Rachel-refined proposal on stewardesses

paper proposal:

1. Specifics: My paper is going to be about flight stewardesses in the mid 20^th century. I will primarily be focusing on the 1950-70s because that is when the commercial airline industry really took off. I will probably narrow this time period based on the primary sources I am able to find. The main characters are the women who become stewardesses, the airline executives, the airline passengers, and the government. As I have found so far, there is not one person who really dominated this story

2. Argument: I want to argue whether or not the “new woman” that was defined by female stewardesses in the period were really given social and occupational freedoms. I plan do to do this by choosing the side most women aligned themselves with as well as frame the issue in both the Civil Rights and Cold War/anti-communist movements that were going on at the time.

3. Significance: First and foremost, I believe my topic is interesting because it will give a voice to women whose voices have been so commercialized both at the specific time in history and into today via advertisements, television shows, and film. Flight stewardesses are seen as the first steps of the woman breaking out of the 1950’s housewife framework. I want to see if women felt the same way. I also think the intersection of women’s rights and opportunities, the Civil Rights Movement, and the Cold War is not only fascinating but really important when looking forward to further increase opportunities for women.

4. Primary Literature: My main primary sources are: stewardess ads, stewardess employment rules (standards set by airlines), letters and diaries of these women (have yet to find a lot of these though), and court cases.

5. Secondary Literature: I have found numerous books about stewardesses. Each book seems to focus on a certain dimension of my paper: sexuality, gender roles, advertising, etc. I hope my work will contribute to the discussion by weaving these dimensions together.

6. Troubleshooting: The crux of my paper is voices of stewardesses. Therefore, not being able to find a lot of voices via letters, diaries, various statements in court cases, etc. would pose an enormous issue. My topic is also very broad so I will need to focus it a bit more (which is always challenging). I’m not too worried about the broad nature of my topic so far since I begin most of my papers with an incredibly unfocused topic that I then hack into a smaller and smaller, more focused paper.

Both of the articles this week I found absolutely fascinating!!!!

Waldstreicher-

Waldstreicher’s article brought up the perspective of identity and stereotype. Waldstreicher argues that physical identifiers of identity helped slave fugitives escape and pass in colonial America. I really liked this article first and foremost because of its intrigue (that was especially heightened because the quote at the beginning of the paper.

Waldstreicher uses clothing and hair to not only poke holes in fugitive slave advertisements but also to illustrate points of identity in society at that time. Slaves were identified by their clothing (they usually had very little items so it was assumed they could be identified by their clothing) and their hair (curly and stereotypically “black”). However, slaves were able to find ability for self expression and for assistance in running away because of these misused identifiers. They often stole their former masters clothes and obtained wigs to help with their passing process. I liked how the author showed not only the use of clothes and wigs in aiding the fugitive’s running away but also how these items represented a change in consumer society: “clothing also illustrates the contemporaneous movement of an emulative consumer desire down from the top of society and the emergence of vernacular style at the bottom.” I think this parallel really helped me gain a better understanding of the historical context.

This article relied most heavily on fugitive slave advertisements and their language. These sources were very successful because they were written by slave owners, so it very clearly illustrated how owners perceived the identity and appearance of their slaves. Waldstreicher also heavily took from other historians, specifically African American historians.

Chauncey-

The central part of Chauncey’s argument is that our understanding of the pre-war gay community is based on the post-war perspective because of our society’s belief that history is directly linear.

Chauncey challenges three stories about the gay community between 1890 to the onset of World War II. Chauncy draws parallels between this time period and today’s time understand of the gay community as invisible because of society’s understanding of history as perspective. We assume the post-war periods homophobia and perception of the gay community was the same as the pre-war period. This included the idea that the gay community was invisible. Although the gay community was perceived to be invisible because of the post-war framework, the pre-war gay community was actually highly visible with both symbols (such as bleached hair, red ties, etc).

Although this piece make some very bold claims, the organization and sources used made the argument believable and also very easy to follow. I found the identification of the three “myths” broken down section by section really easy to follow. I really liked the information about the gay communities in the pre-war time period by exploring African American papers and working class and immigrant community sources. I also really liked the use of popular culture, such as the Bringing Up Baby character. Additionally, I really liked how Chauncey explored the understanding of masculinity and femininity in both the pre and post war society. Finally, I thought Chauncey exploration of the gay community’s cultural autonomy pre war and the intersection of the gay community and the non-gay community via fascination with drag queens and drag balls was not only interesting but drew a lot of parallels for me to today.