Upper-class Women Research Articles

Politics in the Name of Women’s Reservation

The discussion highlights concerns regarding gender-based reservations in India, particularly the potential for these policies to disproportionately benefit wealthier and upper-class women, sidelining women from lower socio-economic strata and disadvantaged castes. It proposes solutions such as ‘reservation within reservation’ for Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes to ensure equitable distribution of benefits and advocates for a shift towards economic-based reservations, considering financial need rather than gender alone. The importance of education, awareness campaigns and transparent criteria for reservation is emphasized, promoting equal access to opportunities. An intersectional approach that addresses both gender and caste factors is deemed essential to bridge existing disparities. The discussion concludes by emphasizing the need for regular reviews and data-driven policy adjustments to create an inclusive reservation system that empowers individuals from all backgrounds, aligning with the broader goal of fostering a just and balanced society.

Resistencia al mandato de la maternidad: discursos en torno a la no maternidad de mujeres de 25 a 45 años, de estratos medio y alto de Lima Metropolitana que decidieron no tener hijos

This article examines the complex dynamics of non-motherhood in contemporary Peruvian society, focusing on middle and upper-class women in Metropolitan Lima. By employing a qualitative methodology centered on narratives, the study explores the meanings attributed to motherhood and non-motherhood, challenging concepts such as "maternal instinct." Autonomy emerges as a right and diverse reasons for choosing not to become a mother are revealed. Moreover, the study addresses stigma, social pressure, and moral violence, highlighting strategies of resistance against the maternal mandate and the construction of new female identities. The article advocates for inclusive dialogue regarding the life choices of these women.

It Is High Time for Serious Women

Abstract This article aims to highlight aspects of female emancipation in the Kingdom of Poland in the second half of the nineteenth century that gave this movement a specific, national character. The political and economic consequences of the January Uprising (1863–1864) hit the landed gentry particularly hard. As a result, many gentry women faced the necessity of earning a living and this forced a change in their way of life and aspirations. The traditional model for elite women did not match the economic challenges, and with this in mind, the Polish press, especially magazines for female readers, aimed to create a new model of gentry womanhood. Most periodicals agreed that women's emancipation was on a certain level necessary. But to what extent? This question has been a subject of dispute. Some columnists postulated to limit women's professional aspirations to manual occupations in order to preserve the domain of prestigious intellectual labor exclusively for men. This conservative movement succeeded only partially, with some upper-class women devoting themselves to handicrafts while others, against conservatives’ wishes, graduated from universities abroad and obtained qualifications for performing previously male professions. The majority of these educated women combined paid labor with social work. They were strongly influenced by the promoted ideal of a “new Polish woman” who was to be hard working, constantly improving her mental faculties, and engaging in activities that benefitted Polish society and the nation. This model contributed significantly to the formation of a new generation of distinguished female activists.

Counting the Numbers: Nationalism and the Question of Surplus Women

The ‘evils’ of sati and widowhood constituted two of the major elements of social reformation and women’s progress in India in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. These ‘evils’ were rooted in casteist and sexist ideologies and practices, aspects that remained largely unrecognised by the dominant reformist agendas. The narrative of social progress of women focused only on the upper-class and upper-caste women whose lives were prescribed by brahmanical and patriarchal ideals of chastity, purity, and devotion to husbands. Consequently, ‘patriarchy’ was interpreted as a traditional system oppressing the upper-class upper-caste women. The social reformations such as companionate marriage, widowhood, sati, were practices predominant only in upper-caste communities. It is also significant to note that social reformation was intended to revive the ‘great’ Hindu tradition and rid it of its bad elements exhibited through the practice of sati. This article, through a comparative reading of the discourses on sati and widowhood by Raja Rammohan Roy and the idea of endogamy by B. R. Ambedkar, examines the roots of brahmanical patriarchy to delineate the gendering of caste in imposing a false homogeneity of nationalism.

