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Telephone 609-258-3601; Fax 609-258-1301Contact: Susan Overton, director
Princeton University Women’s Center
(609) 258-5565Date: February 5, 1999
Brumberg to Address "How History and Culture Shape the Experience of American Girls"
PRINCETON, N.J. -- Joan Jacobs Brumberg will deliver a lecture, "From Corsets to Body Piercing: How History and Culture Shape the Experience of American Girls," on Monday, February 22, at 8 p.m. at Dodds Auditorium, Robertson Hall.
Brumberg, who is Stephen H. Weiss Professor of History, Human Development, and Women’s Studies at Cornell University, has based her presentation on her latest book, The Body Project. Her slide presentation and talk will draw on diary excerpts and media images from the 1830s to the present and will trace the shift in girls’ attitudes from the Victorian concern with "good works" to the modern concern with "good looks." Brumberg’s work explores the contemporary world of American girls in which the body -- dieted, sculpted, pierced, and frequently a source of anxiety -- is the primary project for most young women, inclusive of race and sexual orientation.
Professor Ann J. Lane of the University of Virginia said of her work, "Brumberg’s lectures are fascinating and lively because she supplements a strong argument about social change with provocative visuals that make the experience of American women in the past come alive. This kind of history is never boring, regardless of your gender."
The lecture is presented by the Princeton University Women’s Center and Raising Women’s Voices, with the sponsorship of the American Whig-Cliosophic Society, the Center for Jewish Life, Common Ground, the Parent Association of Princeton Area Independent Schools, the Council of the Humanities, Dining Services, the Graduate School, Health Services, S.HA.R.E. and the Counseling Center, the Department of History, the Office of Religious Life, the Program in African-American Studies, the Public Lecture Series, the Standing Committee on the Status of Women, the Undergraduate Student Government, the Program in Women’s Studies, the Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs, and the YWCA of Princeton.
Admission is free and open to the public. Call the Princeton University Women’s Center at (609) 258-5565 for more information.