So Much Depends on a Pair of Trousers

As I’ve mentioned before, in the course of reading and writing about women warriors over the last long while, I’ve spent a certain amount of time thinking about women who disguised themselves as men and enlisted as soldiers. I came to the question with the image of women who fought in the American Civil War…

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Women Warriors and So-Called Armor

  I am slowly tiptoeing my way into the edits on Women Warriors: responding to my editor’s concerns about structure,* fixing sentences that cause me pain as I read them a month or ten after writing them, tracking down incomplete references,** tightening up some sections, and expanding others. I find it to be a satisfying…

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The Question of the Queen Mother

Speaking of the linguistic booby traps that await the unwary in the pursuit of global history, as I believe we were, I offer you the example of the Queen Mother. In English, the term “Queen Mother” generally refers to the widow of a king* who is the mother of a reigning monarch. The term has…

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