PART 20
EARLY AMERICA
***, MARRIAGE, CHILDREN, GAYS, LESBIANS, BOYS AS GIRLS, ABORTION,
BREECHING, FAMILY AND OTHER MYTHS
***uality in the Family Life Cycle
Despite initial regional variations, the family quickly became the central
economic unit in every American colony. As in other preindustrial
societies, the family both produced and consumed almost all goods and
services. Reproduction and production went hand in hand, for family
survival in an agricultural economy depended on the labor of children,
both
in the fields and in the household. Moreover, English inheritance
practices
sup****ted parental authority, for fathers bequeathed to their sons the
land
that was necessary for establi****ng new families. For all of these
reasons,
colonial laws and customs strongly sup****ted family formation. New England
colonies forbade "solitary living" in order to insure that everyone
resided
within a family, either their own or, as in the case of servants and
apprentices, in another household. Even in colonies without such laws,
economic survival demanded family living. Thus the life of the individual
was integrally connected with that of the family. To understand the
meaning
and practice of ***uality in colonial America, then, we look first at the
life cycle of the individual within the family, beginning with attempts to
socialize children to channel ***ual desire toward marriage, and turning
next to the experiences of court****p, marriage, and childbearing.
A young person growing up in colonial America learned about ***uality from
two primary sources: observation within the family and moral instruction
from parent and church. A small minority of colonists were also exposed to
medical advice literature published in London and reprinted in America
during the eighteenth century. Although these various sources of
information might conflict on specific points, overall they transmitted
the
expectation that ***uality within marriage, aimed toward reproduction,
would become a part of normal adult life.
Childhood observation of ***ual activity is common in agricultural
societies, and all regions remained agricultural throughout the colonial
period. "Procreation was everywhere, in the barnyard as well as in the
house," one historian has written of seventeenth-century New England.'
Colonial laws against bestiality, and scattered prosecutions for buggery
with farm animals, attest to one influence of the barnyard. In
Connecticut,
for example, a man confessed to having had ***ual relations with a variety
of animals since the age of ten; Massachusetts executed several teenage
boys for buggery. ***ual relations with animals required harsh punishment,
for colonists believed that these unions could have reproductive
consequences. The mating of humans and animals, they feared, would produce
monstrous offspring. For this reason, colonists insisted on puni****ng not
only the man but also the beast, who might bear such monsters. Thus
William
Hacketts, "found in buggery with a cow, upon the Lord's day," had to
witness the execution of the cow before his own hanging took place.
Sixteen-year-old Thomas Grazer of Plymouth confessed to buggery "with a
mare, a cow, two goats, five sheep, two calves and a turkey." The court
ordered a lineup of sheep at which Grazer identified his ***ual partners,
who were "killed before his face," and then "he himself was executed."'
Although executions were rare, ***ual observation or experimentation with
animals was no doubt as widespread in colonial America as in other
agricultural societies.
Children also learned about *** in the home. The small size of colonial
dwellings allowed children quite early in their lives to hear or see
***ual
activity among adults. Although curtains might isolate the parental bed,
all family members commonly slept in the same room, especially during
winters, when a single fireplace provided the heat. Thus a four-year-old
girl re****ted to a servant that she saw a man "lay on the bed with her
mamma," and heard him instruct the mother to "lay up higher." Furthermore,
the practice of sharing beds exposed some young people to adult ***uality.
In one home, three adults and a child were sleeping together when one of
the men unbuttoned his breeches and had "carnal knowledge" with a female
bedmate. One woman got into bed with her children, and when a man joined
them, her daughter recalled, the mother instructed the children to "lie
further or else shee would kick us out of bed." Even couples who sought
greater privacy had difficulty finding it, for loosely constructed houses
allowed neighbors and kin to observe what happened behind closed doors.'
SOURCE: Intimate Matters A History of ***uality in America. John D"emilio
and Estelle B. FreedmanPerennial Library Harper and Eow Publishers (1989)
pp 16 - 17
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Breastfeeding and Maternal ***uality in Colonial America
Paula A. Treckel
Journal of Interdisciplinary History, Vol. 20, No. 1 (Summer, 1989), pp.
25-51
doi:10.2307/2040
http://links.jstor.org/sici?sici=0022-1953(198922)20%3A1%3C25%3ABAMSIC%3E2.0.CO%3B2-3
http://makeashorterlink.com/?M20A161ED
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Young ***uality in the Colonial Americas, Jenny Sarna
http://www.nd.edu/~gbederma/hist488/SarnaPaper1.htm
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***uality: A Litmus Test for Culture
By Allan C. Carlson*
The 2003 American Studies Lecture at Hillsdale College- April 16, 2003
http://www.profam.org/pub/fia/fia_1705.htm
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[PDF] Colonial Intimacies: Indian Marriage in Early New England
http://www.wm.edu/oieahc/wmq/Jan02/PlaneJan02.pdf#search=%22***uality%20in%20colonial%20american%20homes%22
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Basic ***ological Premises DAVID L. WEIS
http://www2.hu-berlin.de/***ology/GESUND/ARCHIV/IES/USA04.HTM
***************************************************************
You are invited to check out the following:
The Rise of the Theocratic States of America
http://members.tripod.com/~candst/theocracy.htm
American Theocrats - Past and Present
http://members.tripod.com/~candst/theocrats.htm
The Constitutional Principle: Separation of Church and State
http://members.tripod.com/~candst/index.html
[and to join the discussion group for the above site and/or Separation of
Church and State in general, listed below]
HRSepCnS · Hampton Roads [Virginia] SepChurch&State
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HRSepCnS/
[Its not just Hampton Roads folks who are members, there are members from
all over the US and a couple from overseas as well]
***************************************************************
.. . . You can't understand a phrase such as "Congress shall make no law
respecting an establishment of religion" by syllogistic reasoning. Words
take their meaning from social as well as textual contexts, which is why
"a
page of history is worth a volume of logic." New York Trust Co. v.
Eisner,
256 U.S. 345, 349, 41 S.Ct. 506, 507, 65 L.Ed. 963 (1921) (Holmes, J.).
Sherman v. Community Consol. Dist. 21, 980 F.2d 437, 445 (7th Cir. 1992)
.. . .
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USAF LT. COL (Ret) Buffman (Glen P. Goffin) wrote
"You pilot always into an unknown future;
facts are your only clue. Get the facts!"
That philosophy 'snipit' helped to get me, and my crew, through a good
many combat missions and far too many scary, inflight, emergencies.
It has also played a significant role in helping me to expose the
plethora of radical Christian propaganda and lies that we find at
almost every media turn.
*****************************************************************
THE CONSTITUTIONAL PRINCIPLE:
SEPARATION OF CHURCH AND STATE
http://members.tripod.com/~candst/index.html
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