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Articles

Sanna Sarromaa:

A good girl: Representation of young womanhood in Det Nye magazine in 1958

This article explores the representation of young women on their way into adult life, using a series of articles entitled My fate published in the Norwegian young women’s magazine Det Nye in 1958. Through these stories, which were presented as authentic stories written by readers, Det Nye represented and reflected young womanhood. The theoretical and methodological point of departure for this study is Chartier’s (1988) concept of representation. In this, representations do not merely reflect their cultural and historical context; they also actively construct the context within which young women become adults. The representation of young women in the My fate stories mainly consisted of four elements: having a good reputation, being a good housewife, having a proper outlook and being innocent. Control of young women’s sexuality was a central aspect of Norwegian society in the 1950s and sexuality was clearly present in all the My fate stories, as well as being an explicit part of all four elements of the representation.

Camilla Hambro:

Femininity, criticism and originality. Musicking at the Copenhagen 1895 Women’s Exhibition from past to present

In reviews of this event, projections of the composers’ and artists’ femininity and appearance are both highlighted and intertwined. Presenting everything from apparently fair and balanced descriptions to reviews that openly state common negative attitudes towards women’s abilities, critics – mainly male composers, conductors and musicians – tried to make it appear as if women posed no real threat or challenge to the male establishment. What male critics made sound highly conventional, was in fact propaganda based on their own gender-loaded esthetics. Still, most of them account for enthusiastic crowds of women applauding the participant’s executive skills and compositions. It seems that if gifted women chose to develop in other directions than this esthetic, they didn’t get renown, and if they followed in men’s footsteps, they were accused of not being original. Therefore the originality of the represented women couldn’t be accepted or receive public renown.

Rannveig Dahle:

Social work – a story of gender, class and profession

The social construction of professions and their work is a broad interdisciplinary field of research. The contributions of women in creating professions, however, have been poorly recorded, if not invisible. This article explores how the profession of social work as women’s work originated in Norway. Well educated, upper class women started a school in 1920 with the modest ambition to educate lower class women; an internationally inspired and supported idea. The new occupation constituted a ‘natural’ expansion and transformation of women’s unpaid work in many social organizations, based on humanistic ideas. Femininity was embedded in the construction of the curriculum and in the professional role of the performers. A different historical account has the constitution of the welfare state in the postwar period as its point of departure. Executive officers were needed in public administrative bodies to provide custodial services. This gives rise to a somewhat different trajectory, but even more important, it brings to the fore questions of both gender and class in the construction of educations and professions.