In Shopping for Pleasure; Erika Rappaport reconstructs London's Victorian and Edwardian West End as an entertainment and retail center. In this neighborhood of stately homes; royal palaces; and spacious parks and squares; a dramatic transformation unfolded that ultimately changed the meaning of femininity and the lives of women; shaping their experience of modernity. Rappaport illuminates the various forces of the period that encouraged and discouraged women's enjoyment of public life and particularly shows how shopping came to be seen as the quintessential leisure activity for middle- and upper-class women. Through extensive histories of department stores; women's magazines; clubs; teashops; restaurants; and the theater as interwoven sites of consumption; Shopping for Pleasure uncovers how a new female urban culture emerged before and after the turn of the twentieth century.Moving beyond the question of whether shopping promoted or limited women's freedom; the author draws on diverse sources to explore how business practices; legal decisions; and cultural changes affected women in the market. In particular; she focuses on how and why stores presented themselves as pleasurable; secure places for the urban woman; in some cases defining themselves as instrumental to civic improvement and women's emancipation. Rappaport also considers such influences as merchandizing strategies; credit policies; changes in public transportation; feminism; and the financial balance of power within the home. Shopping for Pleasure is thus both a social and cultural history of the West End; but on a broader scale it reveals the essential interplay between the rise of consumer society; the birth of modern femininity; and the making of contemporary London.
#856671 in Books Princeton University Press 1989-10-01Original language:EnglishPDF # 1 9.25 x .87 x 6.25l; 1.20 #File Name: 0691006083388 pages
Review
0 of 0 people found the following review helpful. Five StarsBy surfwood4This book provides a more detailed account some kinds of relationships that existed during slavery7 of 8 people found the following review helpful. Black; white; shades of grey; but just a little too rosy.By DragonslayerSubstantially; I agree with the other reviewer. Sobel argues successfully that there existed in the South (at any rate in Virginia) during the Antebellum period a culture that displayed African influences; and that these influences were visible not just among blacks but among whites; who increasingly were raised by slaves; learned to walk and talk from slaves; and in some cases were unable to function emotionally or physically without slaves.What's missing from the picture is the abuse and cruelty inherent to the slave system. And; one could argue; appropriately: it's not what the book is about. My concern would be that if this were the *only* book one read about the Antebellum South; one could emerge with a skewed picture.10 of 10 people found the following review helpful. The World They Made TogetherBy ggconSobel uses the concept of "world views" to support her argument that although the English and the different cultures in West Africa had separate world views; the close interaction between 18th-century Virginian whites and blacks resulted in these separate world views deeply influencing each other. In the 18th century; black and white children played together; white children often had a black woman as a "surrogate mother"; and blacks and whites often worshipped together. This close interaction reinforced perceptions; values; and identities (world views) that were common between the two world view systems and; with time; the differences between the world views resulted in each world view being influenced by the other until they developed a symbiotic relationship.
