Gendering the Fair: Histories of Women and Gender at World's Fairs

[...] Isabel Moráis traces Portugal's display of an African (Bai anta) woman referred to as the "Little Black Rose" at a 1934 exposition to bolster its imperial claims, and Alison Rowley examines rhe deployment of the "New Soviet Woman" at the 1939 New York World's Fair to demonstrate the gender equity supposedly woven into the very fabric of the equal-opportunity Soviet Union. In other essays Sarah J. Moore analyzes the construction of an imperial American masculinity at the 1915 Panama-Pacific International Exposition; Markwyn examines the physical and cultural spaces allotted to women at the same exposition; Anne ClendLnning traces the ironies of peace activism at the 1 924 British Empire Exhibition glorifying colonial conquest; Boisseau reveals the focus on women's work rather than domestic acbJevemenc ac a series of Chicago expositions during the 1 920s; and Mary Pepchinski studies the architectural features of woman's buildings ac several American and European fairs from 1893 to 1939Due ro cheir relative brevity, all of ehese essays are more suggestive than conclusive, but the authors attempt to speak to each other, and the topics are generally interescing in and of chemselves.