Domesticating sexuality : contextualizing the contradictory imagery of female consumerism, 1955-1959

Abstract

American citizens of the later half of the 1950s witnessed notable shifts in their socio-economic status. The decade following the Second World War wrought prosperity, which stemmed as a direct result of the emergence of a mass media and the cultural amendments that followed. The media fashioned a new consumer culture, one based on material and individual products. The onset of mass advertisement and consumption lead to a dramatic and significant shift in female gender identity. The expulsion of women from the labor force resulted in a demand of a compliant, visually appealing, and domestic housewife. Women became marketable products through various advertisements in adult periodicals, romance novels, and etiquette books that focused on domesticity and cultivated a culture of vanity. These materials constructed a contradictory female consumer culture in that they emphasized collectivism and individualism simultaneously. The dual emphasis on femininity is presented within etiquette texts as the authors prescribed a specific and satisfactory code of social behvavior for women of this ear. The principle argument maintained that if women followed the provided guidelines precisely, they would achieve marriage and domesticity. The romance novel, however, remained as more of a strategic etiquette concept enacted. The romance author encouraged women to perform as the heroine within their novels because that character successfully sought and obtained domesticity. The etiquette text explained the ideal while the romantic heroine represented it. The advertisements and articles presented in adult periodicals of this era existed as a means of effectively maintaining domesticity after the ideal had been achieved.