“The Gilded Cage”: Oppression Experienced by Upper-Class Women in Novel The Widows of Malabar Hill (2018) by Sujata Massey

This analysis explores the issue of oppression towards women as a result of patriarchal practices, traditional traditions, gender roles, and social expectations in the novel The Widows of Malabar Hill (2018) by Sujata Massey. This is qualitative research that relies on text and applies feminist literary criticism to analyze the issue in the novel. This analysis aims to find out the forms of oppression experienced by the upper-class women in the novel. This research found that upper-class women experienced several forms of oppression including gender-based discrimination, gender-based marginalization, powerlessness, restricted access to formal education, restriction on property sales rights, being forbidden to work in public, limitation in freedom of mobility, cultural and religious practices, gender-based violence, and lack of legal rights. This research also indicates that even in the upper social classes, gender and patriarchal culture are the main causes of women's oppression. This oppression limits the opportunities that upper-class women have to develop their true potential.

Re-assessing the Classic Frames: Intersection of Caste, Class and Gender in Neelakuyil

Neelakuyil, produced in 1954, is among the few Malayalam films that represent how caste category and gender norms affect the lives of the proletariat and upper-class women. The film retains its position as a classic and the foremost among works chosen to historicize Malayalam Cinema. This article argues that the symbiosis of patriarchal power, caste discrimination and economic disparities unveil a complex system of discrimination and manipulation of women’s lives. How Neelakuyil illustrates the impact of such a schema on the mindset of dominant selves and the way in which they have a bearing upon the subaltern lives are negotiated. I adopt a Dalit-feminist perspective within the conceptual framework of intersectionality by focusing on the manner in which the protagonist Neeli’s subjectivity is situated within the narrative discourse. I also attempt to examine the ideologies of ‘progressive thought’ and ‘paternal authority’ embodied in the characters Sankaran Nair and Sreedharan Nair and their ideological significance in relation to persistent caste dynamics.

Determinants of singleness among women aged 40 and over in Algeria: what relation to the labor market?

The decrease in the average age of marriage and the increase in loneliness among women in Algeria is a phenomenon that is becoming increasingly visible in society. In the coming years, the number of single people will increase. This article analyses the factors leading to increased loneliness among women aged 40 and over in Algeria based on data from the MICS6/2019 survey. The minimum age threshold was chosen because it corresponds to the age after which the probability of first marriage is almost zero based on Algerian statistics. The methodology of this study is stepwise Wald logistic regression. The paper built regression models based on two samples: the first (24,681 women aged 40 and over) and the second (4,329 women aged 50-54). For an empirical study of loneliness among women, it is proposed to analyze the following determinants: type of employment, type of social protection, place of residence, level of education, and age. Based on the results of the research, four main conclusions were formed. First, the odds of being single are 14.1 times and 4.23 times higher among job-seeking and working women, respectively, compared to non-working women. Due to the loss of hope to get married, women choose career development instead of building a family union. Under these conditions, women integrate into the labor market late. Since most of this category is unemployed and not of retirement age, they have low health insurance coverage. Based on this, to create decent living conditions for single women aged 40 and older, it is advisable to launch a program to improve the qualifications of these women, find ways to integrate them into the working environment and provide them with health insurance. Secondly, the long-term trend indicates that loneliness as a psychological phenomenon will increase every year in society, which will, accordingly, contribute to the strengthening of the imbalance in the marriage market. Late marriage and declining fertility are indicators of new patterns of behavior brought about by economic and social change. Thirdly, the level of well-being is also a statistically significant factor influencing the loneliness of women. Middle-class women are 1.27 times more likely to be single than upper-class women. Fourth, the survey revealed significant regional differences. Women in Algeria’s north-eastern and north-central regions are more likely to remain single. These results can be further explored through qualitative research.

