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A Century of Votes for Women

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Member Reviews

"A Century of Votes for Women" is an educational and interesting read. It is rather dry which I think can be a bit of a drawback for books on more educational or historic topics.

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A very deep dive into the history of woman's suffrage. It's a little dry, but I guess that's to be expected from a book like this.

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I appreciated the research and density of information in A Century of Votes for Women. I found it very readable and enjoyed the book tremendously.

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3.75 stars

"A Century of Votes for Women" gave an interesting overview of how the voting behaviour of women changed during the first century of suffrage.

Unfortunately, the chapters got rather repetitive and I think that the analysis could have been more condensed. Still, a very interesting subject matter.

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Interesting book, well researched and fun little read. Wasn’t quite what I was expecting, but I would recommend to anyone interested in the topic or in need of a little history lesson.

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I throughly enjoyed this book, I found it well-written and well researched. Overall it was really interesting to read about the history of women voting, and you could tell the author cared about the topic.

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A CENTURY OF VOTES FOR WOMEN by Christina Wolbrecht and J. Kevin Corder deals with looking at some attention-grabbing questions: "How have American women voted in the first 100 years since the ratification of the Nineteenth Amendment? How have popular understandings of women as voters both persisted and changed over time?" It is interesting to think about the changes since women were first given the right to vote – changes in working outside the home, in education levels, in number of children, in racial composition, and even in voting itself: since 1964, more women than men have voted in presidential elections. Wolbrecht and Corder fill this book with those kind of statistics and numerous charts and graphs, plus an extensive set of notes and helpful index (together roughly making up almost a quarter of this text). The discussion by these two professors of political science (University of Notre Dame and Western Michigan University, respectively) is divided chronologically, with brief overviews followed by more in-depth analysis of individual elections. For example, one section (post 1980) looks at the introduction and then repeated use of the "gender gap" concept – how women's votes differed from men's. This chapter, looking at five national elections through the "soccer mom" of 1996-era fame, "trace[s] changes in women's lives, the debate over women's rights, and the persistence of partisan differences over these issues." That alone is fascinating reading and a topic on which our students could gather first hand impressions by talking with their parents and grandparents.

For even more ideas on women's history and the right to vote, please see these resources recommended by School Library Journal:
https://www.slj.com/?detailStory=resources-to-help-commemorate-the-19th-amendments-centennial

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I expected to find a more reader-friendly book on the history of vote. However If you are like me and read a textbook from time to time just to be in the loop on certain topics, this book on women's vote might be a good choice. It puts in perspective the political history, the people involved and how much things changed in the last 100 years. It offers good sources and doesn't seem biased, other two pluses.

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I expected this book to be more for the broad audience, but in reality it's pretty much a textbook. However it is a textbook that I would eagerly recommend to people, interested in women's history, political history of USA or history in general. This book is absolutely packed with information, well-researched and takes a very neutral stance and doesn't make unsupported generalisations.

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This book gives an overview/summary of women ever since they were given the right to vote by the 19th Amendment in 1920. It reads as a textbook and would be good for all people who are interested in history.

I enjoyed this book a lot. It was nice to see the history of women voters, from when the 19th Amendment was passed in 1920 to today in 2020. It reads more as a textbook and would be perfect for fans of history and political science.

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The author did a good job of breaking the last 100 years into sections & not grouping all the women together however I felt the book was repetitive.- very informative and I do believe it should be read as a college prep or college text to fully understand the vast scope of the work, it was well researched and could be beneficial to history majors.

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2020 marks a milestone in American political history: 100 years prior, the 19th Amendment was passed and women received the right to vote in the United States. Wolbrecht and Corder, professors of political science at Notre Dame and Western Michigan University respectively, recognize this landmark event and present a follow-up question: How have women voted in their century of suffrage?

The authors break up these 100 years into periods of roughly 16-20 years, recognizable to any student of U.S. history as major eras of social, political, military, and economic change in the country. They analyze the best-available data to comment on trends such as voter turnout, voting patterns as compared to men, party preference, and other demographic data such as education, births, marriage, and labor force participation. As the century progresses and more data becomes publicly available, the authors disaggregate the data further and analyze state/local elections, the influence of race and class, and other quasi-political trends.

The authors did a good job of not lumping all women into one homogenous bloc that votes in the same way. They realize that in the initial decades of women's suffrage, all women had the right to vote on paper, but in practice, only white women actually participated in elections, and women of color were systemically barred from voting. As more women of color voted in major elections, the authors begin to note trends that are more consistent across lines of race or socio-economic status than gender, especially notable in the 2016 election.

I found this book to be interesting, but fairly repetitive for my pre-existing knowledge. I studied history in college and have always been an ardent reader and student of U.S. history and women's history in the 20th century, taking classes on the subjects and reading other books on the topic. So, I felt that much of the historical and political analysis was already known to me, such as the history of how women received the vote, how the reversion to the domestic sphere in the 40s and 50s affected politics, the increasing openness in the 60s and 70s, etc. I found the data analysis to be the most compelling component of the book. Overall, this book is quite dry and academic - think of it as a book you would likely read in a college course on women's political history in the United States. Nonetheless, it presents a wealth of data, information, and analysis for students of this topic to use.

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A Century of Votes for Women should be read by all students in college. This book is dense in facts and dry, but the authors have clearly done their research.

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An interesting look at the different ways in which women have voted in America since 1920. I found a lot of the book terms confusing as I am not American however it was interesting to see how voter demographics change over the years. I found it rather dry and it would probably work better as a book to be dipped in and out of rather than read in a linear fashion as I did. Recommended for those interested in American social history.

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Unlike other books, A Century of Votes for Women looks beyond the final vote for the 19th Amendment and explores from the struggle for the vote up to and including today. There are a lot of stats and information...sometimes a little too much at times, but it is obviously well researched and backed up.

I received a copy of this book for a fair review, all opinions are my own.

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A Century of Votes for Women is a data rich yet lucid and totally readable resource on one of the most important subjects in American politics: the enfranchisement and impact of women in American democracy. This is essential knowledge and should be required reading for political science majors.

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