Women’s History For Beginners offers a lively, revealing, and provocative overview of this important (and controversial) academic field. Who are the great women of history, and why don’t we know more about them? You don’t need to be a scholar to notice that men’s history dominates everything we learn in school; yet a quick tour of the past reveals dynamic female role models at every turn.

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This is more than an introduction to women’s roles and contributions across time. It also examines the ways that women in all societies have been ruled by men, according to law and custom. Women’s History For Beginners opens with a critical investigation of why so few of us are exposed to women’s history in our years of schooling—and why educators and political groups remain leery of bringing fair, accurate women’s history content into the classroom even now. It concludes with the reminder that women, too, are divided by race and class and nationality; that there is no one-size-fits-all women’s history but many different versions, each worthy of investigation and understanding.