Wilful daughters, domestic goddesses, pious Muslims, and rebels: Islam, fashion, commodities, and emotions among upper class women in Pakistan, 1947–1962

AbstractPakistan, 15 January 1950. Impeccably dressed, Zarina is going out to celebrate the wedding of her partner-in-gossip-crime, Fizza. Her busy life makes her feel anxious. The wrongdoings of the home helpers and her parents’ constant bickering fill her family life. Fashion magazines, get-togethers at the association she has just joined, and ladies’ glamorous parties are her only antidotes to stress.This article explores the history of Zarina and her fellow upper class women's emotions, everyday lives, and daily perception of religious and socio-political ideas of change in Pakistan's momentous formative years (1947–1962). By relying on Francis Robinson's research on religious change, self, and the fashioning of Muslim identity, it provides the first historical ethnography of how upper class women in Pakistan understood and experienced socio-political change through the transformation of their emotions, religious views, lifestyle, and behaviour.Drawing on material and visual culture and a rich selection of newspaper clippings and government records, this article lifts the curtain on the material and immaterial ‘stuff’ of women's dreams, taste in fashion, private lives, and political and religious ideas. Finally, it illuminates how women and their gendered agency became the key ‘sites’ for a new and, at times, surprising Islamic revival.

The Lady in the Overall: First World War Patriotism, Respectability, and Workwear of Upper-Class Munitionettes

Abstract This article offers new insights into the national market for utilitarian garments worn by British upper-class Munitionettes in the pursuit of essential First World War munition manufacture. There has been a resurgence in recent years in the interest of women’s workwear, but little dress historical research has been undertaken into the manufacture and consumption of these garments by upper-class women, which this article seeks to address. The numbers of women involved in munition production peaked in 1917 at almost 1,000,000 meaning the circulation of workwear in this industry alone, was in the millions. Workwear worn by upper-class women represents discourses of wealth, femininity, respectability, and patriotism. That such expensive and high-quality garments exist speaks to the cultural significance the women themselves recognized in these utilitarian garments. This workwear symbolized their contribution to the war effort, the political ambitions for suffrage and personal achievement. These garments were not worn outside the workplace as the fabric would have been contaminated with chemicals, thus would not have been pleasant to preserve. Crucially, it is through the material cultural analysis of rare extant high-end garments worn by upper-class women, that the extent of the market for workwear has been revealed.

Mediating Dual Roles in Overseas Journey: Public and Private Writings by Bin Chun (1804–1871)

This study examines how Bin Chun 斌椿 (1804–1871), the first late Qing Chinese scholar-official to Europe, kept a critical distance from the West by delivering different messages between his prose (written for the late Qing court) and poetry (shared with friends). It explores his representations of “self-styled heroism,” Qing Occidentalism, and gender hierarchy in writing. In the prose written for a more public purpose, Bin Chun credited his popularity to the respected nation behind him, portrayed Westerners as barbarians, and reserved his praise for upper-class women in the West. In contrast, his poems elaborate on his charisma, tone down the bizarre scenes in the West, and include exuberant descriptions of ladies. As the official has been considered a conservative who failed to recognize the strength of the West, this research sheds light on his efforts at cultural mediation that reveal further complexity in his stance.

Women’s property rights in the Archaic and Classical Cypriot city-kingdoms?

AbstractThis paper investigates the law of the Cypriot city-kingdoms in the Archaic and Classical periods. New insights concern the property rights of upper-class women from Cyprus, specifically from Idalion. The paper provides a fresh analysis of the content of the Idalion Bronze Tablet and of two scarab-seals. The data coming from their examination are compared with the iconography of women in Cyprus and the contents of two paragraphs of Lysias’ speech,On the Property of Aristophanes. The analysis of these testimonies demonstrates that in the Archaic and Classical periods, Cypriot upper-class women may have been landowners who rented out their properties, may have owned personal seals, and conceivably, may have managed family estates in the event of their husband’s death.

A Comparision Between Whether and How Western Fashion Represents the Identity of Upper-Class Women in Shanghai and Chinese Immigrant Women in the United States during the 1920s

During the 1920s, the city of Shanghai became a hub of Western influence, as more foreigners and Chinese individuals with overseas degrees brought new ideas to the port city. The growing upper-class in Shanghai increasingly had access to purchase Western products, specifically Western fashion on Nanjing Road. Meanwhile, Chinese immigrants living in the United States during this decade experienced varying degrees of Western influence in their everyday lives and how they dressed. The topic of this paper addresses an understudied comparison, utilizing fashion as an angle to examine the identities of upper-class women in Shanghai and Chinese immigrant women in the United States during the 1920s. This paper observes primary sources including photographs and a newspaper as a method to address the research topic. This paper argues that during the 1920s, most second-generation Chinese immigrant women adopted Western fashion to assimilate into American culture. However, the first-generation Chinese immigrant women mostly maintained their Chinese culture despite being in a new environment. On the other hand, in Shanghai, Western fashion became popular among upper-class women during the 1920s as it reflected their social and economic power; their identity became increasingly linked to progressive Western womens ideals. Ultimately, this papers assertion contributes to shaping a larger perspective explaining how the different environments of Shanghai and the United States caused the upper-class women in Shanghai and Chinese immigrant women in the United States to have disparate values in regard to Western fashion.

