is important to note that each of the girls, or novices, were given the name “Mary” followed by a saint. This is a symbol of equality amongst all women who submit themselves to patriarchal reign, in which they equally share the burden of secrecy within the church. Upon entering the convent, each women possessed her own testimony, her own ambitions, her own will. Ignorantly declaring an ode to the church, each woman lost her voice and essentially her individualistic identity. In his article, Cohen states the following:
“Boston Ursulines called upon young novices to renounce their ‘own ideas, imperfect desires and self-will’ and urged them to cultivate a spirit of ‘profound humility,’ ‘self-denial,’ ‘self-contempt,’ and ‘self annihilation.’ Even fully-professed nuns were, as historian Margaret Susan Thompson has explained, ‘supposed to be docile, submissive, self-effacing, and unworldly” (150).
Therefore, when is it one’s duty to disclose information and where exactly is the line between private and public? For example, page ninety-three of the narrative explains a situation in which Reed was allowed to spend private time with the daughter of Mrs. G (a supposed “friend” within the convent). Upon Reed’s request, after being lavished with gifts and engaged in petty conversation, her companion was to deliver a message specifying Reed’s desire to receive visits from her closest “protestant” friends. However, the message was never delivered “as I have since learned I was deceived in regard to the friendship of Mrs. G.” In said situation, one wonders whether or not the decision to deceive Reed was entirely the intention of Mrs. G, or was she simply submissively following orders instructed to her by a higher power.
Nineteenth century “separate sphere” ideology in congruence with True Womanhood, stems into what was considered a woman’s private “sphere” and what Catholicism deemed secret, and by when and whom information was dispersed. Is it as simple as private equals “good” and public equals “bad” for women? If this serves true, then women serve merely as tools, in which men of power can manipulate to carry out and reach their own incentives.
“She wrote a letter to my father, of the contents of which I was then ignorant, but have since learned it contained offers of two or three quarters’ schooling, free of expense. My father says he treated it with contempt; and his answer by the bearer was briefly this: ‘he wished me to have nothing to do with the institution; that my friends would prefer my going to a Protestant seminary.’ At my next interview with the Superior, she however told me, my father had become reconciled to my remaining with them two or three quarters; after which time, he would inform them whether he could consent to have me stay there longer, as a teacher of music” (69).
Aware of her father’s initial negation to the church, Reed’s desire to remain submissive and not give way to her own curiosity, neglected to inquire the veracity of the message. The Bishop was aware of the lack of teacher’s within the convent and , although only implicated by the text that the Superiors had orders to bring in new instructor‘s amongst the women, they remained dutiful in assuring the task was accomplished by whichever means necessary. Total submissiveness required unquestioning obedience.
In 1520, Martin Luther felt it his duty to denunciate the Roman Catholic sect and expose the injustices in which he was witness to. Whether, partly or entirely fiction, Rebecca Reed’s narrative strove to achieve that same purpose. Convents not only serve as institutions of spiritual and mental growth, but also as spiritual factories that contain research, writing, and other sources of information. When the convent at Mount Benedict in Charlestown, Mass was finally burned down by a fierce group of Protestant men, not only was that gate of information closed, but the women, in a sense, got their voices back. The novel, although emits a discrepancy of veracity, gave light to the individual stories of those who were finally liberated.
Inadvertently, Protestant men proved a double standard during the commencement of the Mount Benedict riot. Cohen states:
“One or two other scraps of evidence suggest that local Protestant men may have not only wanted to protect or liberate the convent women but also to discipline them. In part, the motif of female captivity simply provided members of the mob with a convenient excuse to vent their ethnic and sectarian prejudices. Yet one suspects that it may also have signaled a deeper reluctance to acknowledge that American women might actually prefer the unconventional ‘separate sphere’ of Mount Benedict to the patriarchal households in which most of them had been raised - or even to the newfangled ‘separate sphere’ being carved out by many antebellum women in their own homes” (163).
The very reasons Reed chose to join the convent initially (seclusion, and escape), were the reasons why many women later left the convents.
