Quilting Girl Identity

Elaine Hedges sums up the correlation between women and quilting when she writes, “too reticent, perhaps, to record life in her own words,” quilting provided girls and women a medium to speak of themselves and to create identities outside their domestic spheres (293). What we consider the stereotypical, nineteenth-century persona of the angel in the house was the reality faced by most middle to upper middle class women. They carried out their duties, namely, to moralize their children and their husbands, while sanctifying their homes so that they may offer them safe havens from the demoralizing world outside. In her poem, “Repining,” Christiana Gabriel Rossetti characterizes the emotional condition of such a woman:

She sat always thro’ the long day

Spinning the weary thread away;

And ever said in undertone:

‘Come, that I be no more alone’ (1-4).

Alone and weary characterizes most of a woman’s condition in the nineteenth century. However, added to that, silence plays a crucial part in that condition, described here by Rossetti’s sentiments in “Twice,” “Yet a woman’s words are weak;/You should speak, not I” (7-8). The nineteenth century was the era of separate spheres, believed by many to be of God's design, designating women and men with separate abilities to govern their spheres. Incidentally, speaking of God, Rossetti writes, “He broke my will day by day/He read my yearnings unexpressed/And said them nay” (3-5). Domestic duties, successful children, and “good” matches proved for many nineteenth century women not enough. Therefore, female/girl productions became invaluable identity makers. Quilting, commonplace books, jewelry making, mourning clothes, and later, as Liz Rohan notes, photography became more than production for many women, but outlets. Men, in the business sphere, the sphere of hunting clubs, drinking, socializing, negotiating, and producing capital, left the domestic sphere open for women to create tight-knit communities revolving around their domestic endeavors and labors. As Hedges observes, quilting “enabled women to transcend the limiting daily routine” (294). It also enabled women, daughters and mothers, friends and family, to meet in a commonplace and reveal some yearnings in the safety of coded practice within the commonplace setting. As novels like Mary Barton illustrate, with scenes such as Mary’s scandalous confession (simply admitting that she loves Jem in a public setting), the social norm surrounding women dictated a silent acceptance and perseverance, a “reticence” in speaking, in revealing anything intimate about themselves. So its imaginable that the quilting parties entailing exchanges—scraps and pieces stitched into personal stories—gave voice “at a remove” to the daily weariness, the longings for more.

Personally, what I find interesting about all this in terms of girl identity is the secretive connotation built into girl/female socializing. Spinning does conjure the Fates from Greek Mythology.  From the “reticence” of nineteenth-century, female decorum develops into an almost inherent suspicion surrounding “girl time,” a sense that girls speak in code, gossip and whisper. I remember a few years ago talking with a male friend about watching Julie Dash’s Daughters of the Dust. He said, “I didn’t get it at all, but I think you’ll like it a lot. You’ll get it.” When I asked why, he replied simply. “Because you’re a girl.” The statement is curious on so many levels. Dash’s film is comprised of visual images, cut and pieced together like a moving collage, and the dialog spoken is predominantly Gullah. And, coincidentally, it’s about a matriarchal culture from the lens of the female members of a particular family. Here’s a link to the trailer for those interested, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c4PEcVK6gbM

His comment, if I’m inclined to give him more credit, seems to suggest that my “girl” born talent to digest “visual” media and “object” is heightened to the extent that meaning (in this instance) transcends the foreign language and avant-garde film style. Or perhaps, he implies that in the film’s represented communal “girl” space, he felt excludes somehow. There is certainly a mystery surrounding “girl” conditions (periods, boy-craziness, PMS, pregnancy, birth, consumer fetishism, romance) as we have touched on in this class, that are represented in ways marketed specifically to “girls.” Maybe it would be worthwhile to investigate quilting as a social activity, its visual narrative practice a means to make girlhood specific and different from boyhood in terms of marketing and identity making.