I thought that the history of the American theater in the
early nineteenth century was a very interesting part of the reading. It seemed
to be like a microchasm of everything that was happening at the time. It
involved the evolution of a culture from regarding theater as blasphemous to
the acceptance of upper-class women. It involved the evolution of the theater
itself from a basic nineteenth century bar scene (complete with prostitutes and
class division) to a family-friendly environment. However, the part of the
evolution that wasn’t yet complete was the inclusion of women’s independence.
The part of the reading that struck me was that it seemed pretty much anything
was acceptable for a woman to do on-stage, but not if she appeared dominant. I
think this helped me better understand the nature of our discussion last class,
of why burlesque in particular was so controversial.
I also thought that it was kind of ironic that P.T. Barnum
was said to be pretty much solely responsible for the movement of the theater
scene towards family-friendly, or more specifically woman-friendly. To think
that the same man who put “freaks” on display to earn his living would be
responsible for the cleansing process of the theater industry was just
mind-numbing to me.
Also, I apologize for the lateness of this post. I was going
to put it up last night, but fell asleep reading the end of the fourth chapter.
Morgan et al, Definitely think more about the questions your raise here as we move into Chapter 5 for next week. I want us to keep coming back to the question we touched on Thursday about what shapes perceptions about the appeal or the danger of popular culture. Is it something intrinsic to the cultural texts - in this case the performances - themselves? OR something else? This is key when we are talking about theater, which was extremely interactive social entertainment culture in the mid-19th century.
ReplyDeleteTo further on the points that I made on this blog, I think Olive Logan's opinions contributed to the microcosm of overall public opinion through the opinions regarding theater. For someone who was a women's rights activist, I thought it was a little odd for her to condemn a free display of women's sexuality. That being said, I understand that it was a different time, and I get the idea of hiding sexuality to seem more respectable to those who currently hold the power (at that time being white men). Still, to me it just seemed different. Furthermore, I thought her criteria for actresses (the list of questions on page 123) exemplified common attitudes of what constitutes a sexualized actress in modern America (minus the can-can part). That led me to ask the question, how long have those standards been in place? That seems like something the modern feminist movement would be aiming to eliminate. Though, I suspect modern feminists would probably have less criticism for the sexuality expressed in the plays overall. If I'm wrong on that, feel free to correct me! I meant no offense :)
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