This is the note card that I wrote for my colonial project. My subject is family life. In this note card, I wrote about marriage and courtship. I really liked writing about it because it’s a subject that really interests me. My source for this note card was a Wiki, so I got my information from the people who were doing this topic last year. It was really interesting to read some of the interviews from last year. I am proud of it because I worked really hard and I think I made good connections. We had to do 10 note cards in all and this was my last one. When I first started writing the note cards, I wasn’t doing as much analysis as I could have, so I started trying to stretch the analysis. Once I got to the 10th note card, I was able to do a lot more analysis that I did before. I also spent a lot more time on this one than I did on any of the others.

Source:

Williamsburg, VA, Historic Interpreter. Interview. By Olivia Cueto. 2015.

Quote:

“Colonial marriage perspectives were pretty much all the same. The women would get married at the age of 12 or 13 and the men would be a few years older. Women changed a lot when they got married. Before native women got married they were bald, naked and usually covered in grease. But when a native women got married they finally grew out their hair, got clothing, and could start caring more about their bodies. Weddings were held in cold months Blacksmiths could marry a couple. If a divorce happened, the mother would usually take the children unless she was the one that cheated.”

Paraphrase:

• Women would get married at puberty and men would be a few years older. 
• Once women got married, their lives changed completely.
• When Native American women got married, they were bald, naked and covered in grease.
• When the woman got married, they grew out their hair, got clothing and started caring about their bodies.
• Weddings happened in cold months.
• Blacksmiths could marry people.
• If a divorce happened the mother would take the children.
• If the wife was the one who cheated on her husband, the husband might take the children.

My Ideas:

In this quote, she says that women got married at puberty. In another note card that I had it said that women got married in their 20s. The men would be a few years older because that might show superiority. Once women got married, their outlooks in life changed. The way that they were viewed in society changed and the way that they viewed the world changed. Society started seeing them as women, instead of girls. Once women got married, they were finally recognized in the society as adults. They viewed the world differently because they started seeing things the way that adults see it. For example, instead of seeing war like something far off, they started seeing war like a really problem for their society. They would also start to care more about their appearance. Before the women were married in Native American societies, they were usually bald, naked and covered in grease. Once they got married they were allowed to grow out their hair and clean themselves and care about their clothes.  This shows that marriage affected women more than men. Once women got married, the women would start to have children. Once they had children, their whole lives would be different.  Men wouldn’t see their families very often because they were so busy hunting, so when they got married, their lives wouldn’t be as impacted. Weddings were held in cold weather. I don’t really know why. I think it could have been because the men wouldn’t be as busy in the winter, so they had more time to plan a big celebration like a wedding. If a divorce happened in Native American cultures, the mother would take the children because the wife would normally be the one to initiate the divorce. The women were the ones who could initiate the marriage by throwing the men’s clothes out of the house. This shows that Native American women had more power in a marriage then a European women might. A European women would never even think about divorcing her husband, let alone actually doing it. It would be extremely rare for a European woman

History:

Created: 11/02/2016 10:59 AM