Girls’ History: History of Girls, II
Miriam Forman-Brunell and Ilana Nash, Contributing Editors
Studying Girlhood on the Web
This section offers brief coverage of web sites relevant to some branch of the study of girlhood, both in its historical and contemporary aspects. If you know of a site you would like to see listed, please send the URL to Ilana Nash at ilana_nash@yahoo.com. We will usually review two sites in each issue.
The “Girl Culture” Site at Duke University <http://www.duke.edu/~jbb1/girlculture/>
This web site was designed to complement a class at Duke University called “Girl Culture: Studies in Femininity and Feminism” a few years ago. The course description and syllabus are interesting enough, but there is also a diverse bibliography which covers both secondary and primary sources for the study of girlhood. Secondary sources are divided into such headings as “Body,” “Race and Ethnicity,” and “’Bad’ Girls/Delinquents.” The selected readings cover historical material as well as up-to-date social science writings about girls’ health, educations, consumer patterns, and other topics. Primary sources include fiction for and about girls, girls’ magazines, and films. The “Girl Sites” section offers links to websites for girls, but does not provide much by way of source materials for historical, academic study of girlhood.
Girls' Literature in the Sallie Bingham Center For Women's History and Culture at Duke University <http://scriptorium.lib.duke.edu/women/beyond-nancy-drew.html>
This web site references an outstanding collection of etiquette and "conduct of life" books and girls' literature (e.g., novels; storybooks; mysteries). Some works in the collection are grouped topically (e.g., heroines; nurses; tomboys), some by presses. All titles listed in this bibliography can be found in Duke University's Rare Book, Manuscript, and Special Collections Library, unless noted otherwise. With few exceptions, titles are listed chronologically within the various subject headings. This is a selective bibliography; it is recommended that you search Duke University Library'sonline catalog.
“The Jazz Age – Flapper Culture and Style” <http://www.geocities.com/flapper_culture/>
This page is part of a larger website, “Pandorasbox.com,” the homepage for a Louise Brooks fanclub (for those of you too young to remember, Louise Brooks was a popular silent-film actress, and one of the definitive flappers). The “Jazz Age – Flapper Culture and Style” page is an excellent resource for scholars of 1920s youth. In addition to the beautiful graphics, the host has provided full-text transcriptions of two 1920s magazine articles on the subject of flappers (one attack, and one defense). There is also a link to another transcribed article – a diatribe from the Ladies’ Home Journal (1921) listing the dangers of jazz music and its deleterious effect on the young. The links lead you to several other, well-selected sites for studies of 1920s music, fashion, literature, and youth culture. A real treat.
Primary Sources Online
Primary sources long considered a part of the women’s history canon can be reunderstood within the context of girls’ history and culture. While widely available in book form, they are now also accessible in electronic formats making them especially useful to students. These include:
“The School Days of an Indian Girl,” by Zitkala-Sahttp available via The History of Childhood and Education web site http://www.socsci.kun.nl/ped/whp/histeduc/links09b.html
Harriet Jacobs, Incidents in the Life of Slave Girl, is available at http://xroads.virginia.edu/~HYPER/JACOBS/hjhome.htm
