Paula Doress-Worters

Areas of Expertise

Women in Political Movements; History of Women in U.S.; Women’s Health; Aging and Caregiving

Email: pdoress@brandeis.edu

Current Project

My plan is to expand outreach for my new work, Mistress of Herself: Speeches and Letters of Ernestine L. Rose in order to claim Rose’s place as an early and significant leader of first wave feminism, thereby expanding public understanding of the diversity of social movements. I will also research the lives of some of her contemporaries.

Biography

Paula B. Doress-Worters was one of the original co-authors of Our Bodies, Ourselves, co-author of subsequent editions up to and including Our Bodies, Ourselves for the New Century and The New Ourselves, Growing Older. Paula came to the WSRC/Brandeis to explore a long-standing interest in women’s history and the lives of women as political activists. Her particular focus was Ernestine L. Rose, a pioneering activist of the nineteenth century women’s rights movement whose contributions have been hitherto largely overlooked, perhaps because Rose was an immigrant, an atheist and a Jew. Though neglect of Rose has been attributed to a lack of archival papers, Paula has found and recently published, with the Feminist Press at CUNY, a 389 page volume of Rose’s speeches and letters.  

Paula founded the Ernestine Rose Society to revive Rose’s legacy and with the support of the members raised funds to restore the grave marker of Ernestine and William Rose at Highgate Cemetery in London. Through learning about Rose and 19th century women’s rights reform, Paula has gained a deeper perspective on her own experiences in 20th and 21st century feminism, thereby shaping a lens for envisioning the future of feminism.

Education

Ph.D., Boston College

M.A., Goddard College

B.A., Suffolk University

Representative Publications

Doress-Worters, Paula. Mistress of Herself: Speeches and Letters of Ernestine L. Rose, Early Women’s Rights Leader. New York: Feminist Press, 2008.

Links

Ernestine Rose Society Web Site

Ernestine Rose Blog 

Our Bodies, Ourselves for the New Century

The New Ourselves Growing Older