Women’s organizations competed for prestige with male bodies on equal symbolic footing

Evidence

On the WC’s official stationery, she wrote to Booker T. Washington in 1901 inviting him to address the Woman’s Convention and National Baptist Convention at their next annual meeting in Birmingham. Receiving his acceptance in early 1902, she reveled in delight that the women, rather than the men, had first extended the invitation: “There may be an effort later on by our brethren to secure you, but I beg that you bear in mind that the Baptist women gave the first invitation, even before they [men] thought of it.” — Evelyn Brooks Higginbotham, Righteous Discontent, 736

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: Women’s organizational self-determination existed within the denomination alongside male boards — Evelyn Brooks Higginbotham, Righteous Discontent: The Women’s…, 726; Women’s church-based organizing pursued separate spaces while remaining dependent on male approval — Evelyn Brooks Higginbotham, Righteous Discontent: The Women’s…, 701; Media beauty competitions cultivate commodified feminine status in ruling classes. (+2 more)

Broader Connections

• Englishwomen earned equality claims by demonstrating superiority over colonized women #exemplifies (0.82) — Deepa Kumar, Islamophobia and the Politics of Empire, 162
• Male denominational leaders tried to subordinate autonomous black women’s organizations #complicates (0.80) — Evelyn Brooks Higginbotham, Righteous Discontent, 738
• Women’s church-based organizing pursued separate spaces while remaining dependent on male approval #complicates (0.78) — Evelyn Brooks Higginbotham, Righteous Discontent, 701
• Media beauty competitions cultivate commodified feminine status in ruling classes. #exemplifies (0.75)