This collection of classic essays in feminist body studies investigates the history of the image of the female body; from the medical 'discovery' of the clitoris, to the 'body politic' of Queen Elizabeth I, to women deprecated as 'Hottentot Venuses' in the nineteenth century. The text look at
the way in which coverings bear cultural meaning: clothing reform during the French Revolution, Islamic veiling, and the invention of the top hat; as well as the embodiment of cherished cultural values in social icons such as the Statue of Liberty or the Barbie doll. By considering culture as it
defines not only women but also men, this volume offers both the student and the general reader an insight into the interdisciplinary and cross-cultural study involved in feminist body studies.
Notes on contributors
Introduction, Londa Schiebinger
Scientific (Mis)representations
Skeletons in the Closet: The First Illustrations of the Female Skeleton in Eighteenth Century Anatomy, Londa Schiebinger
'Amor Veneris, vel Dulcedo Appeletur', Thomas Laqueur
The Birth
of Sex Hormones, Nelly Oudshoorn
Hermaphrodites and the Medical Invention of Sex, Alice Domurat Dreger
The Body Politic
Icons of Divinity: Portraits of Elizabeth I, Andrew Belsey and Catherine Belsey
Freedom of Dress in Revolutionary France, Lynn Hunt
Gender, Race, and
Nation: The Comparative Anatomy of 'Hottentot' Women in Europe, 1815-1817, Anne Fausto-Sterling
Hard Labor: Women, Childbirth, and Resistance in British Caribbean Slave Societies, Barbara Bush
Embodied Ideals
The Slipped Chiton, Marina Warner
The Development of Horticulture in
the Eastern Woodlands of North America: Women's Role, Parry Jo Watson and Mary Kennedy
Masculinities
I Could Have Retched All Night: Charles Darwin and His Body, Janet Browne
The Jewish Foot, Sander Gilman
Big Man, Little Woman: The Ideal Couple, Sabine
Gieske
Restrained Bodies
The Anthropometry of Barbie: Unsettling Ideal of the Feminine Body in Popular Culture, Jacqueline Urla and Alan Swedlund
Foot-binding in Neo-Confucian China and the Appropriation of Female Labor, C. Fred Blake
The Forbidden Modern: Civilization and
Veiling, Nilufer Gole
Guide to Further Reading
Index
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Londa Schiebinger is the Professor of the History of Science at Pennsylvania State University. She has won the Ludwik Fleck Book Prize (Society for Social Studies of Science) for her previous publication Nature's Body, and the History of Women in Science Prize (History of Science Society) for
her article Why Mammals are Called Mammals.