Florence Kelley: Pragmatist, Feminist, Socialist

Florence Kelley: Pragmatist, Feminist, Socialist

Class, Gender, and Train Travel in F. Scott Fitzgerald’s “A Short Trip Home”

ABSTRACT Trains captured the imagination of young Scott. How could they not with the James J. Hill, who built the Great Northern line that ran from St. Paul, Minnesota to Seattle, Washington by 1893, as a family friend. The Fitzgeralds also relied heavily on railroads in their personal lives. They moved almost annually throughout Scott’s childhood, and his mother enjoyed taking him on trips to visit relatives and to retreat to warmer climates. Not surprisingly, trains, though typically overlooked in analyses of Fitzgerald’s fiction, appear throughout his works. Inspired by numerous trips to St. Paul from his New Jersey boarding school and Princeton, Fitzgerald wrote “A Short Trip Home” in October of 1927, and it appeared in the Saturday Evening Post two months later. This work has received little critical attention in part because it has been dismissed as a ghost story. On the surface, this Gothic tale seems to be about a spectral thug who extorts upper-class women on trains, but by presenting the protagonist, Eddie Stinson, as a type of ghost himself, Fitzgerald crafts a dual narrative that offers a chilling commentary about patriarchal power. Eddie proves to be no less ruthless than the apparition of Joe Varland and no less predatory in his relationship with Ellen Baker. For Fitzgerald, these ghosts reveal an America terrified of egalitarianism, and Eddie’s attempts to vanquish the spirit of a working-class gangster and “protect” Ellen make it clear that the real horror can be found in the nation’s fear of female autonomy and eroding class hierarchies.

‘A fur coat and a blunted vocabulary are misfits’: Representations of Munitionettes’ Fashion and Class during the First World War

This article offers new insights into the way fashion was used to identify and disseminate discourses surrounding patriotism and class during the First World War. Official directives encouraged frugality; thus any extravagance was deemed to be unpatriotic. Wartime narratives targeting the alleged disconnect between women and the reality of war were depicted in satirical cartoons. Upper-class women were depicted wearing expensive, new, ‘ragged’ clothes, whereas lower-class munition workers faced accusations of profligacy exemplified by the wearing of fur coats, previously out of their financial reach. Expensive furs had historically been considered the preserve of the wealthy and royal echelons of society. Therefore, the wearing of such garments, even if made from cheaper pelts, by lower-class female factory workers led to assumptions of their impropriety. Cartoons depicted consumer behaviour in terms of class, which further cemented the trope of the fur-wearing munitionette profiting from the war. The caricatures analysed in this article are contrasted with a consideration of the actual purchases made by working-class women, to add a more nuanced interpretation of the hyperbolic condemnation of munition workers during the First World War.

The change in upper-class women’s social status between the end of the Roman Republic and the beginning of the Roman Empire

The paper focuses on the history of suffragists at the end of the Roman Republic and the beginning of the Roman Empire. As the wave of supporting equal female rights in the modern world is becoming increasingly popular, this research will help explain women’s fighting history for their rights, especially during the political shock period. It would also let us see how the pioneer of female freedom began with the long road. The upper-class Roman women used different ways to get more political and economic rights in front of the patriarchal society. The development in female rights also pushed the status of women onto a higher level in Roman Empire, both in political areas and daily life. However, due to the limitation of the era and lack of support from the mass, no significant success was achieved. Though the women at that time failed to take a completely equal position with men, they still built up the base of modern suffragists.

