Free Republic
Browse · Search
General/Chat
Topics · Post Article

Skip to comments.

Who decided women should shave their legs?
The Staight Dope ^ | 1/05 | cecil adams

Posted on 03/02/2005 12:56:15 PM PST by pissant

Dear Cecil:

Why do women shave their legs and underarms? When did this custom begin? If it's for hygienic reasons, why don't men to it too? Is it all a big conspiracy by the razor companies? I've heard some European women don't shave. Please clarify this mystery. --A., Chicago

Dear A.:

I knew if I procrastinated long enough on this often-asked question somebody would eventually do the legwork for me. Sure enough, Pete Cook of Chicago has sent me a 1982 article from the Journal of American Culture by Christine Hope bearing the grand title "Caucasian Female Body Hair and American Culture."

The gist of the article is that U.S. women were browbeaten into shaving underarm hair by a sustained marketing assault that began in 1915. (Leg hair came later.)

The aim of what Hope calls the Great Underarm Campaign was to inform American womanhood of a problem that till then it didn't know it had, namely unsightly underarm hair.

To be sure, women had been concerned about the appearance of their hair since time immemorial, but (sensibly) only the stuff you could see. Prior to World War I this meant scalp and, for an unlucky few, facial hair.

Around 1915, however, sleeveless dresses became popular, opening up a whole new field of female vulnerability for marketers to exploit.

According to Hope, the underarm campaign began in May, 1915, in Harper's Bazaar, a magazine aimed at the upper crust. The first ad "featured a waist-up photograph of a young woman who appears to be dressed in a slip with a toga-like outfit covering one shoulder. Her arms are arched over her head revealing perfectly clear armpits. The first part of the ad read `Summer Dress and Modern Dancing combine to make necessary the removal of objectionable hair.'"

Within three months, Cook tells us, the once-shocking term "underarm" was being used. A few ads mentioned hygiene as a motive for getting rid of hair but most appealed strictly to the ancient yearning to be hip. "The Woman of Fashion says the underarm must be as smooth as the face," read a typical pitch.

The budding obsession with underarm hair drifted down to the proles fairly slowly, roughly matching the widening popularity of sheer and sleeveless dresses. Antiarm hair ads began appearing in middlebrow McCall's in 1917. Women's razors and depilatories didn't show up in the Sears Roebuck catalog until 1922, the same year the company began offering dresses with sheer sleeves.

By then the underarm battle was largely won. Advertisers no longer felt compelled to explain the need for their products but could concentrate simply on distinguishing themselves from their competitors.

The anti-leg hair campaign was more fitful. The volume of leg ads never reached the proportions of the underarm campaign. Women were apparently more ambivalent about calling attention to the lower half of their anatomy, perhaps out of fear that doing so would give the male of the species ideas in a way that naked underarms did not.

Besides, there wasn't much practical need for shaved legs. After rising in the 1920s hemlines dropped in the 30s and many women were content to leave their leg hair alone.

Still, some advertisers as well as an increasing number of fashion and beauty writers harped on the idea that female leg hair was a curse.

Though Hope doesn't say so, what may have put the issue over the top was the famous WWII pinup of Betty Grable displaying her awesome gams. Showing off one's legs became a patriotic act. That plus shorter skirts and sheer stockings, which looked dorky with leg hair beneath, made the anti-hair pitch an easy sell.

Some argue that there's more to this than short skirts and sleeveless dresses. Cecil's colleague Marg Meikle (Dear Answer Lady, 1992) notes that Greek statues of women in antiquity had no pubic hair, suggesting that hairlessness was some sort of ideal of feminine beauty embedded in Western culture.

If so, a lot of Western culture never got the message. Greek women today (and Mediterranean women generally) do not shave their hair. The practice has been confined largely to English-speaking women of North America and Great Britain, although one hears that it's slowly spreading elsewhere.

So what's the deal with Anglo-Saxons? Some lingering vestige of Victorian prudery? Good question, but what with world unrest, the economic crisis, and the little researchers having missed their naps, not high on Cecil's priority list. Here's hoping some all-but-thesis Ph.D. candidate will pick up the trail.

--CECIL ADAMS


TOPICS: Chit/Chat
KEYWORDS: legs
Navigation: use the links below to view more comments.
first previous 1-20 ... 141-160161-180181-200201-203 next last
To: Trinity_Tx

That 1915 date is not right.


181 posted on 03/02/2005 6:21:11 PM PST by nopardons
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 167 | View Replies]

To: Trinity_Tx

And a match isn't going to work...only wood stoves do the trick;just HOW it's done,though,I am in the dark about. :-)


182 posted on 03/02/2005 6:23:24 PM PST by nopardons
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 174 | View Replies]

To: pissant
That wasn't the kind of research I had in mind. LOL

I meant about depilatories anyway and that kind of thing.

In Ovid's "ART OF LOVE" he has a whole section on makeup and perfume and hair for women and tells men to brush their teeth and all kinds of other such things. There are other ancient texts about hygiene and cosmetics.

