Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

Constructions Of Femininity: Women And The World's Columbian Exposition, Lauren Alexander Maxwell

Undergraduate Honors Thesis Collection

The women of the Queen Isabella Association were the embodiment of what has been termed the ‘New Woman.’While the New Woman was an amalgamation of many different trends, historians agree that she “represents one of the most significant cultural shifts of the late nineteenth and twentieth centuries.”5 These women chose to “move beyond domesticity” and fought to become equal members of American sociopolitical life.6 Joanne Meyerowitz argues that their greater significance was the tendency of the New Woman to “challenge the dominant Victorian sexual ethos.” 7 She inserted herself into the public sphere on her own terms, without the protection …