The Power of Their Will: Slaveholding Women in Nineteenth-Century Cuba

The Power of Their Will: Slaveholding Women in Nineteenth-Century Cuba

Pandemic Time: A Critical Introduction

Pandemic TimeA Critical Introduction Darius Bost Whatever it is, coronavirus has made the mighty kneel and brought the world to a halt as nothing else could. Our minds are still racing back and forth, longing for a return to “normality,” trying to stitch our future to our past, and refusing to acknowledge the rupture. But the rupture exists. And amid this terrible despair, it offers us a chance to rethink the doomsday machine we have built for ourselves. Nothing could be worse than a return to normality. –Arundhati Roy, “The Pandemic is a Portal” A recent study published in Science Advances used weekly, online surveys to assess participants’ perceptions of time over a five-month period of quarantine in Brazil, which, at the time, ranked second worldwide in the number of deaths related to the pandemic. They aimed to understand how social distancing and emotional and psychological factors influenced participants’ perceptions of time. Researchers found that time was distorted during social distancing, the sense of time as slowing down was strongly associated with emotions and feelings of isolation, and the perception of time as speeding up was strongly associated with stress and personal care.1 The researchers acknowledged that their sample was biased toward middle- and upper-class women in the southeast region of Brazil, but they saw no reason why this sample could not be used to address their research question. In their 2020 “Feminist Response to COVID-19,” however, a global network of feminist and women’s rights organizations from the Global South and from marginalized communities in the Global North stressed that a feminist response to COVID-19 “must center the well-being of all people in an intersectional manner,” must take into account how “multiple and intersecting discrimination . . . may increase the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on specific population groups and communities,” and “that women, men, and gender non-conforming people [End Page 110] within these groups will have different experiences and needs.”2 Relatedly, they note how, “in many countries, curfews and lockdowns are being brutally enforced by military and police forces, often most cruelly targeting the most marginalized groups.”3 The principles set forth by this coalition of feminist advocates suggest that “pandemic time” is perceived and experienced differently among (multiply) marginalized populations who already live under conditions of precarity and experience the pandemic as overlapping with preexisting crises. This special section on pandemic time explores how the coronavirus pandemic has altered our senses of time through an intersectional lens. Though the pandemic has impacted every corner of the globe, care has been distributed unevenly, and often arrives belatedly in poorer countries. In the areas of the globe that have been most affected, pandemic time is felt as trauma on both catastrophic and deeply personal levels, and the time of grief seems unending to some while it is barely recognizable to others. Attempts to return to normal or to create some sense of normalcy seem cruelly optimistic when the post-pandemic world has seemingly upended normative conceptions of time.4 As the epidemic continues to unfold, and as its meanings continue to be mediated through polarizing political discourses, the unevenness of global capital, and overlapping disasters, this special section queries our senses of time in the post-pandemic world. My emphasis on senses of time is meant to underscore how, rather than producing a shared sense of time, the pandemic has exposed how racial, ethnic, class, gender, sexual, regional, and national differences shape our perceptions of time. This special section gathers leading and emerging scholars to reflect on pandemic time as it is experienced at the individual and group levels. The authors draw from feminist, queer, Black, Indigenous, and Latinx epistemologies of time to offer unique and diverse, and often personal, perspectives on the pandemic and its temporal affects and effects. By way of introduction, this essay approaches the theme of “pandemic time” by reflecting on my experience of COVID-19, beginning with my contraction of the virus two-and-a-half years after the appearance of the pandemic in the United States. I begin with my personal experience to express my sense of pandemic time, despite its official designation as an...

The Artistic Characteristics of Feminism in Edith Wharton's Novels

Edith Wharton, as one of the representative writers in the American realistic literature school at the end of 19th century and the beginning of 20th century, described the life of aristocratic women with delicate psychological descriptions and precise language, and explored the fate and status of upper-class women from a unique perspective. Through the study of the artistic characteristics of feminism in Edith Wharton's novels, it is clear how Wharton reflects real life and expresses ideas by shaping characters, telling stories and describing the environment. Through "The Age of Innocence", the female consciousness is explored from many angles. Through "The Reef", this paper studies the conflict between traditional ideas and personal desires revealed by tragedy. Through "Etan Frome", the strong naturalistic is studied. Through "The Summer", "The Letters" and "The Excuses", this paper studies the narrative method of epiphany.

