A cultural history of women.

Includes bibliographical references and indexes.

volume 1. A cultural history of women in Antiquity / edited by Janet H. Tulloch: Introduction / Janet H. Tulloch ; The life cycle : from birth to old age / Katariina Mustakallio ; Bodies and sexuality / Allison Glazebrook and Nicola Mellor ; Religion and popular beliefs : ritual practices and female practitioners / Janet H. Tulloch ; Medicine and disease / Steven Muir and Laurence Totelin ; Public and private / Kistina Milnor ; Education and work / Marcia Lindgren ; Power / Lynda Garland ; Artistic representations : survival of the classical ideal / Shelby Brown.

volume 2. A cultural history of women in the Middle Ages / edited by Kim M. Phillips: Introduction : medieval meanings of women / Kim M. Phillips -- The life cycle : the ages of medieval women / Cordelia Beattie -- Bodies and sexuality / April Harper -- Religion and popular beliefs : choices, constraints, and creativity for Christian women / Katherine L. French -- Medicine and disease : the female "patient" in medieval Europe / Iona McCleery -- Public and private : women in the home, women in the streets / Kim M. Phillips -- Education and work : multiple tasks and lowly status / Sandy Bardsley -- Power : medieval women's power through authority, autonomy, and influence / Lois L. Huneycutt -- Artistic representation : women and/in medieval visual culture / Marian Bleeke, Jennifer Borland, Rachel Dressler, Martha Easton, and Elizabeth L'Estrange.

volume 3. A cultural history of women in the Renaissance / edited by Karen Raber: Introduction / Karen Raber ; The life cycle / Karen Raber and Stephanie Tarbin ; Bodies and sexuality / Mara I. Amster ; Religion and popular beliefs / Megan L. Hickerson ; Medicine and disease / Margaret Healy ; Public and private / Danielle Clarke ; Education and work / Meg Lota Brown and Kari Boyd McBride ; Power / Holly Hurlburt ; Artistic representation / Mary Rogers.

volume 4. A cultural history of women in the Age of Enlightenment / edited by Ellen Pollak: Introduction : women daring to know in the Age of Enlightenment / Ellen Pollak ; The life cycle : motherhood during the Enlightenment / Kathleen M. Brown ; Bodies and sexuality : sex, gender, and the limits of enlightenment / Susan S. Lanser ; Religion and popular beliefs : visionary women in the Age of Enlightenment / Phyllis Mack ; Medicine and disease : women, practice, and print in the Enlightenment medical marketplace / Lisa Forman Cody ; Public and private : public and private lives in eighteenth-century France / Joan B. Landes ; Work and education : the case of laboring women poets in England, Scotland, and Germany / Susanne Kord ; Power : varieties of women's political power in Enlightenment England / Charlotte Sussman ; Artistic representation : the famous ballads of Anna Gordon, Mrs. Brown / Ruth Perry.

volume 5. A cultural history of women in the Age of Empire / edited by Teresa Mangum: Introduction / Teresa Magnum ; The life cycle : women and the life cycle, circa 1800-1920 / Pat Thane ; Bodies and sexuality : sexuality and bodies in the Age of Empire / Ellen Bayuk Rosenman ; Religion and popular beliefs : women and wandering Jews after Daniel Deronda / Susan David Bernstein ; Medicine and disease : women and medicine in the Age of Empire / Pamela K. Gilbert ; Public and private : the fault lines between public and private selves in women's autobiographical writings / Linda H. Peterson ; Education and work : women and the education acts / Florence S. Boos ; Power : memsahibs, manners, and empire / Teresa Mangum ; Artistic representation : travel narrative and the construction of female artistic identity in the nineteenth century / Alexandra K. Wettlaufer.

volume 6 A cultural history of women in the modern age / edited by Liz Conor: Introduction / Liz Conor ; The life cycle : reproduction and maternal loss in a modern nation / Catherine Kevin ; Bodies and sexuality : twentieth-century orgasms, or, the problem of female heterosexuality / Zora Simic ; Religion and popular beliefs / Maureen Perkins ; Medicine and disease : women, health, and medicine in the twentieth century / Mary Rojek Kleinman and Alice J. Dan ; Public and private : politicizing the personal, questioning the public-private divide / Bronwyn Winter ; Education and work / Deborah Simonton ; Power : women, politics, and power in Europe after 1920 / June Hannam ; Artistic representation : from cinema to the interactive screen / Jannell Hobson.

These volumes present an authoritative survey from ancient times to the present. With six volumes covering 2500 years, this is the most authoritative history available of women in Western cultures. Each volume discusses the same themes in its chapters: the Life Cycle; Bodies and Sexuality; Religion and Popular Beliefs; Medicine and Disease; Public and Private Worlds; Education and Work; Power; and Artistic Representation. This means readers can either have a broad overview of a period by reading a volume or follow a theme through history by reading the relevant chapter in each volume.