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This volume brings together a range of scholars from diverse disciplinary backgrounds to re-examine the histories of facial hair and its place in discussions of gender, the military, travel and art, amongst others. Chapters in the first section of the collection explore the intricate history of beard wearing and shaving, including facial hair fashions in long historical perspective, and the depiction of beards in portraiture. Section Two explores the shifting meanings of the moustache, both as a manly symbol in the nineteenth century, and also as the focus of the material culture of personal grooming. The final section of the collection charts the often-complex relationship between men, women and facial hair. It explores how women used facial hair to appropriate masculine identity, and how women's own hair was read as a sign of excessive and illicit sexuality.
List of contents
Introduction; Jennifer Evans and Alun Withey.- PART I: (RE)BUILDING THE BEARD?.- 1. Beard History as a Map of the Masculine Past; Christopher Oldstone-Moore, Wright State University, US.- 2. 'The head and front of my offending': Beards, Portraiture, and Self-Presentation in Early Modern England; Margaret Pelling, University of Oxford, UK.- 3. Beardless Young Men? Some Notes on the Construction of Masculinities through Facial Hair in Nineteenth-Century Spain; Victoria Alonso Cabezas, Universidad de Valladolid, Spain.- 4. A Tiny Cloak of Privilege: Facial Hair's Role in Performative Storytelling; Helen Casey, Central St Martin's, UK.- 5. 'Shave him like a Federal!': Subjectivities, Beards and Politics in Early Nineteenth-Century Argentina; Marcelo Marino, University of Buenos Aires, Argentina.- 6. Facial Hair and Historical Memory in 1960s and 1970s Britain; Mark Anderson, University of Nottingham, UK.- PARTII: MASCULINITY AND THE MOUSTACHE.- 7. Combing Masculine Identity in the Age of the Moustache, 1870-1900; Shannon Twickler, Bard Graduate Center, US.- 8. Whiskers at War: Moustaches, Modernity, Militarism and Masculinity in the Twentieth Century British Army; Alice White, University of Kent, UK.- PART III: FEMININE FACIAL HAIR AND FEMININE RESPONSES TO FACIAL HAIR.- 9. 'Clap on these False Beards': Female Playwrights and their Beards; Morwenna Carr, Lancaster University, UK.- 10. A Feminine Feature: Women's Eyebrows in Early Modern Europe; Sean Williams, University of Sheffield, UK.- 11. Feminine Facial Hair in Eighteenth and Nineteenth-Century France; Aurore Chérry, Lyons University, France.
About the author
Jennifer Evans is Senior Lecturer in History at the University of Hertfordshire, UK. Her research focuses on the body, gender and medicine in the seventeenth century. She is currently working on a project exploring men’s sexual health in the seventeenth century. Recent publications include Perceptions of Pregnancy from the Seventeenth to the Twentieth Century (Palgrave, 2017), co-edited with Ciara Meehan.
Alun Withey is Wellcome Research Fellow in the Centre for the History of Medicine at the University of Exeter, UK. An historian of early modern medicine and the body, he is currently working on a major research project on the history of facial hair in Britain. Recent publications include Technology, Self-Fashioning and Politeness in Eighteenth-century Britain (Palgrave, 2015).
Summary
This volume brings together a range of scholars from diverse disciplinary backgrounds to re-examine the histories of facial hair and its place in discussions of gender, the military, travel and art, amongst others. Chapters in the first section of the collection explore the intricate history of beard wearing and shaving, including facial hair fashions in long historical perspective, and the depiction of beards in portraiture. Section Two explores the shifting meanings of the moustache, both as a manly symbol in the nineteenth century, and also as the focus of the material culture of personal grooming. The final section of the collection charts the often-complex relationship between men, women and facial hair. It explores how women used facial hair to appropriate masculine identity, and how women’s own hair was read as a sign of excessive and illicit sexuality.