Like bathing,the early Christians eschewed everything they saw as being pagan,which is probably why women stopped using depilatories,even though they did shave their hairlines,in the Middle Ages,so that they would appear to have very high foreheads.

183 posted on 03/02/2005 6:30:39 PM PST by nopardons
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 177 | View Replies]

To: F16Fighter
I guess it's a matter of...ahem...personal taste.

Indeed...

184 posted on 03/02/2005 6:42:02 PM PST by mhking (Do not mess with dragons, for thou art crunchy & good with ketchup...)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 145 | View Replies]

To: nopardons

That's fascinating. But it still sounds scary as chit! LOL


185 posted on 03/02/2005 7:06:25 PM PST by exnavychick
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 179 | View Replies]

To: nopardons
Like bathing, the early Christians eschewed everything they saw as being pagan...

So then the French are the most Christian people on Earth. Who knew? ;)

186 posted on 03/02/2005 7:15:41 PM PST by Mr. Jeeves
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 183 | View Replies]

To: pissant

Or their cousin Helen Thomas


187 posted on 03/02/2005 7:26:09 PM PST by clamper1797 (This Vietnam Vet ain't Fonda Kerry)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 173 | View Replies]

To: clamper1797

or Molly Ivans, or KOKO the Gorilla


188 posted on 03/02/2005 7:28:23 PM PST by pissant
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 187 | View Replies]

To: Jaded
"You'd be surprised (or not) at how many young females 16-25 don't shave their legs unless they absolutely have too."

Naah, I guess I wouldn't.

I guess it all depends on the probability of "showtime."

189 posted on 03/02/2005 7:30:53 PM PST by F16Fighter
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 170 | View Replies]

To: exnavychick

I guess if you knew what you were doing,it wasn't "scary" at all and it worked! I'm just sorry that that knowledge got lost and it wasn't done to me! :-)


190 posted on 03/02/2005 7:50:09 PM PST by nopardons
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 185 | View Replies]

To: Mr. Jeeves

LOL


191 posted on 03/02/2005 7:50:33 PM PST by nopardons
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 186 | View Replies]

To: pissant

I thought Koko was Helen Thomas' better looking sister


192 posted on 03/02/2005 8:00:07 PM PST by clamper1797 (This Vietnam Vet ain't Fonda Kerry)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 188 | View Replies]

To: mhking


I don't shave - I wax my legs. It last for a long time, and leave the skin smooth and nice.


193 posted on 03/02/2005 8:45:20 PM PST by Victoria Delsoul
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 124 | View Replies]

To: mhking

bttt


194 posted on 03/02/2005 11:36:11 PM PST by lainde ( ...We are NOT European, we are American, and we have different principles!")
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 124 | View Replies]

To: Victoria Delsoul


Do you do your own and does it hurt? Lifelong shaver here and sick of it I'd love an alternative.


195 posted on 03/03/2005 4:07:44 AM PST by SouthernFreebird
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 193 | View Replies]

To: Tijeras_Slim

Actually, in many Middle Eastern cultures body hair ANYWHERE on a woman is considered unnattractive. The pre-pubescent look is preferred.


196 posted on 03/03/2005 9:46:03 AM PST by two134711
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 2 | View Replies]

To: exnavychick

My grandmother never shaved her legs either and also had smooth legs. Not sure if she wore silk stockings or not, I should ask my mom.

I love the results of shaving, too. I personally do not like having hairy armpits or legs, even in the winter when no one but my husband can see them....and maybe it does make me feel more feminine.


197 posted on 03/03/2005 11:54:33 AM PST by KEmom (Please send viable Republican candidates to Massachusetts!!)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 37 | View Replies]

To: pissant

S'alright. I haven't posted any info about myself on my profile page. I probably would have assumed the same in your shoes.


198 posted on 03/03/2005 2:22:20 PM PST by PreviouslyA-Lurker (Some Americans don't understand that being an American is more than living in America.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 52 | View Replies]

To: SouthernFreebird
Do you do your own and does it hurt?

Yes, I do. It hurts a little at first, but the result outweighs any feeling of discomfort.

I use wax-strips. The trick is pulling the strip close to the skin as fast as you can. I found you some info. You don't need to get the same product. There are many brands of wax-strips to choose from. LINK

Good luck.

199 posted on 03/03/2005 5:37:43 PM PST by Victoria Delsoul
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 195 | View Replies]

To: Victoria Delsoul



Thanks so much for the info. I think I'll work up the nerve to try it, I don't want to spend every day shaving this summer.


200 posted on 03/03/2005 7:12:53 PM PST by SouthernFreebird
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 199 | View Replies]


Navigation: use the links below to view more comments.
first previous 1-20 ... 141-160161-180181-200201-203 next last

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.

Free Republic
Browse · Search
General/Chat
Topics · Post Article

FreeRepublic, LLC, PO BOX 9771, FRESNO, CA 93794
FreeRepublic.com is powered by software copyright 2000-2008 John Robinson