Thursday, December 4, 2008
Proposal
Proposal
Leslie Cordero
Dr. Lisa Logan
AML 4101
Nov. 26, 2008
Private versus Public Disclosure: How Submissiveness and Secrecy dictate the private Nun’s tale in Six Months in a Convent
Emerging in a time of counter-reformation, Rebecca Reed’s narrative of Six Months in a Convent closely resembles a similar treatise written by Martin Luther in 1520, in which he adamantly, yet persuasively, exposes occurrences affiliated with the Roman Catholic Church dealing with several abuse scandals and declaring a necessary reformation in the church. Consequently, Luther was excommunicated and “delivered unto Satan for the destruction of his flesh.” Therefore, as a woman raised in Protestant antebellum America, who shared close ties with the Roman Catholic church – both constricted within a patriarchal system – did Rebecca Reed neglect to fulfill the duties of true womanhood or was she, in fact, subservient of a patriarchal society? In this paper, I will demonstrate how the pressure of safeguarding information and constricting novices, superiors and other women in Rebecca Reed’s Six Months in a Convent defined them – against their own instincts – as “patrons” of the patriarchal hierarchy.
The preface defines what is private and public in congruence with the church’s intentions, how they set about in accomplishing their goals, and how the [Protestant] public viewed them. Women, in such instances, have no primal authority –in either the Protestant community or the Roman Catholic sect – in declaring the exposure of any relevant source of information. It was only when the authority of a male in higher power was given, that women of such obligation were entitled to disclose “public” information. What Six Months in a Convent successfully depicted was the general idea of equality amongst women. When young girls chose to enter the convent and adopted their “St. Mary’s,” they relinquished their personal stories, their voices. Therefore, submitting themselves as a class of women to a long-reigning patriarchal hierarchy. When the burning of the convent took place in August of 1834, many of those women got their voices back. They were liberated from the oppressive dictatorship of Roman Catholic authority.
This paper will attempt to convey how the 19th century “separate sphere” ideology in congruence with True Womanhood, stems into what was considered a woman’s private “sphere” and what Catholicism deemed secret, and by when and whom information was dispersed. Is it as simple as private/good, public/bad for women? Essentially, I would like to consider how these relationships are prevalent in modern society and to what extent “secrecy,” as an American cultural bystander, has been implemented into the country’s workmanship within a patriarchal system.
Leslie Cordero
Dr. Lisa Logan
AML 4101
Nov. 26, 2008
Private versus Public Disclosure: How Submissiveness and Secrecy dictate the private Nun’s tale in Six Months in a Convent
Emerging in a time of counter-reformation, Rebecca Reed’s narrative of Six Months in a Convent closely resembles a similar treatise written by Martin Luther in 1520, in which he adamantly, yet persuasively, exposes occurrences affiliated with the Roman Catholic Church dealing with several abuse scandals and declaring a necessary reformation in the church. Consequently, Luther was excommunicated and “delivered unto Satan for the destruction of his flesh.” Therefore, as a woman raised in Protestant antebellum America, who shared close ties with the Roman Catholic church – both constricted within a patriarchal system – did Rebecca Reed neglect to fulfill the duties of true womanhood or was she, in fact, subservient of a patriarchal society? In this paper, I will demonstrate how the pressure of safeguarding information and constricting novices, superiors and other women in Rebecca Reed’s Six Months in a Convent defined them – against their own instincts – as “patrons” of the patriarchal hierarchy.
The preface defines what is private and public in congruence with the church’s intentions, how they set about in accomplishing their goals, and how the [Protestant] public viewed them. Women, in such instances, have no primal authority –in either the Protestant community or the Roman Catholic sect – in declaring the exposure of any relevant source of information. It was only when the authority of a male in higher power was given, that women of such obligation were entitled to disclose “public” information. What Six Months in a Convent successfully depicted was the general idea of equality amongst women. When young girls chose to enter the convent and adopted their “St. Mary’s,” they relinquished their personal stories, their voices. Therefore, submitting themselves as a class of women to a long-reigning patriarchal hierarchy. When the burning of the convent took place in August of 1834, many of those women got their voices back. They were liberated from the oppressive dictatorship of Roman Catholic authority.
