Associate Professor of Music Lydia Hamessley presented her paper, "Banjo and Bicycles: 'The New Woman' as Viewed through the Stereograph," at the Society for American Music's National Conference in Chicago on March 19. She will also present the paper at the American Musicological Society New York State/St.Lawrence Chapter Meeting at Syracuse University on April 8.
Hamessley says, "In the 1890s, stereophotography was a popular venue for the dissemination of images of all kinds, some of which provide insights about the changing role of women in American culture. Many stereoviews feature the proto-feminist New Woman, but with a surprising characteristic: this 'new woman' plays the banjo with the same gusto with which she smokes, plays cards, and rides bicycles.
"In this presentation, I examine the way that these views subvert the respectable image of the middle-class women who played the parlor banjo. Through an examination of these 3-D views, I show how the banjo in the hands of the New Woman became a cautionary cultural icon for middle- and upper-class women, subverting the respectable image of the parlor banjo and the bourgeois women who played it. This new perspective enhances what we know about the way musical instruments have been used to reconfigure attitudes toward gender roles in the popular imagination and furthers our understanding of the complex role women have played in the history of the banjo. Moreover, this study demonstrates how gender and sexuality can affect the reception of music, and musical instruments, through powerful iconographic images."
The presentation is illustrated with several examples of stereoviews from Hamessley's personal collection.
