Open AccessThe Perfect American Woman
Author(s) -
Marina Ferguson
Publication year - 2020
Publication title -
constellations
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
ISSN - 2562-0509
DOI - 10.29173/cons29420
Subject(s) - epitome , femininity , beauty , ideal (ethics) , competition (biology) , extension (predicate logic) , aesthetics , art , sociology , gender studies , law , literature , political science , computer science , ecology , biology , programming language
The Miss America Pageant has served as a platform for beautiful women for a century. Throughout its long tenure, the Pageant has picked a woman each year to serve as the epitome of beauty and femininity. This paper will discuss the Pageant’s trends in the 1950s and 1960s. The Pageant controls the contestants’ talents, outfits, and time as they are in the competition. As such, they have almost complete control over who enters the competition and, by extension, who wins. Through their screening process and judging criteria, the Pageant is able to choose a woman each year that embodies their version of the ideal American Woman.