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Scopophilia And Spectacle: Fashion And Femininity In The Novels Of Frances Burney, Cheryl Denise Clark

Dissertations

My dissertation investigates how the relationship between looking and being seen, or the interaction between scopophilia and spectacle, intersects with the rise of consumer culture and the ascendance of eighteenth-century fashion and fashionable places. By using Frances Burney’s novels as a lens through which to examine the eighteenth century’s fascination with looking, I consider the ways in which attracting “the look” or gaining attention through the visibility of stylish apparel and goods becomes a pathway to social agency in Burney’s novels. Fashion for Burney, I argue, emerges as a multifaceted system that manifests as a means of as social power …