This paper will attempt to convey how the 19th century “separate sphere” ideology in congruence with True Womanhood, stems into what was considered a woman’s private “sphere” and what Catholicism deemed secret, and by when and whom information was dispersed. Is it as simple as private/good, public/bad for women? Essentially, I would like to consider how these relationships are prevalent in modern society and to what extent “secrecy,” as an American cultural bystander, has been implemented into the country’s workmanship within a patriarchal system.
Tuesday, December 2, 2008
Abstract
Below is a copy of my abstract. This was suprisingly very difficult to complete because of the limited amount of articles pertaining specifically to Six Months in a Convent. Finally, I found Daniel Cohen's article. At first, I wasn't very satisfied with it (partly because it was over 30 pages) but mostly because I couldn't draw any sort final conclusion from it. As I read it over numerous times, I found that many of his points did, in fact, contain much insight and analysis.
Leslie Cordero
Dr. Lisa Logan
AML 4101
11/18/08
Abstract
Cohen, Daniel. “Miss Reed and the Superiors: The Contradictions of Convent Life in Antebellum America.” Journal of Social History, Vol. 33, No. 1 (1996): 149-184. JSTOR. University of Central Florida Library. 10/20/2008.
As a scholar of the Florida International University, Daniel A. Cohen’s article on Rebecca Reed’s, “Six Months in a Convent” primarily shows how Reed and the Ursulines “shared many of the same aspirations and frustrations, pursued many of the same options and strategies, and operated within many of the same social, ideological, and institutional constraints” (150). Amongst the comparison between Reed and the Nuns, Cohen also explores how the tension between the nuns and their Bishop and other conflicts within the convent, which equally suffices as much as the hostilities between Protestants and Catholics -- and how these anxieties may have contributed to the convent’s downfall.
As an introduction to the argument, Cohen first establishes how his research has exposed in Reed’s narrative details that are corroborated by contemporary Catholic sources. He further argues, that although Reed’s testimony may not be altogether reliable, but it can be useful in reconstructing the life of not only Reed, but the Ursuline Convent during the years prior to its fall. In making this comparison, Cohen notes the stereotypes and polarities placed upon Reed and the Ursulines by pro and anti-Catholics. “The anti-Catholic literature contrasted the humble, sincere, forthright, and American Reed to the arrogant, hypocritical, secretive, and foreign Ursulines. At the same time, pro-Catholic publications contrasted the ignorant, vulgar, shiftless, and mendacious Reed to the educated, genteel, dedicated, and trustworthy Ursulines” (150).
As he titles his article “the contradictions of convent life,” Cohen states that the most important contradiction was between “the personal pride and ambition of many of the women who entered convents and the monastic virtues of humility and submissiveness to which they were expected to conform” (150). While urged by monastic virtues to surrender their self-will, ideas, imperfect desires, and essentially themselves entirely and encouraged to adapt a spirit of “profound humility,” “self-denial,” “self-contempt,” and “self-annihilation,” historians like Margret Susan Thomson found that the fully professed nuns who were supposedly advanced in the practice of docile, self-effacing submissiveness were -- in the context of antebellum gender roles -- emerging from schools in which were often operated by such convents that provided American women with “unmatched opportunities for female autonomy, authority, and achievement” (151).
Later in the article, Cohen examines the gendered motives of the convent rioters and states that although the rioters were hesitant to explain their motives, it was strongly indicated that “they viewed their actions as a vindication of violated gender norms” (162). He reports that several weeks prior to the riot, the leader of the mob -- amongst others -- had crudely beaten the convent’s Irish caretaker after he supposedly rudely confronted three protestant women who strolled past the convent. Cohen then emphasizes the fact that although Protestant men may have wanted to liberate convent women, they also sought to punish them. This fact alone raises the suspicion that “it may also have signaled a deeper reluctance to acknowledge that American women might actually prefer the unconventional ‘separate sphere’ of Mount Benedict to the patriarchal households in which most of them had been raised -- or even to the newfangled ‘separate spheres’ being carved out by many antebellum women in their own homes” (163).
