Call Number:

Print Collection 83

Repository:

University of Pennsylvania: Kislak Center for Special Collections, Rare Books and Manuscripts

Extent:

7.33 linear feet (4 record center boxes; 10 14x18 boxes)

Language Note:

The bulk of the material is in English with a small amount in French.

Preferred Citation:

Kathy Peiss collection of research material on beauty culture, feminism, and women in the workforce, 1860-2003, Print Collection 83, Kislak Center for Special Collections, Rare Books and Manuscripts, University of Pennsylvania

Date:

1860-2003 (inclusive)

Creator:

Peiss, Kathy Lee

Form:

Advertisements, Periodicals, and Printed ephemera

Abstract:

Kathy Peiss (1953-) was a history professor at the University of Pennsylvania who has authored books on 2nd wave feminism, beauty culture, and women in the workplace. This collection contains magazines, pamphlets, booklets, bibliographies, newsletters, brochures, catalogs, trade cards, advertisements, sheet music and ephemera related to Peiss' research.

Kathy Peiss (1953- ) is the Roy F. and Jeannette P. Nichols Professor Emerita of American History at the University of Pennsylvania. She received a B.A. from Carleton College in 1975 and Ph.D. from Brown University in 1982, both in American Studies. She taught in the Labor Studies Program, Livingston College, Rutgers University (1980-81); the American Studies Department, University of Maryland Baltimore County (1981-1986); History and Women's Studies, University of Massachusetts Amherst (1986-2001); and the History Department, University of Pennsylvania (2001-2022). At Penn, she was affiliated with the Gender, Sexuality and Women's Studies Program, the History and Sociology of Science graduate group, and Cinema Studies.

Peiss's earliest work was in the new fields of U.S. women's history and the history of sexuality. She practiced "history from the bottom up," with a particular interest in the way commerce and culture shaped the everyday lives and popular beliefs of Americans across time. Her research explored the history of working women; working-class and interracial sexuality; leisure, style, and popular culture; and the beauty industry in the U.S. and abroad. She is the author of Cheap Amusements: Working Women and Leisure in Turn-of-the-Century New York (1986); Hope in a Jar: The Making of America's Beauty Culture (1998); and Zoot Suit: The Enigmatic Career of an Extreme Style (2011). Other publications include Passion and Power: Sexuality in History, co-edited with Christina Simmons (1989); Men and Women: A History of Gender, Costume, and Power, co-authored with Barbara Clark Smith in conjunction with a Smithsonian Institution exhibit (1989); Love Across the Color Line: The Letters of Alice Hanley to Channing Lewis, co-edited with Helen Horowitz (1996); and Major Problems in the History of American Sexuality (2001). She has served as a consultant to museums, archives, and public history projects, and appeared in the documentary films New York, Miss America, and The Powder and the Glory.

This collection includes materials on her cosmetics and beauty culture research. Peiss was active in the development of women's studies in the 1980s and 1990s and taught courses on historical and contemporary feminist topics, reflected in the collection materials on 2nd wave feminism.

At Penn, Peiss taught courses on modern American cultural history and the history of women, gender, and sexuality. She developed a research interest in print culture and cultural policy during World War II, and wrote Information Hunters: When Librarians, Soldiers, and Spies Banded Together in World War II Europe (2020).

Sources: Penn Arts and Sciences, Department of History

Wikipedia

This collection primarily contains published material and is arranged in 5 series. Series I-III contains material arranged by topic and series IV-V is arranged by format, magazines and books. It includes magazines, pamphlets, booklets, bibliographies, newsletters, brochures, trade cards, advertisements, music, books and ephemera related to Peiss' research on cosmetics and beauty culture, working women and 2nd wave feminism. Peiss was active in the development of women's studies in the 1980's and 1990s and taught courses on historical and contemporary feminist topics. Some of the labor history material relates to the U.S. Women's History, 1865 to present, HIST 346, course she taught at Penn.