This dissertation examines the interplay between gender ideology, women's actions, and automotive technology in the United States from the beginning of the automotive era through the 1920's. Looking at cultural ideology as a strong yet fragmented and malleable historical force, I have analyzed the effect of popular conceptions of masculinity and femininity on the design, marketing, and use of automobiles. At the same time, I have attempted to show how motorcars, often employed as vehicles of social ideals, promoted some reinterpretation of men's and women's proper roles and places. The auto indeed served as a focus for discourse about the contingent relation between social and political emancipation. While some observers expected the automobile to liberate women from domesticity and subordination, others insisted on the congruence between automobility and domestic life. Though some women would use cars as tools of social or political nonconformity, the auto ultimately transformed and extended women's spatial and temporal province, while preserving the home as the ideal hub of women's activities. Still, the car culture revision of gender ideology had profound consequences for the way the private family car would emerge as a primary transportation mode, facilitating new manners and morals, new commercial and political possibilities, and a revolution in urban development.

The purpose of this study has been to analyze the language of the popular lyrics of the seventies to determine if sexism is used to communicate in various musical genres. Three manifestations of sexist language developed by the Sexism in Textbooks Committee of Women at Scott, Foresman have been used in this study. The lyrics analyzed include 100 lyrics selected from songwriter-singers noted as articulate musical artists of the seventies, 90 songs reaching the "Top Ten" charts (1970-1978), and the top 100 songs of 1978. Chapter I defines sexism and explains three manifestations of sexist language. Chapter II includes examples from seven talented lyricists which illustrate sexism. Chapter III presents an evaluation of sexism in the "Top Ten" lyrics (1970-1978). Chapter IV reveals changes in stereotypic language appearing in the 1978 top 100 lyrics. Chapter V offers summaries and reasons for the findings.

Edward William Bok, the Ladies' Home Journal's editor from 1889 to 1919, remained a confirmed proponent of Victorian womanhood. Yet, dramatic changes in American society made his perceptions increasingly anachronistic and, recognizing this, he reluctantly permitted his magazine's portrayal of woman to change with the times. The first part of the dissertation examines Edward Bok's Victorian attitudes toward woman's role in society. According to him, woman's intellectual, emotional, and physical inferiority and her moral and intuitional superiority harmonize perfectly to define a special sphere for her--the home—where she fulfills her roles as wife, mother, and homemaker. Outside the home, Bok permitted only a narrow range of activity for woman—church and club activities and even employment outside the home if finances required it. The second part of the dissertation illustrates how the Journal's image of woman changed during Bok's tenure, especially during the second decade of the twentieth century. At the outset, all departments of the Journal reinforced the editor's concept of woman, but by the time Edward Bok retired, in 1919. the magazine's image of woman contrasted sharply with Bo'k's personal views.

Reality television programming chronicling the daily workings of multiple birth families within American culture has gained notoriety in recent years. Such programs, especially Discovery Health and TLC's 17, 18 Kids and Counting and TLC's Jon and Kate Plus Ei8ht, film, edit and broadcast the "everyday" life of these families. This research study focuses attention on hegemonic ideologies surrounding family values, motherhood, gender roles and religious faith, illuminated through textual and audience analysis. Working from an interdisciplinary approach combining feminist media and cultural studies, this study finds that hegemonic notions of family values, gender representations, religious faith and conceptions of motherhood are evident to varying degrees in the television texts and accepted by fans who negotiate their meanings online. / by Emily M. CIttadino. / Thesis (M.A.)--Florida Atlantic University, 2010. / Includes bibliography. / Electronic reproduction. Boca Raton, Fla., 2010. Mode of access: World Wide Web.