Finally, Cohen ends the article by reiterating the profound similarities and differences between Rebecca Reed and the Superiors and articulating directly the contradiction of true womanhood and separate spheres in Catholic convents during a time of antebellum gender ideological reformation. “On the one hand, they drew together a group of women into a formally demarcated ‘separate sphere’ and demanded of them the quintessential female virtues of True Womanhood: piety, purity, humility, submissiveness, and domesticity. But, on the other hand, many Protestants complained that convents tore women away from those primal relations of affection and authority--as daughters, wives, and mothers--that were the very essence of female identity in antebellum America”(171).
Daniel Cohen’s article was refreshing to read after extensive research on similar topics. He provided distinguished insight into the historical context of the novel and thoroughly focused analysis throughout the development of his points and established his credibility with numerous sources all listed in the endnotes. I feel as though much of his investigation was done with congruency and proved to be thought-provoking. He approached the burning of the convent from a different angle and analyzed and assimilated the events that were taking place during that time to unravel the true cause of the riot. Cohen’s article will, in my opinion, serve as a strong asset in piecing together the final product of the research paper.
Leslie Cordero
Dr. Lisa Logan
AML 4101
11/18/08
Abstract
Cohen, Daniel. “Miss Reed and the Superiors: The Contradictions of Convent Life in Antebellum America.” Journal of Social History, Vol. 33, No. 1 (1996): 149-184. JSTOR. University of Central Florida Library. 10/20/2008.
As a scholar of the Florida International University, Daniel A. Cohen’s article on Rebecca Reed’s, “Six Months in a Convent” primarily shows how Reed and the Ursulines “shared many of the same aspirations and frustrations, pursued many of the same options and strategies, and operated within many of the same social, ideological, and institutional constraints” (150). Amongst the comparison between Reed and the Nuns, Cohen also explores how the tension between the nuns and their Bishop and other conflicts within the convent, which equally suffices as much as the hostilities between Protestants and Catholics -- and how these anxieties may have contributed to the convent’s downfall.
As an introduction to the argument, Cohen first establishes how his research has exposed in Reed’s narrative details that are corroborated by contemporary Catholic sources. He further argues, that although Reed’s testimony may not be altogether reliable, but it can be useful in reconstructing the life of not only Reed, but the Ursuline Convent during the years prior to its fall. In making this comparison, Cohen notes the stereotypes and polarities placed upon Reed and the Ursulines by pro and anti-Catholics. “The anti-Catholic literature contrasted the humble, sincere, forthright, and American Reed to the arrogant, hypocritical, secretive, and foreign Ursulines. At the same time, pro-Catholic publications contrasted the ignorant, vulgar, shiftless, and mendacious Reed to the educated, genteel, dedicated, and trustworthy Ursulines” (150).
As he titles his article “the contradictions of convent life,” Cohen states that the most important contradiction was between “the personal pride and ambition of many of the women who entered convents and the monastic virtues of humility and submissiveness to which they were expected to conform” (150). While urged by monastic virtues to surrender their self-will, ideas, imperfect desires, and essentially themselves entirely and encouraged to adapt a spirit of “profound humility,” “self-denial,” “self-contempt,” and “self-annihilation,” historians like Margret Susan Thomson found that the fully professed nuns who were supposedly advanced in the practice of docile, self-effacing submissiveness were -- in the context of antebellum gender roles -- emerging from schools in which were often operated by such convents that provided American women with “unmatched opportunities for female autonomy, authority, and achievement” (151).
Later in the article, Cohen examines the gendered motives of the convent rioters and states that although the rioters were hesitant to explain their motives, it was strongly indicated that “they viewed their actions as a vindication of violated gender norms” (162). He reports that several weeks prior to the riot, the leader of the mob -- amongst others -- had crudely beaten the convent’s Irish caretaker after he supposedly rudely confronted three protestant women who strolled past the convent. Cohen then emphasizes the fact that although Protestant men may have wanted to liberate convent women, they also sought to punish them. This fact alone raises the suspicion that “it may also have signaled a deeper reluctance to acknowledge that American women might actually prefer the unconventional ‘separate sphere’ of Mount Benedict to the patriarchal households in which most of them had been raised -- or even to the newfangled ‘separate spheres’ being carved out by many antebellum women in their own homes” (163).
