allyson cherry (alllcher@mars.utm.edu) from 206.240.200.164 at 09/29/98 02:21PM
comment
    when i think of southern women a picture comes to my mind of a woman who knows how to be dignified and refined... but if she herself or her family is threatened, she will quickly become a different person and rise to the occasion to fight with whomever it is who dares to challenge her. i don't really think of southern women as being "prim and proper"... i think that once upon a time that image would have come to mind first... but just after a month in scholars with dr. z., i've come to have a whole new outlook on the southern culture. attending dr. scott's lecture gave me another view still. i think that a prime example of what i am trying to say is this: while all of the men were at home before the civil war, the southern ladies were content to talk the talk and walk the walk of the image of the perfect southern lady. they called on one another and visited... went to church on sundays... spent time with the children... took good are of their husbands... but the minute the men left for war these ladies became new people. they rose to the occasion without missing a beat and assumed jobs in factories, as nurses, as workers on the farm..... to me this quality in a woman is what distinctly sets her apart as being a southern woman. she has to have that tenacity inside of her that makes her fight for what she believes in and what is dear to her heart.