Research Catalog

Buildings for bluestockings : the architecture and social history of women's colleges in late Victorian England

Title: Buildings for bluestockings : the architecture and social history of women's colleges in late Victorian England / by Margaret Birney Vickery.
Author: Vickery, Margaret Birney, 1963-
Publication: Newark, DE : University of Delaware Press, c1999.

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Status	Format	Access	Call Number	Item Location
Request for On-site Use Request Scan How do I pick up this item and when will it be ready?	Text	Use in library	NA6605.G7 V53 1999	Off-site

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Details

Description

xiii, 200 p. : ill.; 27 cm.

Summary

"Vickery's book, which includes floor plans and eight pages in color, examines the intimate relationship between a Victorian institution intended solely for women and the architectural theories of the period. In doing so, she sheds light on the role of the founders, such as Emily Davies at Girton, their goals for their colleges and the pressure which a reluctant and skeptical society placed upon them. Reformers in women's education were sometimes radical feminists, but more often the women and men who were involved were modest in their approach, arguing for little change in the status of women and veiling their ambitions for women's progress under a restrained and traditional rhetoric.
This conservative approach conditioned the built environment of the colleges and is an important aspect of nineteenth-century British feminism." "Central to this book is the connection between the attitudes of Victorian society towards the higher education of women and the built environment. Feminist architectural historians and anthropologists are just beginning to explore these connections, and Vickery's book, with its focus on a gender-specific building type, offers insight into the ways in which the values of a society are encoded into the environment in which we live and work. It is therefore of interest not only to architectural historians, but to feminists, social historians, and anyone interested in the history of the collegiate environment."--Jacket.

Subject

Genre/Form

History.

Bibliography (note)

Includes bibliographical references (p. 179-192) and index.

Contents

The "little band of pioneers" : Girton Colege -- On different terms : Newnham College -- Following the precedent : Lady Margaret Hall, Somerville, and Westfield Colleges -- A palatial residence : Royal Holloway College -- Society's reaction to the women's colleges : their architectural influence.

ISBN

0874136970 (alk. paper)

LCCN

99047386

OCLC

42475583
ocm42475583
SCSB-1123357

Owning Institutions

Princeton University Library