In my professional role I’m an academic librarian with faculty status, which means I get/have to do research. Luckily, I get to do it in an area I’m interested in (fashion in social history)! I’ve just had a scholarly article published, the second one to look at the role of fashion among the elite women who went to Smith College in the 1920s (you can read about the first article here).
This one is called “Fashioning the College Woman: Dress, Gender, and Sexuality at Smith College in the 1920s” and is in the most recent (March 2009) issue of the Journal of American Culture. Basically, it looks at the discussion/debates around the “meanings” of women’s fashion in the 1920s and how Smith students interpreted those meanings — looking at issues like the “New Woman” (fashion as progress) and sexuality (the eroticization of fashion in this era). Good times!
How very cool – congratulations! I found a printable PDF of it online here – I don’t know if it’s supposed to be available to all and sundry for free, but it is at the moment!
Cool! Go download it if you want to read it!
Awesome! Congratulations!!
May I ask why Smith College? Did you go there and/or where you are working now? And/or is/was it simply notable within the US for this?
(Sorry for all the slashes).
Or is this answered in the article and I’m dumb for asking before reading it?
Brocade: the small scale answer is that I needed a deep collection of primary sources on one group of women, and Smith has a great collection on their students; I was at grad school in Boston when I did the research, so they were nearby. Large scale answer is that college women were the ones who were supposedly at the cutting edge of US fashion wearers in the 1920s, and there was a lot of cultural attention paid to them — and Smith was one of the leading colleges for women in the era.
Yes, there’s more detail in the article on this!
Congratulations! that’s wonderful 😀
Congrats, you expert you! 😉
Ooooh, I so want to read it!!! Is it going to be availble online for only a limited time? I have a lit review to write this week, then an exhibit report the next, then start the lit review for my actual thesis. And try as I might, I don’t think 1920s college women can be worked into 18th century english seamstresses, lol.
Well, CONGRATULATIONS, also from the one who loves you best! Can’t wait to see you perform in Ashland this fall.
xo
mom