A fresh exploration of American feminist history told through the lens of the Beauty Pageant world.
Connect with her at hilaryleveyfriedman.com and on Twitter (@hleveyfriedman)..
Her first book, Playing to Win , focused on children\'s competitive afterschool activities.
Friedman also serves as the president of the Rhode Island chapter of the National Organization for Women.
About author(s): Hilary Levey Friedman is a sociologist at Brown University, wHere she has taught a popular course titled "Beauty Pageants in American Society." She is a leading researcher in pageantry, merging her mother\'s past experiences as Miss America 1970 with her interests as a glitz- and glamour-loving sometime Pageant judge, and a mentor to Miss America 2018.
Presenting a more complex narrative than what\'s been previously portrayed, Here She Is shows that as American women continue to evolve, so too will Beauty pageants.
Friedman also acknowledges the damaging and unrealistic expectations pageants place on women in society and discusses the controversies, including Miss America\'s ableist and racist history, Trump\'s ownership of the Miss Universe Organization, and the death of child pageant-winner JonBenét Ramsey.
She looks at how pageantry has morphed into culture everywHere from The Bachelor and RuPaul\'s Drag Race to cheer and specialized contests like those for children, Indigenous women, and contestants with disabilities.
Barnum spectacle at the birth of the suffrage movement, through Miss Universe\'s bathing beauties to the talent- and achievement-based competitions of today.
Using her unique perspective as a NOW state president, daughter to Miss America 1970, sometimes Pageant judge, and scholar, Friedman explores how pageants became so deeply embedded in American life from their origins as a P.
T.
She traces the role of pageants in many of the feminist movement\'s signature achievements, including bringing women into the public sphere, helping them become leaders in business and politics, providing increased educational opportunities, and giving them a voice in the age of #MeToo.
Why do they persist? In Here She Is , Hilary Levey Friedman reveals the surprising ways pageants have been an empowering feminist tradition.
America\'s most enduring contest, Miss America, celebrates its 100th anniversary in 2020.
Yet they are thriving.
Many predicted that pageants would disappear by the 21st century.
A fresh exploration of American feminist history told through the lens of the Beauty Pageant world
