American Womanhood and the New Woman

American Womanhood and the New Woman: A Rhetorical Consideration of the Development and Circulation of Female Stereotypes, 1890–1920 Rachel Stroup | Ohio State University This article studies the emerging trope of the American “New Woman” in the popular press dating from 1890-1920. The New Woman served as the aggregate stereotype of modern women during the progressive era. Magazines and newspapers depicted the New Woman as a sharp distinction from the esteemed Victorian “True” Woman, who was submissive, pious, and virtuous. Using archival examination of Progressive Era newspapers and magazines, and feminist rhetorical historiography, this project found that this discussion possessed the same argumentative features as the conversation about True Womanhood—women were lumped together as a whole and were all thought to be following the same roles. In addition, the term was derisively enacted. The rhetoric surrounding the New Woman has been understudied by rhetorical scholars; rhetorical analyses of feminist conversations in history bear a signif- icance today in understanding the appeals used in feminist movements and in understanding how current notions of gendering are heavily influenced by the past. When a phrase previously unknown the nineteenth-century fanaticism with suddenly appears in print, and is often “the woman question.” Along with the push heard in conversation, it becomes in for women’s rights and access to new occu- order to ask what it means. How shall pations came an alternative understanding we precisely define so nebulous a being about woman’s role and function within as the new woman? For nebulous she society. During the Progressive Era, the ste- certainly is, melting away into thin reotype that arose from this transformative vapor when one demands of her who definition of gender was called the New and what she is, whence she hails, and Woman. Coined initially by Sarah Grand in where she is going. Among the thou- The North American Review in 1894, the sands and tens of thousands who jostle New Woman was instantly a recognizable us as we walk on the crowded highway, figure in a world that was changing quickly. which is the new woman, and what On the surface, the New Woman was an business has she in the path, and educated, economically independent whither is she leading those who fol- woman who followed a life path different low in her wake? from the traditional path laid out for “The New Woman,” Harper’s Bazaar, women—that is, to be married, have chil- July 27, 1895 (594) dren, and live quietly in the home (Welter 21). She became known in the press for the activities in which she participated, which From 1890 to 1920, a new conversation included sports, politics, business, and the about the behaviors of women evolved from growing workforce. A contrast to the ideal Stroup | 25 Victorian woman (the True Woman), the New Woman, 1895–1915, where she chal- New Woman’s identity and influence on lenged the typical perception of the New American life sparked a zealous debate on Woman as a white, affluent, educated, and the new choices women were making. politically progressive woman, and explored Although the phrase “New Woman” repre- the ways in which women from other ethnic, sented the independence women were regional, and socioeconomic backgrounds pursuing in their careers and personal lives, also led lives indicative of modern women. the rhetoric surrounding the New Woman’s In addition, Patterson also edited an anthol- identity extended from the Victorian obses- ogy of New Woman texts in 2008 titled The sion with women’s behaviors. The nineteenth American New Woman Revisited: A Reader, century saw a huge movement to structure 1894–1930. This collection of texts and women’s lives by strictly regulating their images sought to define the New Woman. behavior. But by the fin de siècle, women These scholars applied a historical focus began to be a part of the workforce, marry when studying the New Woman; however, later or not at all, and gradually rely on men another layer of understanding the New less and less. The debate surrounding the New Woman and its function as a stereotype in Woman performed a significant function in Progressive Era conversation can be uncov- redefining women’s place in the outside world ered through a rhetorical study. and in domestic life. In many ways, this Such feminist rhetorical studies on the debate was the catalyst that would pave the history of the New Woman would extend way for new lifestyles and experiences to be from the existing work of scholars’ analyses made available to women. And yet, as I will of nineteenth-century women’s rhetorical argue, the term “New Woman” circulated in practices. For example, in Appropriate[ing] the press primarily as a conduit to condemn Dress (1998), Carol Mattingly discusses the the new choices women were making. ethos created by women depending on what The New Woman has been a topic of they wore and the value placed on women study for historians, who have examined the because of their appearances. The rhetoric of prose and literature surrounding its mean- fashion, she argues, played a huge role in the ing. For example, Carolyn Christensen reception of women’s messages. Kimberly Nelson in 2000 was the first to edit a collec- Harrison, in “Rhetorical Rehearsals: The tion of drama, prose, and fiction from the Construction of Ethos in Confederate Progressive Era that chronicles the conten- Women's Civil War Diaries” (2003), makes tious debate about the New Woman, titled an argument for diaries as rhetorical spaces A New Woman Reader. Jean V. Matthews in in which Confederate women crafted ethos. 