|
|
Dictionary definition: Addams, Jane Laura
- Article from:
- A Dictionary of Contemporary World History
- Author:
Copyright© A Dictionary of Contemporary World History 2004, originally published by Oxford University Press 2004. (Hide copyright information)
|
Addams, Jane Laura
(b. 6 Sept. 1860, d. 21 May 1935). US social reformer Born in Mayesville, South Carolina, she graduated from Rockford College in 1881. With her friend Ellen Gates Starr, she opened Hull House in Chicago in 1889, a settlement house for immigrants and workers, on the model of
Toynbee Hall
in London, with the aim of attacking urban poverty. One of the leading activists of the
Progressive
movement, she was a pioneer in the new discipline of sociology, advocating better labour and housing conditions, and campaigning for child labour regulation by law. She later had considerable influence over the ...