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- Title
CON EL CUERPO, DE PALABRA Y OBRA. CONDUCTAS DE ESCÁNDALO PÚBLICO DE LAS JÓVENES EN ESPAÑA, 1800-1835.
- Authors
Calvo Caballero, Pilar
- Abstract
This article investigates the capacity of young women at the beginning of the Romantic Period to elicit public scandal. By examining eight judicial lawsuits at the Royal Chancery of Valladolid against the backdrop of the history of emotions, we set out to study how public outrage around the conduct of these minors was typically built. They exercised their emotional freedom without limits or shame, insensitive to the emotional suffering they caused. Their scandals entailed irrational, deeply emotional journeys: transvestite lives in order to survive; inheritances received as a result of the infatuation of old married men; the eternal liaisons with married notaries, merchants or surgeons, parish priests, cousins' husbands; or the flattery of the soldiers leading to the contraction of the Great Pox. The element of irrationality stemmed from the fact that they were girls determined to escape from deprivation or loneliness; they could make an honest living, but aided by their youth and beauty, they felt attracted to an illegal trade that offered them a better life and extended their social circle so as to include privileged persons. Their families or respectable people encouraged them, while others admonished them, but the choice was ultimately theirs. Their transgressions, from innocent cross-dressing to cohabitation and prostitution, would often be treated with mercy by the courts. Like pastors and confessors, rather than punish them, the courts warned these unruly young women, thus giving them the opportunity to rebuild their lives away from public scandal.
- Subjects
MARRIED men; OLDER men; CROSS-dressers; COSMETICS; INFATUATION; YOUNG women
- Publication
Futuro del Pasado: Revista Electrónica de Historia, 2024, Issue 15, p361
- ISSN
1989-9289
- Publication type
Article
- DOI
10.14201/fdp.31424