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Reviews
| Femininity in Flight: A History of Flight Attendants, by Kathleen M. Barry. Durham and London: Duke University Press, 2007. 328 pages. $22.95, paper.
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| Femininity in Flight documents the flight attendants' struggle for professional recognition in the United States from the 1930s to the present. This period saw the development of commercial airlines, with their ever larger, faster planes, into the competitive, volatile businesses they are today. The book focuses on flight attendants' "glamorization," work conditions, and political and union activism within the context of a changing society. Particularly influential were social changes such as those prompted by the Civil Rights movement, the second wave of the Women's Movement, and the popular culture that reflected these years of change. In fact, this book describes how flight attendants' labor history cannot be separated from the evolving cultural climate and gender expectations of each period. As Barry puts it, hers is, in part, an analysis of the "rewards and costs of representing femininity for a living" (p. 209). |
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There are seven chapters and an epilogue, roughly organized by decades, and an extensive bibliography and endnotes, the end materials comprising a full third of the volume. Well-selected black and white photographs illustrate the text. Successive chapters cover 1930s nurse/stewardesses, postwar "glamour girl" attendants, jet age airline work conditions, deregulation, women's rights and Title VII, and ends with the damage done to the industry after September 11, 2001. Leaders of stewardesses used strategic liaisons, federal legislation, and court challenges to enable flight attendants to win professional advancement, autonomy, and freedom from age, sex, and race discrimination in the workplace. While their leaders maneuvered organizationally, flight attendants negotiated the divide between mainstream definitions of gender appeal and their desire for appropriate respect and compensation for their important professional contributions both to air safety and an airline's competitive edge. Students of Femininity in Flight will learn that Ada Brown, Edith Lauterbach, Sonia Pressman Fuentes, and many other flight attendant advocates can claim credit for improving women's employment conditions, both in their individual industry and collectively as a part of the larger history of women's activism. It is good to have such work as Kathleen Barry's to enrich our knowledge of the often-overlooked influence of a strong pink-collar industry. |
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Femininity in Flight provides useful material for labor history, union history, social movement theory and history, or gender role analysis in upper-level high school or lower-division college courses. It would be a helpful text for newcomers to these disciplines, given its interesting and little-known but still accessible subject. Students will relate to the restrictions imposed on flight attendants regarding appearance, race, weight, and demeanor, if less readily to the age and mandatory early retirement, and marital and parental status requirements. The book thus has rich potential for stimulating student discussion or further research, particularly regarding gender role expectations. |
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| Grand Valley State University, Allendale, MI |
Gayle A. Davis |
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