Beauty, Virtue, Power, and Success in Venezuela 18502015
By (author) Elizabeth Gackstetter Nichols
Not available to order
Publication date:
17 August 2016Length of book:
232 pagesPublisher
Lexington BooksISBN-13: 9781498523653
Beauty, Virtue, Power, and Success in Venezuela 1850–2015 examines the societal duty of Venezuelan women to display and perform their inner virtue and worth through careful management of their outer physical appearance in four historical moments: 1850–1890, 1910–1950, 1960–1990, and 2000–2015. Since the early 1800’s, Venezuelan women—and more specifically, their bodies—have served as physical symbols of homeland, honor, and morality. Nichols contextualizes her study socially and historically by examining the impact of cultural phenomena like nineteenth-century eugenics, scientific motherhood, popular and elite literature, film, beauty pageants, and plastic surgery. This book tells the story of how Venezuelan women have learned to exercise and perform to societal expectations of beauty. Recommended for scholars of Latin American studies, women’s studies, gender studies, sociology, and history.
Beauty, Virtue, Power, and Success in Venezuela 1850–2015 closely follows the omnipresent world of beauty in Venezuela from canonical fiction to contemporary Miss Venezuela pageant queens. Nichols' research is extensive and invites readers to explore the grip of beauty and power in Venezuela. This book is needed in the field of Venezuelan literary, film, and cultural studies and will continue to invite other readings of both the body and the body of work that Nichols carefully curated in this book.