Abstract:

This article examines how an entrepreneurial woman, Martha Parker, worked a private trade network within a globalizing world by using her connections and the East India Company’s structure to her advantage. Rather than viewing women’s independent commercial activity as a reaction to patriarchal institutions, this article pays attention to the gendered agentic expectations of early modern society, which influenced how a woman’s place in the economy was understood. Martha’s experience is supported by evidence from more than one thousand petitions to the East India Company from women, which underlines how women like Martha challenged norms and institutions. They thereby contributed to the emergence of new business practices and networks that would shape the structure and significance of private trade within the East India Company’s activities. This adds significantly to our understanding of women’s relationships to both private and corporate activity within Britain’s emerging trade and empire in Asia.

摘要：

本文探讨了女性企业家玛莎·帕克 (Martha Parker) 如何利用自己的人脉关系和东印度公司的结构，在全球化的世界中经营私人贸易网络。本文没有将女性的独立商业活动视为对父权制度的反应，而是关注早期现代社会的性别化能动性期望，这影响了人们如何理解女性在经济中的地位。1000 多份女性向东印度公司请愿的证据支持了玛莎的经历，这些证据强调了像玛莎这样的女性如何挑战规范和制度。因此，他们促成了新的商业实践和网络的出现，这些实践和网络将塑造东印度公司活动中私人贸易的结构和重要性。