2003 wrote The Rise of the New Woman: The Jacqueline Jones Royster (2000) looks at the Woman’s Movement in America, 1875–1930. rhetorical proficiencies of African American Her work documents the course of the wom- women in the nineteenth-century. In addi- en’s suffrage movement, the trials faced by tion, Nan Johnson in Gendering Rhetorical the suffragists’ campaigns, and their even- Space in American Life, 1866–1910 (2002) tual victories in securing women’s rights. demonstrates that the domestic spheres in Martha H. Patterson in 2005 wrote Beyond which women were placed gave them their the Gibson Girl: Reimagining the American own authority when they conformed to the 26 | Young Scholars in Writing feminine ideal. Sarah Hallenbeck more quintessence of the New Woman. While recently (2016) analyzed the rhetorical con- Mattingly, Johnson, and Hallenbeck have notations placed on new technology—like each grappled with “True Womanhood” bicycles—and women’s use of it to trans- and “New Womanhood” in their studies, as form social constructions about gender. they have explored the competing influences These works have provided a critical in the nineteenth century surrounding understanding about how nineteenth-cen- women’s conduct, their studies keep the tury women have constructed messages, New Woman peripheral in the purview of how those messages were received, and how their research. Unlike the other movements successful women’s attempts were to enter of rhetorical study—e.g. the abolition move- male domains. While these works have ment or the suffrage movement—there was mainly focused on women rhetors, under- no organized “New Woman movement” standing female stereotypes as constructed whose main goal was to redefine femininity through public conversation is crucial to for a new age. Consequently, the New understanding the context for women’s rhe- Woman had a different meaning in the torical activity. These conversations on Progressive Era than contemporary scholars womanhood were rhetorical acts themselves attribute to her. Typically, when scholars in the way that they granted and limited speak of the New Woman of the Progressive women’s participation in rhetorical spaces. Era today, she is illustrated as an emblematic Studying the discourse about womanhood icon of feminist reform. Knowledge of femi- during a momentously progressive time, as nist achievements over history has led some in the New Woman debate, offers a clearer scholars to focus on the progress the New and deeper cognizance of the reception of Woman represents today rather than on her women’s words that provides more context reception in the Progressive Era, and this for further research in feminist rhetorical focus ignores the influence these stereotypes studies. Still, the significant figure of the had. Jessica Enoch has called for “a new New Woman, the fundamental representa- feminist historiographic practice, one that tive of the change in women’s behavior examines the rhetorical process of gendering. throughout the nineteenth century—who This mode of historiography interrogates the was in fact rooted in the discussion of wom- rhetorical work that goes into creating and en’s rhetoric—has not been given enough disturbing gendered distinctions, social cate- attention by rhetorical scholars. gories, and asymmetrical power relationships The New Woman was an important devel- that women and men encounter in their opment in the progression of societal daily lives” (115). This article responds to that conceptions of femininity, so to fully under- call by examining the development of the stand women’s rhetoric, we must understand stereotype of the New Woman and the reac- the stereotype of the New Woman and the tions to the New Woman during the consequences of her historical moments in Progressive Era in the United States, particu- the press. Yet, the New Woman is difficult larly by considering the influences of the to study according to typical rhetorical conversations that arose as a response to research methods because no individual women who assumed agency over their own woman in the Progressive Era was the lives. Applying a rhetorical methodology to Stroup | 27 the construction of the New Woman allows domesticity” (21).

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