January 23, 2020

Gale Launches Second Installment of Women’s Studies Archive Series

FARMINGTON HILLS, Mich. – January 23, 2020 – Gale, a Cengage company, has released the second installment of its world-renowned Women’s Studies Archive series. Women’s Studies Archive: Voice and Vision, looks beyond women’s suffrage and explores the evolution of feminism throughout the 19th and 20th centuries (1780-2000). Building on the platform of the first collection, Issues and Identity, this new archive brings more female voices to the forefront, critical for scholars working in women’s history, gender studies and social history. Read Gale’s blog about Voice and Vision.

As scholars seek to diversify the perspectives from which history is commonly told, Voice and Vision brings awareness of and recognition to the accomplishments of women. The archive features collections focused solely on female authors as well as magazine and journals created by women. Researchers now have access to periodicals written, illustrated and published by women, representing their work, causes, concerns and voices — largely unavailable until now.

Voice and Vision examines critical areas of study including the abolition of slavery, alcohol and temperance movements, pacifism and political activism, domestic service, education, health and hygiene, divorce, social reform and much more. It provides a diverse, global perspective on women’s history, including material on Chicana leaders and activists, allowing researchers to understand a variety of perspectives on women’s experiences and their impact on society.

Voice and Vision shares women’s stories from world-renowned libraries across 15 collections, including:

The British Library

  • Women’s Periodicals: Digitized periodicals cover every aspect of the surge of emancipationist activities from 1870 to the gaining of full, universal suffrage in 1928 and beyond.
  • Women’s Printing Society Publications: Covers the Society’s output from 1874–1943, both its publications and employment opportunities for women in a previously restricted profession.

Swarthmore College

  • Anna Garlin Spencer Papers, 1878–1931: Includes correspondence and writings from this founding member of the Women’s Peace Party.
  • Hannah Johnston Bailey Papers, 1858–1923: Includes correspondence, memorabilia and more from Bailey, a Quaker pacifist and suffragist.
  • Lydia G. Wentworth Papers, 1902–1947: Features correspondence and manuscripts of the ardent peace advocate and writer.
  • Edwin D. Mead and Lucia Ames Mead Papers, 1876–1936: Includes extensive coverage of the couple’s work as leaders of the U.S. and international peace movements.
  • Hannah Clothier Hull Papers, 1889–1958: Features a depth of material from a founder of the Woman’s Peace Party and the Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom.

American Antiquarian Society

  • Monographs on and by Women: Features contributions from predominantly female authors of poetry, fiction, memoirs, children’s literature, and more on an eclectic mix of topics.

New York University

  • Papers of Mary E. Gawthorpe: An extensive collection of material highlights the British suffragist’s friendships with a network of like-minded leaders and activists.
  • Papers of Elizabeth Gurley Flynn: Dubbed “The Rebel Girl,” this collection details Flynn’s work as a professional revolutionary against capitalism.

The National Archives (United Kingdom)

  • Records of the Women’s National Commission: Features rare materials from the commission (1916–2010), established to ensure female opinions were given due weight in the deliberation of the government and matters of public interest.
  • Records of the Equal Opportunities Commission: Presents material from 1962–2007 exploring the Commission’s work to eliminate discrimination on the grounds of sex or marriage and to promote equal opportunities for men and women.

University of California, Santa Barbara

  • Comisión Femenil Mexicana Nacional Archives: Contains materials that promote the image of Chicana/Latina women in all levels of society.
  • National Network of Hispanic Women Archives: Features a depth of resources to promote the continuation of ethnic and gender studies, gender research and debate.
  • Alicia Escalante Papers: This collection of the Chicana activist’s documents details her significant contributions and causes during the 1960s.

The Women’s Studies Archive series is available on the Gale Primary Sources platform, enabling cross-archival searching to help users make new connections across topics. For those looking to explore even deeper insights, the series is also available through the Gale Digital Scholar Lab. This allows researchers to apply natural language processing tools to raw text data (OCR) from the collections or Gale Primary Sources archives and perform textual analysis on large corpora of historical texts. Now researchers can analyze and explore historical text more interactively, generating new research insights and content sets not previously possible.

Voice and Vision offers:

  • access to more than 800,000 pages of unique content across 15 collections written by women, making it the most comprehensive resource of its kind for women’s studies.
  • diverse coverage on topics such as suffrage, birth control, pacifism, civil rights, socialism and more.
  • a vast array of primary sources from 1780 to 2000, spanning multiple geographic regions, providing a diverse global perspective on women’s experiences and their impact on society.
  • cross-searching and textual analysis within the Gale Digital Scholar Lab and Gale Primary Sources platforms, opening new research opportunities.

Voice and Vision presents women’s voices and narratives in their own words, to counter a male-centric view of history,” said Seth Cayley, vice president of Gale Primary Sources. “The diverse global coverage of the archive makes it an incredibly important resource, not only for strengthening research into women’s studies, but for its interdisciplinary nature on topics that go beyond just suffrage such as slavery, mental health, moral reform, literature and more.”

Gale will showcase Women’s Studies Archive: Voice and Vision at the ALA Midwinter Conference, Jan. 24-27 in Philadelphia at Gale booth #1207.

To request a trial, visit the Women’s Studies Archive: Voice and Vision webpage.

About Cengage and Gale

Cengage is the education and technology company built for learners. The company serves the higher education, K-12, professional, library and workforce training markets worldwide. Gale, a Cengage company, provides libraries with original and curated content, as well as the modern research tools and technology that are crucial in connecting libraries to learning, and learners to libraries. For more than 60 years, Gale has partnered with libraries around the world to empower the discovery of knowledge and insights – where, when and how people need it. Gale has 500 employees globally with its main operations in Farmington Hills, Michigan. For more information, please visit www.gale.com.

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Media Contact:

Kayla Siefker, Gale, a Cengage company, 248-915-9624, [email protected]