During the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, the divorce rate in the United States rose by a staggering 2,000 percent. To understand this dramatic rise, Elaine Tyler May studied over one thousand detailed divorce cases. She found that contrary to common assumptions, divorce was not simply a by-product of women's increasing economic and sexual independence, or a rebellion against marriage. Rather, thwarted hopes for fulfillment in the public sphere drove both men and women to wed at a greater rate and to bring higher expectations to their marriages.
- ISBN10 0226511669
- ISBN13 9780226511665
- Publish Date 1 January 1980
- Publish Status Out of Print
- Out of Print 11 June 1993
- Publish Country US
- Imprint University of Chicago Press
- Format Hardcover
- Pages 208
- Language English