Stage women, 1900–50
Stage women, 1900–50

Author: Maggie B. Gale

Publisher: Manchester University Press

Published: 2019-04-08

Total Pages: 423

ISBN-13: 1526136872

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This electronic version has been made available under a Creative Commons (BY-NC-ND) open access license. This book presents a collection of cutting-edge historical and cultural essays in the field of women, theatre and performance. The chapters explore women’s networks of professional practice in the theatre and performance industries between 1900 and 1950, with a focus on women’s sense and experience of professional agency in an industry largely controlled by men. The book is divided into two sections: ‘Female theatre workers in the social and theatrical realm’ looks at the relationship between women’s work – on and off stage – and autobiography, activism, technique, touring, education and the law. ‘Women and popular performance’ focuses on the careers of individual artists, once household names, including Lily Brayton, Ellen Terry, radio star Mabel Constanduros and Oscar-winning film star Margaret Rutherford.

The Palgrave Handbook of the History of Women on Stage
The Palgrave Handbook of the History of Women on Stage

Author: Jan Sewell

Publisher: Springer Nature

Published: 2020-04-29

Total Pages: 850

ISBN-13: 3030238288

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This book brings together nearly 40 academics and theatre practitioners to chronicle and celebrate the courage, determination and achievements of women on stage across the ages and around the globe. The collection stretches from ancient Greece to present-day Australasia via the United States, Soviet Russia, Europe, India, South Africa and Japan, offering a series of analytical snapshots of women performers, their work and the conditions in which they produced it. Individual chapters provide in-depth consideration of specific moments in time and geography while the volume as a whole and its juxtapositions stimulate consideration of the bigger picture, underlining the challenges women have faced across cultures in establishing themselves as performers and the range of ways in which they gained access to the stage. Organised chronologically, the volume looks not just to the past but the future: it challenges the very notions of ‘history’, ‘stage’ and even the definition of ‘women’ itself.

A Social History of British Performance Cultures 1900-1939
A Social History of British Performance Cultures 1900-1939

Author: Maggie B. Gale

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2019-11-26

Total Pages: 388

ISBN-13: 1351397192

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This book provides a new social history of British performance cultures in the early decades of the twentieth century, where performance across stage and screen was generated by dynamic and transformational industries. Exploring an era book-ended by wars and troubled by social unrest and political uncertainty, A Social History of British Performance Cultures 1900–1939 makes use of the popular material cultures produced by and for the industries – autobiographies, fan magazines and trade journals, as well as archival holdings, popular sketches, plays and performances. Maggie B. Gale looks at how the performance industries operated, circulated their products and self-regulated their professional activities, in a period where enfranchisement, democratization, technological development and legislation shaped the experience of citizenship. Through close examination of material evidence and a theoretical underpinning, this book shows how performance industries reflected and challenged this experience, and explored the ways in which we construct our ‘performance’ as participants in the public realm. Suited not only to scholars and students of British theatre and theatre history, but to general readers as well, A Social History of British Performance Cultures 1900–1939 offers an original intervention into the construction of British theatre and performance histories, offering new readings of the relationship between the material cultures of performance, the social, professional and civic contexts from which they arise, and on which they reflect.

Female Aerialists in the 1920s and Early 1930s
Female Aerialists in the 1920s and Early 1930s

Author: Kate Holmes

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2021-11-29

Total Pages: 249

ISBN-13: 0429594313

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Female solo aerialists of the 1920s and early 1930s were internationally popular performers in the largest live performance mass entertainment of the period in the UK and USA. Yet these aerialists and this period in circus history have been largely forgotten despite the iconic image of ‘the’ female aerialist still flaring in the popular imagination. Kate Holmes uses insights gained as a practitioner to reconstruct in detail the British and American performances and public personae of key stars such as Lillian Leitzel, Luisita Leers, and the Flying Codonas, revealing what is performed and implicit in today’s practice. Using a wealth of original sources, this book considers the forgotten stars whose legacy of the cultural image of the female aerialist echoes. Locating performers within wider cultural histories of sport, glamour, and gender, this book asks important questions about their stardom, including: Why were female aerialists so alluring when their muscularity challenged conservative ideals of femininity and how did they participate in change? What was it about their movements and the spaces they performed in that activated such strong audience responses? This book is vital reading for students and practitioners of aerial performance, circus, gender, popular performance, and performance studies.