Finally, Cohen ends the article by reiterating the profound similarities and differences between Rebecca Reed and the Superiors and articulating directly the contradiction of true womanhood and separate spheres in Catholic convents during a time of antebellum gender ideological reformation. “On the one hand, they drew together a group of women into a formally demarcated ‘separate sphere’ and demanded of them the quintessential female virtues of True Womanhood: piety, purity, humility, submissiveness, and domesticity. But, on the other hand, many Protestants complained that convents tore women away from those primal relations of affection and authority--as daughters, wives, and mothers--that were the very essence of female identity in antebellum America”(171).
Daniel Cohen’s article was refreshing to read after extensive research on similar topics. He provided distinguished insight into the historical context of the novel and thoroughly focused analysis throughout the development of his points and established his credibility with numerous sources all listed in the endnotes. I feel as though much of his investigation was done with congruency and proved to be thought-provoking. He approached the burning of the convent from a different angle and analyzed and assimilated the events that were taking place during that time to unravel the true cause of the riot. Cohen’s article will, in my opinion, serve as a strong asset in piecing together the final product of the research paper.
Monday, October 20, 2008
Picture!!! and 'Food For Thought.'
So, I 'googled' some images of "Six Months in a Convent" and here's the most interesting one I found. After completing the preliminary bibliography, I realized how much work this is actually going to be. I'm not sure if it's gotten intimidating yet, but I know what I need to do (and read) to do the best possible attempt at this research paper and it will definately take dedication. There will be so much investisgating. I decided to speak to the Priest at the Catholic church I attend and see if he can provide any knowledge or even opinions on the history of this debate. I attempted to research articles on the web and realized immediately how impossible that task is; this book is almost invisible in the context of history, at least in modern historical accounts. I wonder what that could be saying about "the church keeping this 'underwraps.'"
Bibliography
*More cites may be added with the continuation of this project.
Works Cited
Cantlon, Marie, et al. Encyclopedia of Women and Religion in North America. Bloomington, Indiana. Indiana University Press, c2006. Net Library. University of Central Florida Library. 20 Oct. 2008
Hollingsworth, Gerelyn. Ex-Nuns: Women Who Have Left the Convent. Jefferson, N.C.: McFarland and Co., c1985.
Morgan, David, et al. The Visual Culture of American Religions. Berkeley, California. University of California Press; c2001.
Norman, Edward. The English Catholic Church in the Nineteenth Century. Oxford [Oxfordshire]: Cleredon Press, 1984.
Reed, Rebecca Theresa. Six Months in a Convent. Boston, Massachusetts: Russell, Ordione and Metcalf, 1835.
Wheeler, Michael. Catholic and Protestant in Nineteenth-Century English Culture. Cambridge, UK. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2006.
Works Cited
Cantlon, Marie, et al. Encyclopedia of Women and Religion in North America. Bloomington, Indiana. Indiana University Press, c2006. Net Library. University of Central Florida Library. 20 Oct. 2008
Hollingsworth, Gerelyn. Ex-Nuns: Women Who Have Left the Convent. Jefferson, N.C.: McFarland and Co., c1985.
Morgan, David, et al. The Visual Culture of American Religions. Berkeley, California. University of California Press; c2001.
Norman, Edward. The English Catholic Church in the Nineteenth Century. Oxford [Oxfordshire]: Cleredon Press, 1984.
Reed, Rebecca Theresa. Six Months in a Convent. Boston, Massachusetts: Russell, Ordione and Metcalf, 1835.
Wheeler, Michael. Catholic and Protestant in Nineteenth-Century English Culture. Cambridge, UK. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2006.
Friday, October 17, 2008
Rhetorical Analysis: Six Months in a Convent
As prevalent as it is to read Rebecca Reed’s early 19th Century novel, “Six Months in a Convent,” was reading the front matter of the book. Not only did Reed load most of the history necessary in understanding the novel’s basis in the introduction, but she provides information about herself as well: stating on the title page, “Rebecca Theresa Reed: Who was under the influence of the Roman Catholics about two years, and an inmate of the Ursuline Convent.” Interestingly, Reed’s novel doesn’t follow a standard “chapter” pattern. Instead, the book is one continual “chapter” till the very end. Understanding the novel’s title page, introduction, and first section of the novel becomes paramount in understanding the novel as a whole given the stories length.
