“Audacia Dangyereyes”: Appropriate Speech and the “Immodest” Woman Speaker of the Comstock Era

Rhetoric Society Quarterly Oct 2012

“Audacia Dangyereyes”: Appropriate Speech and the “Immodest” Woman Speaker of the Comstock Era

Wendy Hayden Hunter College

Abstract

In the 1870s and ‘80s, more women discussed sex to promote free love and sex education in speeches, pamphlets, books, and periodicals. Some of these women inspired the 1873 “Comstock law,” which banned materials deemed obscene. This essay uses the fictional figure of Audacia Dangyereyes to illustrate the constraints on women discussing sex in public forums. It identifies the rhetorical moves necessary to accommodate constraining audiences through close readings of the works of Victoria Woodhull, Tennessee Claflin, and Angela Heywood, all women deemed immodest by public standards and obscene by Anthony Comstock. To allay such charges, these women worked to redefine appropriate speech for women.

Journal: Rhetoric Society Quarterly
Published: 2012-10-01
DOI: 10.1080/02773945.2012.724515
Open Access: Closed
Topics: multimodality

Citation Context

Cited by in this index (1)

Hayden (2021)

FromLucifertoJezebel: Invitational Rhetoric, Rhetorical Closure, …

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Rhetoric Society Quarterly
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Rhetoric Society Quarterly
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“The Purity of Truth”: Nineteenth-Century American Women Physicians Write about…

Rhetoric Review

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