Age Of Experimentation - The Twenties

13 Pages 3194 Words

isolationist role that the U.S. chose to represent. The United States desired to not be a major contributor to the rest of the world.
The nineteen-twenties’ social changes were very easy to see, especially on women. The “new woman” was characterized by her yearning for freedom and equality among men and for her desire for attention. To achieve attention, the “new woman” would now wear very appalling short skirts, makeup, and short hair on her head. “Beauty shops sprang up on every block because of the growing popularity of makeup (OY V).” Most of the older generation was insulted by her and they would take no part in trying to become the “new woman.” “She has read in the paper the alarming news that skirts may become even shorter, and that ‘not since the Bourbons has the woman of fashion been visible so far above the ankle (Only Yesterday Chapter I Page 2).” Experimenting with the “new woman” was an experiment that the older generation was not expecting and did not want, however, it is an experiment that has still held until the present day. The woman of the present day currently wears very short skirts, makeup, and a variety of different hairstyles. However, in the twenties, variations of hairstyles were seen as being unconventional; short-haired woman were viewed by others as being a radical. “…short-haired women, like long-haired men, are associated with radicalism, if not with free love (OY I3).” Also, it is currently not unusual for a woman to drink and/or smoke in a bar, pub, or wherever it may be. However, the drinking and smoking woman was one of the most controversial aspects of the nineteen-twenties’ social scene. Before the “roaring twenties,” women took no part in what was considered to be a truly male activity. “Of course there is not a woman within eyeshot [of the bar]; drinking by women is unusual in 1919, and drinking at a bar is an exclusively masculine prerogative (...