[jane addams]

Laura Jane Addams [ 1 ] September 6, — May 21, was an American settlement activist , reformer , social worker, [ 2 ] [ 3 ] sociologist , [ 4 ] public administrator , [ 5 ] [ 6 ] philosopher, [ 7 ] [ 8 ] and author. She was a leader in the history of social work and Women's suffrage.

Jane addams education

Philosophically a "radical pragmatist ", she was arguably the first woman public philosopher in the United States. An advocate for world peace , and recognized as the founder of the social work profession in the United States, in Addams became the first American woman to be awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. Addams helped America address and focus on issues that were of concern to mothers or extensions of the domestic-work assigned to women, such as the needs of children, local public health, and world peace.

In her essay "Utilization of Women in City Government", Addams noted the connection between the workings of government and the household, stating that many departments of government, such as sanitation and the schooling of children, could be traced back to traditional women's roles in the private sphere. Born in Cedarville, Illinois , [ 18 ] Jane Addams was the youngest of eight children born into a prosperous northern Illinois family of English-American descent which traced back to colonial Pennsylvania.

Thereafter Addams was cared for mostly by her older sisters.

Jane addams nobel peace prize

By the time Addams was eight, four of her siblings had died: three in infancy and one at the age of Addams spent her childhood playing outdoors, reading indoors, and attending Sunday school. When she was four she contracted tuberculosis of the spine, known as Potts's disease , which caused a curvature in her spine and lifelong health problems.

This made it complicated as a child to function with the other children, considering she had a limp and could not run as well. Jane Addams adored her father, John H. Addams , when she was a child, as she made clear in the stories in her memoir, Twenty Years at Hull House He kept a letter from Lincoln in his desk, and Addams loved to look at it as a child.

He remarried in when Addams was eight years old. His second wife was Anna Hosteler Haldeman, the widow of a miller in Freeport.