The Art of Display: Permissive and Restrictive Women’s Fashion of the Progressive Era
Open Access
- Author:
- Bott, Alicia Cecelia
- Graduate Program:
- American Studies
- Degree:
- Doctor of Philosophy
- Document Type:
- Dissertation
- Date of Defense:
- September 28, 2021
- Committee Members:
- Catherine Rios, Outside Field Member
Charles Kupfer, Major Field Member
Anne Verplanck, Chair & Dissertation Advisor
Ozge Aybat, Outside Unit Member
John Rogers Haddad, Professor in Charge/Director of Graduate Studies - Keywords:
- Women
Fashion
Politics
New Woman
Modern Woman
Gibson Girl
Flapper
Roaring Twenties
Department Stores
Wanamaker's
Philadelphia
Politics of Fashion
Turn of Twentieth Century
Progressive Era
Photography
Feminism
History of Fashion
Women's History
Gender
Visual Culture
American Studies
History of Advertisements - Abstract:
- ABSTRACT Fashioning the Progressive Woman This dissertation focuses on how fashion declares our cultural and social affiliations by sending messages to others about our personal identity. These messages can be politically intentional to broadcast one’s views and allegiances, inscribed with social meanings that are out of their control. Historically, there are numerous examples of clothing that functioned as both fashion statement and as political stance deemed radical instead of mainstream. By means of the popular culture figures of the Progressive Era (1890-1930), The Gibson Girl and The Flapper, I explore how fashion cycles connect to political messages about women’s rights during the first wave of feminism. Using John Wanamaker’s department store as a case study, I demonstrate that feminist politics were circulating through visual media, such as store display windows, advertisements in magazines and newspapers, and catalogues. By examining this visual culture through the lenses of gender and politics, I establish that both the New Woman (the Gibson Girl) and the Modern Woman (the Flapper) sent political messages associated with specific fashion choices as those looks moved from the radical fringes to the mainstream. These messages reveal how depictions of women become embedded into cultural memory in both positive and negative ways.