“Sister Prudence Allen has done it! She sets before us a sweeping, philosophical analysis of woman’s identity, value, and purpose as it developed across history and disciplines. Readers will delight in her finale: God’s great gift of male-female partnerships established not through fractured identities, or through gender superiority, but by an integral gender complementarity of body, spirit, and will—the basis of flourishing human communities. A magisterial achievement, pulsating with wisdom and humility, The Concept of Woman is needed now more than ever.”
—Mimi Haddad, president, CBEInternational.org

“Demonstrating her encyclopedic knowledge and capacious mind, Allen delivers an engaging tour of ideas and great figures across millennia concerning the perception of woman and man. Written with precision, depth, and not a little wit, this synthesis of her three-volume work provides an invaluable resource for all students of history, philosophy, and theology.”
—Lynn Cohick, Houston Christian University

Sister Prudence Allen, RSM, is a retired professor of philosophy at St. John Vianney Theological Seminary, Denver, Colorado, and professor emerita at Concordia University, Montreal. She is the author of The Concept of Woman, published in three volumes: The Aristotelian Revolution, 750 B.C.–A.D. 1250; The Early Humanist Reformation, 1250–1500; The Search for Communion of Persons, 1500–2015.