A former Notable Woman of ETSU, Dr. Joyce Duncan, a lecturer of Service-Learning in the Division of Cross-Disciplinary Studies, is the author of Shapers of the Great Debate on Women’s Rights, a book that has just been released by Greenwood Press.
The biographical dictionary is part of the Shapers of the Great Debate series edited by Peter B. Levy.
Duncan described the progression for this book based on her first book; Ahead of Their Time: A Biographical Dictionary of Risk-Taking Women (Greenwood Press, 2002).
Duncan said, “I was invited to create this work to be apart of The Shapers of the Great Debate series.”
The volume is divided into the three historical “waves” of progress in women’s rights.
The first-wave activists fought for a constitutional amendment giving women the right to vote; the second wave battled for equality in hiring and salary, for the right of a woman to decide if she wished to give birth, and for political acknowledgment of equality; and the third wave, which is what we are in now, urges a more inclusive movement to give voice to women of color, lesbians and addresses other issues.
The book features frequently recognized names, such as Susan B. Anthony, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Gloria Steinem, and Betty Friedan.
“Although it was contract work, I was fascinated by the topic and the research,” Duncan said. “I am consistently amazed by my fore mothers who paved the way for the freedoms we currently enjoy, and often take for granted.
“The women in the book were authors, orators and activists in eras when such pursuits were considered either immoral or highly unsuitable. But, above all, they were women – wives, mothers, sisters, daughters and friends – who took enormous leaps of faith to secure independence and identity.”
The women selected for inclusion are rhetoricians, academics, writers, politicians, religious figures, actors and minor celebrities, diverse in their approaches and their lifestyles but with the common cause of securing a measure of equality and recognition for themselves and all women.
Duncan’s research was motivated by conversations with young women among her students.
“They have no collective memory,” she says, “of an era when women could not own property or money, when they had little decision-making power regarding the upbringing of their children, when they were discouraged or forbidden from seeking education or a profession, when they were silenced in public and even in houses of worship, when they were chastised for putting pen to paper or offering their opinion and when they were powerless to change their destiny because they had no political clout, no power of the vote.”
English major Ash-Lee Henderson said, “I definitely look forward to reading Dr. Duncan’s book. Hopefully, the ETSU library and Women’s Studies Department will have copies available for young women and evolving feminists and womanists to read and return for free.”
The book is currently available for purchase at amazon.com for $75.

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