Communities of Women: Historical Perspectives

by Barbara Brookes (Editor)

The sense of belonging to a community is fundamental, but it is not tied to a locality; it exists in the mind. Communities can be vast - empires, nations, a huge religious community - or small isolated groups. What distinguishes them is the style in which they are imagined. This book explores communities that are small-scale, of peripheral importance in the broad flow of history, and usually informal in their organization. Sometimes they are simple clusters of women. In time and place, they range from 12th century Swabia to 20th century Australasia. They are equally varied in their focus, whether on place, kin, romance, religion, dispossession, education, occupation or political commitment. What they share is that they are communities of women.

229 pages, Paperback

First published September 1, 2002

About the author

Barbara Brookes is a New Zealand historian and academic. She specialises in women's history and medical history. In 2017, Brookes' book A History of New Zealand Women won the 2017 Ockham New Zealand Book Award in the Illustrated Non-Fiction category.