Work

The Exit Option: Agency and Divorce in Late Eighteenth-Century America

Year: 2024

Type: article

Abstract: Thousands of husbands placed advertisements in colonial newspapers announcing that their wives had deserted them and rejecting responsibility for their wives’ debts. Yet few scholars have studied “runaway wives.” This article argues the notices evidenced wives’ agency in a sexist and socially conservative eighteenth-century America, agency that took the form of “exit,” “voice,” and “loyalty,” to follow Hirschman's seminal work. The article examines the texts of almost four hundred listings and arbitrates between two explanations of this phenomenon: whether the notices were published to protect husbands financially or to effect common-law self-divorces. The husbands’ notices were predominantly acknowledgments of broken marriages.

Source: Journal of Family History

DOI: 10.1177/03631990241263594

Author: Bartholomew Sparrow

Institution: The University of Texas at Austin

Language: English

Topic: Family and Matrimonial Law

Subfield: Law

Field: Social Sciences

Domain: Social Sciences

SDG: Gender equality

Open Access status: hybrid

Estimated APC paid: $3,450