This book is about the life and work of Harriet Martineau, English public educator, sociologist, historian, and journalist.

The Essays in this volume explore the work of Harriet Martineau from a sociological perspective, highlighting her theoretical contributions in the areas of the sociology of labor, gender and political economy. The contributors each offer a contextual, theoretical and methodological assessment of her work beginning with the opportunities and challenges of utilizing Martineau pedagogically in the sociology classroom.

Harriet Martineau lived an extraordinary literary life. She became a reviewer and journalist in the 1820s when her family’s fortune collapsed; published a best-selling series, Illustrations of Political Economy (1832-34), that made her fame and fortune by the age of thirty; overcame a hearing disability to become a “literary lion” in London society; toured the United States and wrote two founding texts of sociology based on her experiences; explored north Africa and the Middle East to observe non-European societies; wrote “leaders” (editorials) on slavery for the London Daily News during the American Civil War; and commented publicly on matters of politics, history, and religion in an era when women supposedly maintained their place in the sphere of domesticity. This edition of her Autobiography reproduces the original 1877 text, which Martineau composed in 1855 and had printed in anticipation of her death. It includes illustrations of the author and her homes; excerpts from the “Memorials,” added by her editor Maria Chapman; and reviews that praise and critique Martineau’s method as an autobiographer and achievement as a Victorian woman of letters.

Introduction: political theory and the founding of American feminism -- Lifting the "Claud-Lorraine tint" over the Republic: Frances Wright's critique -- Of society and manners in America -- Harriet Martineau on the theory and practice of democracy in America -- Facing the "sledge hammer of truth": Angelina Grimke and the rhetoric of reform -- Sarah Grimke's Quaker liberalism -- "The most belligerent non-resistant": Lucretia Mott on women's rights -- Elizabeth Cady Stanton's rhetoric of ridicule and reform -- The shadow and the substance of Sojourner Truth -- Conclusion

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What you haven't realised is that I sew to aid my thought processes. Look – needle – stab – stitch – thought. Needle – stab – stitch – thought. So next time you see a woman demurely sewing a sampler, be very, very wary. God knows what she may be planning. Harriet Martineau (1802–1876) was a social theorist who is often credited as being the first female sociologist. In Harriet Martineau Dreams of Dancing, Shelagh Stephenson depicts the great writer in a period of convalescence, living as an invalid by the sea in Tynemouth. Shut off from her usual society, Harriet is visited by women of the locale; Impie, a recent widow who is using her new-found marital freedom to paint murals on the ceilings of her family home; Beulah, the daughter of a woman who'd been sold into slavery and escaped; and Jane, the housemaid, whose unfeted and unexpected gifts lift her out of domestic servitude and could help Harriet out of illness. Harriet Martineau is a play about female self-reliance in a time of patriarchal dominance. Written by Shelagh Stephenson, it premiered at Live Theatre, Newcastle, in winter 2016.