Sonya Orleans Rose (1935 – October 15, 2020)
[ was an American historian and sociologist whose work focused on the ]cultural history
Cultural history combines the approaches of anthropology and history to examine popular cultural traditions and cultural interpretations of historical experience. It examines the records and narrative descriptions of past matter, encompassing the ...
of the United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Europe, off the north-western coast of the continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotland, Wales and North ...
and the British Empire
The British Empire was composed of the dominions, colonies, protectorates, mandates, and other territories ruled or administered by the United Kingdom and its predecessor states. It began with the overseas possessions and trading posts esta ...
in the 19th and 20th centuries. She was particularly known for her contribution to women's
A woman is an adult female human. Prior to adulthood, a female human is referred to as a girl (a female child or adolescent). The plural ''women'' is sometimes used in certain phrases such as "women's rights" to denote female humans regardl ...
and gender history
Gender history is a sub-field of history and gender studies, which looks at the past from the perspective of gender. It is in many ways, an outgrowth of women's history. The discipline considers in what ways historical events and periodization impa ...
.
Career
Rose was born in 1935 and grew up in New York
New York most commonly refers to:
* New York City, the most populous city in the United States, located in the state of New York
* New York (state), a state in the northeastern United States
New York may also refer to:
Film and television
* '' ...
and Ohio
Ohio () is a state in the Midwestern region of the United States. Of the fifty U.S. states, it is the 34th-largest by area, and with a population of nearly 11.8 million, is the seventh-most populous and tenth-most densely populated. The sta ...
. She received a Bachelor of Arts
Bachelor of arts (BA or AB; from the Latin ', ', or ') is a bachelor's degree awarded for an undergraduate program in the arts, or, in some cases, other disciplines. A Bachelor of Arts degree course is generally completed in three or four years ...
degree from Antioch College and pursued postgraduate studies in sociology
Sociology is a social science that focuses on society, human social behavior, patterns of Interpersonal ties, social relationships, social interaction, and aspects of culture associated with everyday life. It uses various methods of Empirical ...
at Northwestern University
Northwestern University is a private research university in Evanston, Illinois. Founded in 1851, Northwestern is the oldest chartered university in Illinois and is ranked among the most prestigious academic institutions in the world.
Charte ...
where she earned a Master of Arts
A Master of Arts ( la, Magister Artium or ''Artium Magister''; abbreviated MA, M.A., AM, or A.M.) is the holder of a master's degree awarded by universities in many countries. The degree is usually contrasted with that of Master of Science. Tho ...
degree in 1962 and a doctorate
A doctorate (from Latin ''docere'', "to teach"), doctor's degree (from Latin ''doctor'', "teacher"), or doctoral degree is an academic degree awarded by universities and some other educational institutions, derived from the ancient formalism ''l ...
in 1974. Her doctoral dissertation was entitled ''Managing uncertainty: The honeymoon period of new patients on an adolescent ward''. She began her academic career at Colby College
Colby College is a private liberal arts college in Waterville, Maine. It was founded in 1813 as the Maine Literary and Theological Institution, then renamed Waterville College after the city where it resides. The donations of Christian philanthr ...
in 1974 before moving to the University of Michigan
, mottoeng = "Arts, Knowledge, Truth"
, former_names = Catholepistemiad, or University of Michigania (1817–1821)
, budget = $10.3 billion (2021)
, endowment = $17 billion (2021)As o ...
in 1993.
As well as teaching sociology and women's studies
Women's studies is an academic field that draws on feminist and interdisciplinary methods to place women's lives and experiences at the center of study, while examining social and cultural constructs of gender; systems of privilege and oppress ...
, Rose became increasingly interested in cultural history
Cultural history combines the approaches of anthropology and history to examine popular cultural traditions and cultural interpretations of historical experience. It examines the records and narrative descriptions of past matter, encompassing the ...
and, in particular, gender history
Gender history is a sub-field of history and gender studies, which looks at the past from the perspective of gender. It is in many ways, an outgrowth of women's history. The discipline considers in what ways historical events and periodization impa ...
in the context of the United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Europe, off the north-western coast of the continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotland, Wales and North ...
in the 19th and 20th centuries. She published ''Limited Livelihoods: Gender and Class in Nineteenth-Century England'' (1992) which explored the relationship between gender and capitalism in a range of industries during the Industrial Revolution
The Industrial Revolution was the transition to new manufacturing processes in Great Britain, continental Europe, and the United States, that occurred during the period from around 1760 to about 1820–1840. This transition included going f ...
. Historian Angela Woollacott notes that according to Rose, class and gender are not separate systems or structures in 19th century industrial England, but the "content of class relations is gendered and the content of gender distinctions and gender relations is 'classed'". She also co-edited ''Gender and Class in Modern Europe'' (1996) and ''Gender, Citizenships and Subjectivities'' (2002).[
On the basis of an article in the '' American Historical Review'' in 1998, Rose published a major monograph on the cultural history of the United Kingdom in World War II entitled '' Which People’s War? National Identity and Citizenship in Wartime Britain, 1939–1945'' (2003). The work, focusing on nationalism and class, has been described as "one of the key interventions in the history of wartime Britain."][ It was inspired by Rose's own experiences in the United States at the time of the ]September 11 attacks
The September 11 attacks, commonly known as 9/11, were four coordinated suicide terrorist attacks carried out by al-Qaeda against the United States on Tuesday, September 11, 2001. That morning, nineteen terrorists hijacked four commercia ...
and the outbreak of the Iraq War
{{Infobox military conflict
, conflict = Iraq War {{Nobold, {{lang, ar, حرب العراق (Arabic) {{Nobold, {{lang, ku, شەڕی عێراق (Kurdish languages, Kurdish)
, partof = the Iraq conflict (2003–present), I ...
. After this, she was involved in the "imperial turn" in British historiography and co-edited ''At Home with the Empire: Metropolitan Culture and the Imperial World'' (2006).[
Before her retirement to the United Kingdom, Rose wrote a synthetic studies of gender history entitled ''What Is Gender History?'' (2010) and co-edited ''The Oxford Handbook of Gender, War, and the Western World since 1600'' (2020).][
]
Death
Rose died on October 15, 2020, in Sarasota, Florida, at the age of 84.
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Rose, Sonya O.
1935 births
2020 deaths
University of Michigan faculty
21st-century American historians
American women sociologists
Antioch College alumni
Historians of the United Kingdom
Historians of World War II
Historians of the British Empire
Cultural historians
American social sciences writers
American women historians
Colby College faculty
Northwestern University alumni