Culture War Commonalities: Personal Appearance in Commonwealth England
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Authors
Sedge, Andrew
Date
Type
thesis
Language
eng
Keyword
Early Modern England , Personal Appearance
Alternative Title
Abstract
The swift social, political, and religious changes that encompassed England’s Civil Wars, and later the Puritan-dominated Commonwealth, during the seventeenth-century led to a surge of moralist literature, published during a period with little to no press censorship. Against a backdrop of social upheaval and failing moral reformation, commentators increasingly perceived personal appearance as a source of moral failing throughout England. While the campaign of moral reformation at the time can most strongly be attributed to Puritan influences, on the interconnected questions of hair, dress, and cosmetics, political and religious fault-lines appear relatively few. While writers waged a propaganda war against one another through the press, when it came to the topic of appearance, their proscriptions appear have been largely similar. Though significant differences did still appear on a handful of key issues, it becomes apparent that few writers, regardless of how permissive or restrictive their ideologies may otherwise have been, were able to stomach the perceived, rising tide of subversive practices in self-presentation. Though these subversive practices could be leveraged as political insults in attempts to associate opposition with illicit fashion, this was not exclusive to any one side, nor did these insults necessarily reflect their intended target’s actual outlook. Fashion was a site of significant cultural tension and appeared as one battleground in the ongoing culture war of the time, but it was one in which moralists, pamphleteers, and other writers shared a familiar fear: that the age they were living in had become licentious, permissive, and morally backwards.
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ProQuest PhD and Master's Theses International Dissemination Agreement
Intellectual Property Guidelines at Queen's University
Copying and Preserving Your Thesis
This publication is made available by the authority of the copyright owner solely for the purpose of private study and research and may not be copied or reproduced except as permitted by the copyright laws without written authority from the copyright owner.