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Whiskerology
The Culture of Hair in Nineteenth-Century America
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Sarah Gold McBride
Language:
English
Published/Copyright:
2025
About this book
Whiskerology traces how hair became a significant marker of identity and belonging in nineteenth-century America. Viewed during the colonial period as disposable, to be donned or removed like clothing, hair later became an external sign of internal truths about the self—especially one’s gender, race, and nationality.
Reviews
Whiskerology is a delightful, meticulously researched deep dive into the history of hair in nineteenth-century America. Exploring the intersection of body and identity in US history, Sarah Gold McBride untangles and redefines our understanding of our tresses, locks, and curls. Through vivid storytelling, she unveils how hair has long shaped and reflected cultural anxieties about race, ethnicity, and gender. The result is a fascinating account of how something as intimate and ubiquitous as hair became a public marker of power and belonging.
-- Zahra Hankir, author of Eyeliner: A Cultural History
-- Zahra Hankir, author of Eyeliner: A Cultural History
Gold McBride’s fascinating study invites us to take human hair seriously. Nineteenth-century Americans, we learn, saw hair as a body part that expressed truths about one's identity and character. Some even saw racial ancestry in the structure of each individual hair. I will never look at hair the same way again!
-- Kathleen M. Brown, author of Foul Bodies: Cleanliness in Early America
-- Kathleen M. Brown, author of Foul Bodies: Cleanliness in Early America
An illuminating history of an unruly 'appendage.' Once considered mere dead matter, hair was reconceptualized in the nineteenth century—when its hue and texture, volume and silhouette came to signal supposedly unalterable aspects of identity. Gold McBride deftly showcases the ways in which hair has been used to define, defend, and contest the boundaries of race and gender.
-- Hannah Carlson, author of Pockets: An Intimate History of How We Keep Things Close
-- Hannah Carlson, author of Pockets: An Intimate History of How We Keep Things Close
In this innovative and surprising history, Gold McBride reveals wigs, moustaches, and hair dye to be about much more than fashion. Many nineteenth-century Americans fixated on hair as evidence of an individual's place in supposedly natural hierarchies, even as they feared that people were disguising themselves through widespread 'hair fraud.' Whiskerology shows that you can’t understand the history of gender, race, or class without thinking about hair.
-- Corinne Field, author of The Struggle for Equal Adulthood: Gender, Race, Age, and the Fight for Citizenship in Antebellum America
-- Corinne Field, author of The Struggle for Equal Adulthood: Gender, Race, Age, and the Fight for Citizenship in Antebellum America
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Publishing information
Pages and Images/Illustrations in book
eBook published on:
June 3, 2025
eBook ISBN:
9780674300651
Pages and Images/Illustrations in book
Main content:
288
