EBOOK Queens of Academe:Beauty Pageantry, Student Bodies, and College Life

Universities are unlikely venues for grading bodies, beauty, poise, and style.          Nonetheless, thousands of college women have sought not only college diplomas but        campus beauty titles and tiaras throughout the twentieth century, and the cultural        power of beauty pageants continues into the twenty-first.In Queens of Academe, Karen        W. Tice asks how, and why, does higher education remain in the beauty and body        business and with what effects on student bodies and identities. Drawing on archival        research and interviews as well as hundreds of hours observing college pageants on        predominantly black and white campuses, Tice argues the pageants help to illuminate        the shifting iterations of class, race, religion, culture, sexuality, and gender        braided into campus rituals and student life. Moving beyond a binary of        objectification versus empowerment, Tice offers a nuanced analysis of the making of        idealized collegiate masculinities and femininities, and the stylization of higher        education itself.