Nail This To Your Door: A Disputation on the Power, Efficacy, and Indulgent Delusion of Western Scholarship That Neglects the Challenge of Gender and Women's History

Scholars of the North American West have not realized the promise of gender and women's history for the field. Many of the best recent books, articles, documentary films, and museum exhibits slight the insights of gender history, except in the inclusion of occasional female actors who are made to parade under the sign of gender. This essay borrows the form of Martin Luther's famous "Disputation on the Power and Efficacy of Indulgences" (also known as the 95 Theses), which sparked the Reformation, to launch both a critique of contemporary western historiography and a scholarly call to action. It advances 11 Theses that invite scholars to enter the gender historian's version of the kingdom of heaven, where power and privilege are always visible and always interrogated.