Throughout the introduction, Reed maps out an extensive historical account of Martin Luther’s attempt at Reformation and draws a comparison between the movement’s efforts and those of whom withdrew from the Ursuline Community Convent. Reed states the following in reference to those whom declared religious vows of poverty: “ Yet, they hold out public inducements and charge the highest prices for educating the daughters of wealthy parents of that class of Christians whom “all good Catholics” regard as heretics, who must inevitably be damned unless they are converted to the only true faith”(7 ). Although Reed’s introductory speech resembles a hint of sarcasm, and perhaps a bit of anger, she writes with much poise and composure, making her points valid and direct. Rebecca Reed also professes in her introduction, with avid discourse, the turmoil and conflicts between Protestant families and the objectives and motifs or Romanist “educators.” Later in the introduction, she explains and once again compares the experiences of Luther to those of her own after the publishing “Six Months in a Convent.” She states, “under these contradictory impressions, one portion of the community have been urging the immediate publication of the Narrative, while others have threatened its author, and those who should undertake its publication, with a worse excommunication and denunciation than was inflicted upon Luther for his temerity” (12).
After completing the introduction, Reed dives directly into the narrative, beginning first with the very day she was offered a seat in the Nunnery. She accounts the process and conflicts she was faced with in making her decision to join; and thus began her story. I found most interesting, how Reed never actually accounts the names of those she speaks about, instead, referring to them only as “Miss M.H.” or “Mr. H.J.K,” for example. It is for this reason that it seems as though, this narrative is really for those “heretics” in the public who lack any insider knowledge of the Roman Catholic church. It suspiciously seems, as though Reed is invoking somewhat of a warning or disclosure to, not only the aforementioned, but also to young women inspired to join nunneries without any real knowledge of history. “While writing this narrative, I often lament my little knowledge of history, for had I been more acquainted with it, I do not think I ever should have united myself to an institution of this nature” (52). By using only abbreviated names, Reed might have been attempting to either protect specific people within the convent, or perhaps even, to protect herself from real harm against those with power.
Throughout the introduction, Reed maps out an extensive historical account of Martin Luther’s attempt at Reformation and draws a comparison between the movement’s efforts and those of whom withdrew from the Ursuline Community Convent. Reed states the following in reference to those whom declared religious vows of poverty: “ Yet, they hold out public inducements and charge the highest prices for educating the daughters of wealthy parents of that class of Christians whom “all good Catholics” regard as heretics, who must inevitably be damned unless they are converted to the only true faith”(7 ). Although Reed’s introductory speech resembles a hint of sarcasm, and perhaps a bit of anger, she writes with much poise and composure, making her points valid and direct. Rebecca Reed also professes in her introduction, with avid discourse, the turmoil and conflicts between Protestant families and the objectives and motifs or Romanist “educators.” Later in the introduction, she explains and once again compares the experiences of Luther to those of her own after the publishing “Six Months in a Convent.” She states, “under these contradictory impressions, one portion of the community have been urging the immediate publication of the Narrative, while others have threatened its author, and those who should undertake its publication, with a worse excommunication and denunciation than was inflicted upon Luther for his temerity” (12).
After completing the introduction, Reed dives directly into the narrative, beginning first with the very day she was offered a seat in the Nunnery. She accounts the process and conflicts she was faced with in making her decision to join; and thus began her story. I found most interesting, how Reed never actually accounts the names of those she speaks about, instead, referring to them only as “Miss M.H.” or “Mr. H.J.K,” for example. It is for this reason that it seems as though, this narrative is really for those “heretics” in the public who lack any insider knowledge of the Roman Catholic church. It suspiciously seems, as though Reed is invoking somewhat of a warning or disclosure to, not only the aforementioned, but also to young women inspired to join nunneries without any real knowledge of history. “While writing this narrative, I often lament my little knowledge of history, for had I been more acquainted with it, I do not think I ever should have united myself to an institution of this nature” (52). By using only abbreviated names, Reed might have been attempting to either protect specific people within the convent, or perhaps even, to protect herself from real harm against those with power.
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