Corset or Frock Coat?

Attire in the 19th-century Emancipation Discourse

Abstract

The paper illustrates the relationship between women’s clothing and the processes of modernization in the 19th century Europe. The author focuses on the discourse of emancipation and women who, like the French writer George Sand and a group of her Polish followers, broke away from the traditional image of women and adopted masculine clothing. In Poland, the interpretation of Sand’s lifestyle, characterized by her preference for masculine clothing, posed a challenge to her first biographers, who associated the author of Indiana with Frederic Chopin. A woman in a frock coat with a cigar or pipe in her hand was seen by opponents of emancipation as a troublemaker seeking applause. She discredited not only herself, but also the idea of emancipation. Accusations of seeking attention and cheap sensation were accompanied by charges of a sexual-erotic nature: shamelessness, licentiousness, and moral decay. Eliza Orzeszkowa knew and appreciated Sand’s work. She herself avoided talking about her private life. In Kilka słów o kobietach (1870, A Few Words On Women), the essay which was fundamental to the further development of the emancipation movement in Poland. She criticized the troublemakers, bluestocking and lioness women, who reduced the idea of equality to behaviour that violated social norms. In her emancipation program, she advocated respect for the family and marriage, and moral and ethical standards.