Dissertation Information for Elizabeth MillwardNAME:
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SCHOOL: ADVISORS: COMMITTEE MEMBERS: MPACT Status: Incomplete - Inspected Title: Scaling airspace: Gender in the British imperial skies, 1922--1937 Abstract: The dissertation examines the production of airspace in the British Empire between 1922 and 1937. During these years aviation was in the process of being naturalised as a masculine pursuit and airspace as a masculinised space. The dissertation compares Britain and New Zealand, the two nations at opposite ends of the Empire, and discusses how women pilots from those two nations, in particular two of the most significant women pilots of the era, Amy Johnson from England and Jean Batten from New Zealand, struggled to produce airspace that was gendered, classed, and racialised in particular ways. The argument is interdisciplinary and uses two interconnected conceptual frames, which are the contested meaning of embodiment and the interwar consolidation of heteronormativity. Feminist history, feminist geography, lesbian studies, and aviation history are drawn on in order to deal with a range of cultural, medical, social, economic, and legal issues. These include the development of a discourse of "airmindedness" and struggles by women to have access to funding subsidies for pilot training; medical debates over women's bodies and the "racialisation" of women pilots in relation to commercial pilots' licences; and narratives of imperial adventure and imperial markets. The dissertation also examines how Johnson and Batten maintained and challenged imperialism and nationalism through their production of gendered airspace. The production of gendered airspace is theorised as the site of possibility, struggle, and limitation for certain women. |
MPACT Scores for Elizabeth MillwardA = 0 Advisors and Advisees Graph |