paper two rough draft

Question 3)


As the 19th century merged into the 20th century, The United States began to experience a confluence of changing political and social conditions. As immigrants flocked to our land and our own citizens were sent abroad to fight in the name of imperialism, Americans began to experience an identity crisis. The changing conditions in America created a new light on the way in which Americans viewed themselves. No longer defined by westward expansion and a homogeneous population, the identity of the Unites States became ambiguous. Ambiguity created an avenue from change within disenfranchised segments of society, which desperately sought to escape oppression and inequality. Indeed, as normalcy was being redefined, redefining oneself and ones capabilities became a way of escaping oppression. Women in particular capitalized on the opportunities of redefinition, embracing independence beyond previous conception. However, some women, especially African American and Immigrant women, more ferociously clung to the fight for redefinition, the fight for independence.
It is without question that in times of war opportunities for feminine growth abound. As men occupy the barracks, vacancies in the work force allow women to legitimize themselves economically. The Spanish American War in the late 19th century allowed American women to breach the line of traditional domesticity. A new Woman thus emerged as both a wage-earning pillar in family life and independent creatures in themselves. Economic independence left a new taste for equality in the mouths of American women. Furthermore, as American men began to redefine themselves and their relationships to women in the wake of the closing frontier and through the lens of imperialism, social independence, as well as economic independence, became possible. Indeed, as Amy Kaplan suggests, the new imperialistic ways in which men sought to proclaim their manhood at the turn of the twentieth century required the watching eye of the “new woman.” While this new woman peacefully retained her femininity, domesticity, and ultimately her servitude to man, opportunities of travel and work became possible as the audience to masculine conquests of imperialism. Thus, conditions which were created by the closing frontier, conditions that were perpetuated through the length of the Spanish American War, allowed women to expand their roles and the importance of those roles. Although gender equality remained a distant possibility, the circumstances at the end of the 19th century set the stage for female growth and independence.
Just as men and women were not seen as equal sexes, there existed variations in the degrees of equality of women of varying ethnicities. The American climate of the late 19th century, which was marked by the changing roles of men and women, also saw the immergence of an increased expectance of racial equality as immigrants flocked to the United States and African Americans approached 50 years of freedom. Women from these demographic groups faced unspeakable oppression, finding it incredibly difficult to represent themselves as the equals of Anglo-Saxon women let alone the equals of Anglo-Saxons. Furthermore, these groups of women also faced pressure not to abandon their unique heritage in an attempt to gain the opportunities allotted to the most fair-skinned and most masculine segment of the American population. This required a forceful effort on the part of immigrant and African American women to achieve equality. These women cannot rest on the satisfaction of increased social importance and independence as Anglo-Saxon women can. Indeed, a fight for economic independence must be coupled with the growth in social standing.
This case is clearly visible in Kathy Peiss’ “Making Faces: The Cosmetics Industry and the Cultural Construction of Gender, 1890-1930.” In her essay Peiss documents the growth of the cosmetics industry parallel to the growth of female independence. While cosmetics were generally seen as immoral and unrespectable, the antithesis of the traditional American woman, Peiss argues, “Women linked cosmetics use to an emergent notion of their own modernity” (372). By applying makeup despite traditional cultural expectations, American Women were challenging and redefining their roles. While some white women became entrepreneur within the cosmetics industry, most white women were content with the slight expansion of their role in society through the use of cosmetics and their new relationship with the men in their lives. However, women of color and women of foreign decent were forced to fight even harder to separate themselves from the hegemony of a society documented by white men. Not only did these women use cosmetics to present themselves as lighter skinned more feminine creatures, but in astounding numbers they involved their community in efforts to make money from the sale of these increasingly popular items.
Women affectively employed business as a mechanism of breaking the chains of female oppression in the late 19th century. However, in the novel “Bread Givers” by Anzina Yezierska, the heroine employs another weapon in the fight for equality: education. The novel recalls the story of Sara Smolinsky a Jewish immigrant of polish descent that battles her traditional feminine and familial roles by working her way through college. Sara represents the archetype of an empowered woman, surpassing the coquettish girls who legitimize themselves simply through men and makeup. Indeed, not only does Sara challenge social norms by becoming a teacher she denies the methods in which other women obtain their marginal independence, forcibly breaking the chains of inequality.
As the 19th century came to a close the stigmas of feminine independence were slowly being cast away as the social and political spectrum on the United States changed. Most women embraced this change, becoming more independent within the world and in their relationships to men. However, some women surpassed the typical, particularly women of African American and Immigrant statuses. These women were the most disenfranchised within society and thus needed to push the hardest to attain some degree of equality and success.