Work

Women and Politeness in Eighteenth-Century England

Year: 2018

Type: book

Abstract: This first in-depth study of women’s politeness examines the complex relationship individuals had with the discursive ideals of polite femininity. Contextualising women’s autobiographical writings (journals and letters) with a wide range of eighteenth-century printed didactic material, it analyses the tensions between politeness discourse which aimed to regulate acceptable feminine identities and women’s possibilities to resist this disciplinary regime. Ylivuori focuses on the central role the female body played as both the means through which individuals actively fashioned themselves as polite and feminine, and the supposedly truthful expression of their inner status of polite femininity.

Source: Routledge eBooks

DOI: 10.4324/9780429454431

Author: Soile Ylivuori

Institutions: The Huntington Library, Art Museum, and Botanical Gardens, Queen Mary University of London, Yale University

Language: English

Topic: Language, Discourse, Communication Strategies

Subfield: Language and Linguistics

Field: Arts and Humanities

Domain: Social Sciences

SDG: Gender equality

Open Access status: hybrid

Funder: University of Cambridge