Pursuing play : women's leisure in small-town Ontario, 1870-1914 / Rebecca Beausaert.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Beausaert, Rebecca, author.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Women--Recreation--Ontario--History--19th century.

Women.

Women--Recreation--Ontario--History--20th century.

Women--Ontario--Social life and customs--19th century.

Women--Ontario--Social life and customs--20th century.

Leisure--Ontario--History--19th century.

Leisure.

Leisure--Ontario--History--20th century.

City and town life--Ontario--History--19th century.

City and town life.

City and town life--Ontario--History--20th century.

Physical Description:

ix, 401 pages : illustrations ; 23 cm

Place of Publication:

Winnipeg, Manitoba : University of Manitoba Press, 2024.

Summary:

"Life in the Canadian countryside at the turn of the twentieth century is often generalized as insular, backwards, and defined by drudgery. These assumptions are redressed in Rebecca Beausaert's Pursuing Play, which highlights the complexity of small-town culture through a lively examination of women's efforts to negotiate space for themselves and their leisure pursuits. Amply illustrated, Pursuing Play draws on diaries, letters, newspapers, and census records to investigate women's recreational activities in three southern Ontario towns--Dresden, Tillsonburg, and Elora--between 1870-1914. Though women's recreational choices were restricted by pervasive ideas about propriety, Beausaert reveals how they increasingly spearheaded both formal and informal clubs, events, and social gatherings, and integrated them into their daily lives. In telling the story of what small-town women did for fun while navigating social hierarchies, nurturing ties of kinship and friendship, and advancing community development, Pursuing Play adds a new dimension to Canadian histories of gender, leisure, and popular culture. Encompassing public and private pastimes, the growth of sports, the phenomenon of "armchair travelling," and how easily recreation can slip from reputable to disreputable, this rich study uncovers how gender, class, and ethnicity shaped the nature and scope of women's leisure in small-town Ontario and beyond."-- Provided by publisher.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Other Format:

Online version: Beausaert, Rebecca. Pursuing play.

ISBN:

1772840777

9781772840773

9781772840780

1772840785

OCLC:

1427238592