Women, Performance, & Role Reversal

During the early 19th century women were respected only if they maintained their domesticated roles which men imposed upon them. At this point in time women were for the most part expected to remain traditional housewives who cared for the children, kept house, did not question the authority of the husband (or any man for that matter), and women were considered low-class if they procured a job to support themselves or members of their family. In the 18th century, the “proper” woman would read and write literature and poetry because those pastimes did not interfere with their fragile selves and further reestablished their nurturing role.

Given the role and expectations of women in the 19th century, it is not surprising then that women who assumed the career of an actress were proscribed by law and excommunicated by the church. The reason for this is that women were expected to maintain their innocence and virtue. When a woman thrust herself upon stage she was seen as exposing herself for an audience and therefore being an actress was considered similar to that of a prostitute; furthermore a dishonorable profession for a female but an accepted and respected occupation for a male.

However, early professional actress-readers were considered a more palatable occupation for women because they did not wear costumes which revealed alternate personas and they would sit round a table and read to the audience much like a woman would do for her children.

I am very interested in the way society has changed over the last three centuries. We have seen a shift from the expectations that women protect their frail image and innocence to contemporary expectations that women bare all on the big screen or else they will be regarded in a negative light. It seems to me that in the past women were looked down upon if they objectified their bodies but now women actresses are expected to objectify their bodies simply for the pleasure and entertainment of others.

Blog # 4 Anna Cora Mowatt and the performance of mesmerism

A mid-nineteenth century public reader, actress, playwright, and author, Anna Cora Mowatt, has been deemed the first “lady elocutionist” because she established a career as a public reader without having previously been an actress. Anna Cora Mowatt ended her public career as a public reader due to a deliberating respiratory disease. In her search for comfort and cure, Anna began a treatment regimen called “mesmerism.” Mowatt provided a detailed description of her experience with mesmerism in her autobiography. Within Anna’s description of her experience of mesmerism, she claims to have unwittingly portrayed an alternate persona which called herself “the Gypsy.” According to Taylor (2009) who authored The Lady Actress, Anna’s Gypsy character served as a way in which she could break the Victorian social constraints and strict rules that smothered women. When Anna would undergo mesmerism, she could break away from the repressive behavioral norms imposed upon upper-class American women without gaining the negative social stigma that would normally be placed upon a person who behaved they way she did. Of course, only a few of Anna’s closest friends were privileged enough to observe her private performance in which “The Gypsy” wrote poems, told fantastic stories, and who regularly engaged in debates concerning philosophy and religion, which would have been extremely unacceptable for a woman in the Victorian era.

Mesmerism in the 1900’s would be a similar phenomena to modern day hypnosis. Hypnosis has been regarded as a social phenomenon in which the participant undergoes an altered state of consciousness, similar to sleep. Hypnosis often involves an audience and performers wherein the hypnotist is seemingly endowed with the ability to alter individual levels of consciousness. The participant then performs for the audience and breaks social norms which they reportedly do not remember. When a person underwent a mesmerized state they reportedly transcended into an altered consciousness to a state of heightened spirituality. Anna performed for a small private audience of close friends similar to the more public performances of modern day hypnotism in both cases the participant breaks social norms.