Facing the Mirror : Older Women and Beauty Shop Culture

ISBN-13: 9780415915236 / Angielski / Twarda / 1997 / 230 str.

Frida Kerner Furman

Opis

This ethnographic study of a neighbourhood beauty salon investigates how customers constitute a lively, affirming community of peers during their weekly visits. The book seeks to give voice to older women, who, in a sexist and ageist society, are frequently devalued and rendered invisible. Within the text, these older, mostly Jewish, women articulate their experiences of bodily self-preservation, feminity, ageing and caring pertaining to their lives within and outside Julie's International Salon.

Recenzje

"An accessibly written ethnography, the women in Furman's beauty shop reveal a great deal about women's lives and positions in contemporary culture." -- Feminist Bookstore News
"I quickly absorbed Furman's words-the results of nearly five years of research"...it is a book long overdue." -- Heritage Sunday
"Facing the Mirror combines studies of aging, Judaism, and beauty into an excellent ethnographic study of a beauty salon in Chicago." -- Gender & Society
"The book calls much needed attention to an area of women's experience that has been seen as socially insignificant." -- C. Adamsky Choice
"A respectful and even tender treatment of a large and largely neglected population in our culture: elderly, middle income, middle American women...[Furman's] account is beautifully written, warm." -- Sally B. Purvis
"What Furman gives us in Facing the Mirror is hard to come by: a mostly jargon-free chronicle of an oft-ignored population." -- In These Times
"Facing the Mirror is a thoughtful feminist analysis." -- Booklist

Spis treści

Introduction; Chapter Chapter One; Women’s Territory; Community and the Ethic of Care at Julie’s International Salon; Chapter Two; The Witch in the Mirror; Feminine Beauty and Its Imperatives; Chapter Three; “What’s My Alternative?”; Aging and Its Challenges; Chapter Four; “The Cheese Stands Alone”; Women in Relation to Work, Caring, and the Family; Chapter Five; Energetic Anger; An Invitation to Resistance;

O autorze

Frida Kerner Furman is Associate Professor of Religious Studies at DePaul University and is author of Beyond Yiddishkeit: The Struggle for Jewish Identity in a Reform Synagogue.