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Female Spectacle : The Theatrical Roots of Modern Feminism / / Susan A. Glenn.

By: Material type: TextTextPublisher: Cambridge, MA : : Harvard University Press, [2009]Copyright date: ©2000Description: 1 online resource (336 p.)Content type:
Media type:
Carrier type:
ISBN:
  • 9780674037663
Subject(s): DDC classification:
  • 792/.082/0973 23
Other classification:
  • online - DeGruyter
Online resources:
Contents:
Frontmatter -- Contents -- Illustrations -- Introduction -- 1 The Bernhardt Effect: Self-Advertising and the Age of Spectacle -- 2 Mirth and Girth: The Politics of Comedy -- 3 The Strong Personality: Female Mimics and the Play of the Self -- 4 The Americanization of Salome: Sexuality, Race, and the Careers of the Vulgar Princess -- 5 "The Eyes of the Enemy": Female Activism and the Paradox of Theater -- 6 "Nationally Advertised Legs": How Broadway Invented "The Girls" -- 7 "Like All the Rest of Womankind Only More So": The Chorus Girl Problem and American Culture -- Conclusion: The Legacy of Female Spectacle -- Abbreviations -- Notes -- Acknowledgments -- Index
Summary: When the French actress Sarah Bernhardt made her first American tour in 1880, the term "feminism" had not yet entered our national vocabulary. But over the course of the next half-century, a rising generation of daring actresses and comics brought a new kind of woman to center stage. Exploring and exploiting modern fantasies and fears about female roles and gender identity, these performers eschewed theatrical convention and traditional notions of womanly modesty. They created powerful images of themselves as ambitious, independent, and sexually expressive "New Women." Female Spectacle reveals the theater to have been a powerful new source of cultural authority and visibility for women. Ironically, theater also provided an arena in which producers and audiences projected the uncertainties and hostilities that accompanied changing gender relations. From Bernhardt's modern methods of self-promotion to Emma Goldman's political theatrics, from the female mimics and Salome dancers to the upwardly striving chorus girl, Susan Glenn shows us how and why theater mattered to women and argues for its pivotal role in the emergence of modern feminism.
Holdings
Item type Current library Call number URL Status Notes Barcode
eBook eBook Biblioteca "Angelicum" Pont. Univ. S.Tommaso d'Aquino Nuvola online online - DeGruyter (Browse shelf(Opens below)) Online access Not for loan (Accesso limitato) Accesso per gli utenti autorizzati / Access for authorized users (dgr)9780674037663

Frontmatter -- Contents -- Illustrations -- Introduction -- 1 The Bernhardt Effect: Self-Advertising and the Age of Spectacle -- 2 Mirth and Girth: The Politics of Comedy -- 3 The Strong Personality: Female Mimics and the Play of the Self -- 4 The Americanization of Salome: Sexuality, Race, and the Careers of the Vulgar Princess -- 5 "The Eyes of the Enemy": Female Activism and the Paradox of Theater -- 6 "Nationally Advertised Legs": How Broadway Invented "The Girls" -- 7 "Like All the Rest of Womankind Only More So": The Chorus Girl Problem and American Culture -- Conclusion: The Legacy of Female Spectacle -- Abbreviations -- Notes -- Acknowledgments -- Index

restricted access online access with authorization star

http://purl.org/coar/access_right/c_16ec

When the French actress Sarah Bernhardt made her first American tour in 1880, the term "feminism" had not yet entered our national vocabulary. But over the course of the next half-century, a rising generation of daring actresses and comics brought a new kind of woman to center stage. Exploring and exploiting modern fantasies and fears about female roles and gender identity, these performers eschewed theatrical convention and traditional notions of womanly modesty. They created powerful images of themselves as ambitious, independent, and sexually expressive "New Women." Female Spectacle reveals the theater to have been a powerful new source of cultural authority and visibility for women. Ironically, theater also provided an arena in which producers and audiences projected the uncertainties and hostilities that accompanied changing gender relations. From Bernhardt's modern methods of self-promotion to Emma Goldman's political theatrics, from the female mimics and Salome dancers to the upwardly striving chorus girl, Susan Glenn shows us how and why theater mattered to women and argues for its pivotal role in the emergence of modern feminism.

Mode of access: Internet via World Wide Web.

In English.

Description based on online resource; title from PDF title page (publisher's Web site, viewed 18. Sep 2023)