Victorian touring actresses
Victorian touring actresses

Author: Janice Norwood

Publisher: Manchester University Press

Published: 2020-05-09

Total Pages: 191

ISBN-13: 1526133342

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Victorian touring actresses brings new attention to women’s experience of working in nineteenth-century theatre by focusing on a diverse group of largely forgotten ‘mid-tier’ performers, rather than the usual celebrity figures. It examines how actresses responded to changing political, economic and social circumstances and how the women were themselves agents of change. Their histories reveal dynamic patterns of activity within the theatrical industry and expose its relationship to wider Victorian culture. With an innovative organisation mimicking the stages of an actress’s life and career, the volume draws on new archival research and plentiful illustrations to examine the challenges and opportunities facing the women as they toured both within the UK and further afield in North America and Australasia. It will appeal to students and researchers in theatre and performance history, Victorian studies, gender studies and transatlantic studies.

Stage women, 1900-50
Stage women, 1900-50

Author: Maggie B. Gale

Publisher:

Published: 2019

Total Pages:

ISBN-13: 9781526147271

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Stage women, 1900-50 explores the many ways in which women conceptualised, constructed and participated in networks of professional practice in the theatre and performance industries between 1900 and 1950. A timely volume full of original research, the book explores women's complex negotiations of their agency over both their labour and public representation, and their use of personal and professional networks to sustain their careers. Including a series of case studies that explore a range of well-known and lesser-known women working in theatre, film and popular performance of the period. The volume is divided into two connected parts. 'Female theatre workers in the social and theatrical realm' looks at the relationship between women's work - on- and offstage - and autobiography, activism, technique, touring, education and the law. Part II, 'Women and popular performance', focuses on the careers of individual artists, once household names, including Lily Brayton, Ellen Terry, radio star Mabel Constanduros, and Oscar-winning film star Margaret Rutherford. Overall, the book provides new and vibrant cultural histories of women's work in the theatre and performance industries of the period.

Women, Power, and Childbirth
Women, Power, and Childbirth

Author: Kathleen D. Turkel

Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing USA

Published: 1995-11-06

Total Pages: 182

ISBN-13: 0313033757

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Based on her 12 year study of a free-standing birth center, Turkel analyzes the medical model of childbirth in contrast to the midwifery model. In the medical model of birth, women are defined as patients and birth takes place in hospitals where women have little, if any, control over their experience. The midwifery model views birth as a healthy process where midwives act as teachers and guides for women during pregnancy and birth, helping women and their families to shape and define their experience to meet their needs and expectations. Under existing legal and cultural circumstances, free-standing birth centers face a dilemma. They must continually accomodate the medical model while trying to maintain the midwifery model and give women an option to home birth or to hospital birth.

Tracing Your Theatrical Ancestors
Tracing Your Theatrical Ancestors

Author: Katharine M Cockin

Publisher: Pen and Sword Family History

Published: 2023-07-31

Total Pages: 228

ISBN-13: 1526732068

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How can you find out about the lives of ancestors who were involved in the world of theater: on stage and on film, in the music halls and traveling shows, in the circus and in all sorts of other forms of public performance? Katharine Cockin’s handbook provides a fascinating introduction for readers searching for information about ancestors who had clearly defined roles in the world of the theater and performance as well as those who left only a few tantalizing clues behind. The wider history of public performance is outlined, from its earliest origins in church rituals and mystery plays through periods of censorship driven by campaigns on moral and religious grounds up to the modern world of stage and screen. Case studies, which are a special feature of the book, demonstrate how the relevant records and be identified and interpreted, and they prove how much revealing information they contain. Information on relevant archives, books, museums and websites make this an essential guide for anyone who is keen to explore the subject.

The Cambridge Companion to the Circus
The Cambridge Companion to the Circus

Author: Gillian Arrighi

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Published: 2021-07-01

Total Pages: 329

ISBN-13: 1108617689

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The Cambridge Companion to the Circus provides a complete guide for students, scholars, teachers, researchers, and practitioners who are seeking perspectives on the foundations and evolution of the modern circus, the contemporary extent of circus studies, and the specialised literature available to support further enquiries. The volume brings together an international group of established and emerging scholars working across the multi-disciplinary domain of circus studies to present a clear overview of the specialised histories, aesthetics and distinctive performances of the modern circus. In sixteen commissioned essays, it covers the origins in commercial equestrian performance during the late-eighteenth century to contemporary inflections of circus arts in major international festivals, educational environments, and social justice settings.