You're a twenty-first century woman and you're wondering what relevance the lives of early modern era nuns have to you. These two young women make the case that it's nearly impossible to face a problem that hasn't been written about by a nun several hundred years ago. In our age of women being self-sufficient and feeling all kinds of pressures, you can be both amused and amazed at the correspondence between us and them. The authors make the most convincing argument for women in Academia, their natural habitat.
”At some point in our mid-twenties we both decided (still strangers at this point) to join the ranks of academia. The vow of poverty we took when we resolved to be PhD candidates was virtually no different from the one assumed by the austere Discalced Carmelites. The academic submissiveness to professors and thesis supervisors wasn't any less unyielding than the negation of one's will inherent to a nun's vow of obedience. We didn't, in case you're wondering, take the vow of chastity, but you'd be surprised at how easily six years of graduate life in Providence (Rhode Island) can get you quasi-celibate status.”
There's no need to subscribe to any kind of faith to appreciate this book. It is based on the study of literature and history, not religion. What it clearly illustrates is the continuity of humanity. There truly is nothing new under the sun. Our problems, while feeling intensely personal, are representative of dilemmas faced by generations of women. The convent was a haven in earlier centuries for women who didn't want “normal" life of the times: overbearing husbands, unending pregnancies, no time for education, among other hardships. Convent life was no picnic, but at least you had chosen it, rather than being forced into other traditional roles.
The authors are Hispanic women and I wish I knew enough Spanish to listen to their podcast (Las hijas de Felipe). Their fun examination of the current problems of PhD students compared to historical nuns was inspired. Plus, I had to google many unfamiliar terms. I don't have any desire to watch TV, so “almond moms" were a mystery to me. It's never a bad thing to learn—no education is wasted.
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