Hungry for Revolution: The Politics of Food and the Making of Modern Chile

Chilean food politics are perhaps best associated with images of the March of the Empty Pots and Pans, led by middle- and upper-class women a year into Salvador Allende's presidential term. Yet, as Joshua Frens-String demonstrates in Hungry for Revolution, the close association between food and politics in modern Chile began long before Allende's “road to socialism.” Hungry for Revolution documents the importance of food politics in the creation of the welfare state, the development of mass politics, and the advent of dictatorship in twentieth-century Chile. This highly readable and engaging narrative is suitable both for experts in Latin American and food history and for students looking to learn more about food politics and modern Chile.Hungry for Revolution examines how changes in political regimes affected state attempts to address social inequality and activism around food sovereignty. Using state documents, newspapers, memoirs, and speeches from political activists, Frens-String identifies food's central role in the making of Chile's welfare state, which was one of the strongest in Latin America until the Augusto Pinochet dictatorship. In doing so, he places the origins of food politics in Chile well before the neoliberal deregulation of the 1970s and 1980s. He seeks to address the “question of whom national development efforts have historically been set up to benefit, and at whose expense” (p. 11). With a focus on state actors as well as social activists, which provides a well-rounded account of politics from both above and below, he does an admirable job of answering this question for the Chilean case and suggesting connections to other contexts.The book is divided into three parts, each of which focuses on a different time period. The first, “A Hungry Nation,” covers the twentieth century's first decades. Chapter 1 analyzes how food shaped Chile's place in the world economic system and how awareness of the link between global economic prosperity and economic marginalization at home drove political mobilization around food access. Building on the first, the second chapter explains that working-class politics merged with concerns about food security, leading workers to mobilize specifically as consumers, not just as workers.The second part, “Containing Hunger,” addresses the 1930s through the 1960s. Chapter 3 details the rise of the welfare state as a response to concerns about food sovereignty and working-class activism. Specifically, it explores programs designed to raise Chileans' standard of living and nutritional levels in relation to both national concerns and international trends. These events prompted social reformers to propose agrarian reform to address structural inequities, stimulate agricultural production, and reduce dependence on food imports, which is the subject of chapter 4.The book's pace slows in the final part, “Recipes for Change,” and centers on Allende's presidency (1970–73). Chapter 5, “When Revolution Tasted Like Empanadas and Red Wine,” documents the successes of Popular Unity's first year in office, when household goods and foods were available in large quantities and accessible to Chileans of various social classes. Chapter 6 moves on to grassroots activism and worker control of the food supply. This chapter is the book's most historically significant; it describes the establishment of the juntas de abastecimiento y precios (supply and price control boards), local organizations started by activists that monitored the prices of staple items, distributed foodstuffs to lower-income residents, and helped keep items reasonably priced despite inflation. This chapter's focus on consumer activism and grassroots organizing shows how local communities can affect food supply and distribution in a way that goes beyond supply and demand economics and for-profit consumerism. It highlights a different way of thinking about participatory democracy based on joint consumer-worker control of the food economy. The final chapter traces the way that the anti-Allende Right and the Chicago Boys changed the nature of food politics; they moved the discourse away from social welfare and the idea that nutrition was a fundamental right of citizenship and toward a free-market belief that food should be treated like other consumer goods. This chapter emphasizes conservative women's essential role in this process alongside other economic and political actors.Hungry for Revolution's strength is the connection it makes between the past and the present and its contribution to thinking about food politics beyond twentieth-century Chile. The epilogue concludes with recent Chilean protests against the Pinochet-era constitution, citing a protest sign from 2019 that declared that “neoliberalism was ‘born in Chile’ but would ‘die’ there as well” (p. 201). The connection between Chile's twentieth-century food politics and contemporary challenges to neoliberalism emphasizes history's importance for contextualizing the present. As Frens-String asserts, the question about the state's role in determining fundamental rights and standard of living is as relevant as ever; as people around the world challenge austerity and late-stage capitalism, the Chilean case provides an alternative way of merging economic concerns and social welfare.