Southern Methodist Women and Social Justice

Name: Southern Methodist Women and Social Justice
Author: Janet Allured
ISBN: 9780813079318

Interracial Activism in the Long Twentieth Century

Edited by Janet Allured and M. Kathryn Armistead

Published by: University Press of Florida

Series: Southern Dissent

This book tells the stories of nine southern Methodist women, who, inspired by their faith, advocated for progressive reform by fighting for racial equality, challenging white male supremacy, and addressing class oppression.

342 Pages6.12 × 9.2517 b/w illus., notes, bibliography, index

Hardcover
9780813079318
Published: April 8, 2025

$95.00

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9780813073736
Published: April 8, 2025

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PDF
9780813070995
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Description
Authors
Praise
Table of Contents

Highlighting the contributions of Methodist women in advocating for progressive reform from 1900 to the present

This book tells the stories of nine southern Methodist women, who, inspired by their faith, carried forward the spirit of progressivism. They fought for racial equality, challenged white male supremacy, and addressed class oppression. The white and Black women featured here responded to local human rights violations with compassion, advocating for expanded and more diverse private and public services in the United States.

Motivated by a modernist interpretation of the Gospel authorized by the tenets of Methodism, these women expanded notions of southern identity and womanhood. Their actions supported the Black freedom struggle and promoted women’s rights, gaining momentum after the 1939 rise of the Women’s Society of Christian Service—the largest Protestant women’s organization in the country. Grounded in research from church archives and interviews, this book shows how Methodist traditions provided spiritual, theological, and doctrinal support for social justice work among laywomen and female clergy. With Methodism as a case in point, this book expands the historical narrative of twentieth-century reform movements to include the South’s progressive religious traditions.

Janet Allured is retired professor of history and women’s studies at McNeese State University and is currently adjunct professor of women’s history at the University of Arkansas. She is the author of Remapping Second-Wave Feminism: The Long Women’s Rights Movement in Louisiana, 1950–1997. M. Kathryn Armistead is the managing editor of Methodist Review. Her many books include Nevertheless She Leads: Postcolonial Women’s Leadership for the Church.

“A gem of a book that adds significantly to the study of American history, American religious history, and Methodist history.”—Alice G. Knotts, author of Fellowship of Love: Methodist Women Changing American Racial Attitudes, 1920–1968
“An important contribution to our understanding of women’s progressive activism in the long twentieth century. The multiplicity of injustices these women challenged, plus their positions close to the center of their denomination, say a great deal not only about Methodism but also about a period in American Christianity that was different from our own.”—Jennifer Ritterhouse, author of Discovering the South: One Man’s Travels through a Changing America in the 1930s

List of Figures

Foreword

Acknowledgments

List of Abbreviations

Introduction
Janet Allured and M. Kathryn Armistead

Part 1. Pioneering Laywomen

Chapter 1. Legacy of a Spiritual Ancestor: Mary McLeod Bethune (1875–1955)
Katie W. Powell

Chapter 2. “The Complete Exercise of Active Citizenship” and the Political Power of Methodist Home Missionary Women: Bertha Payne Newell (1867–1953)
Chelsea Elizabeth Hodge

Chapter 3. To Redeem the World; A Southern Christian’s Struggle to Transform the South, the Nation, and the World: Thelma Stevens (1902–1990)
Janet Allured

Chapter 4. African American Methodist, Southerner, Womanist: Theressa Hoover (1925–2013)
Janet Allured

Chapter 5. Missionary, Champion of the Oppressed, Religious Feminist: Peggy Marie Billings (1928–2019)
Janet Allured

Part 2. Trailblazing Clergywomen

Chapter 6. Make Plain the Vision; First African American Woman Bishop in the United States: Leontine T. C. Kelly (1920–2012)
Helen R. Neinast

Chapter 7. Cracks in the Veneer; The Use of Power in Places Where the Powerful Least Expect It: Helen Gray Crotwell (1925–2006)
Jennifer E. Copeland

Chapter 8. Trailblazer and First Woman Bishop in the Southeastern Jurisdiction of The United Methodist Church: Charlene Kammerer (1948– )
Jeanette Stokes and Fran Wescott

Chapter 9. Roots and Resistance: Carol Burnett (1956– )
Rachel Sauls

Epilogue: Where Do We Go from Here?
Janet Allured

Appendix: Historic Purpose Statements; United Women in Faith and Predecessors

Chronology: Selective Timeline of Methodism in the United States

A Note on Sources