A blueprint for Cold War citizenship: Upper class women in the U.S. foreign policy, 1945--1963.

摘要

This dissertation discusses the ways two upper class magazines, Vogue and Harper's Bazaar, helped shape the manner in which upper class women acted as informal cultural diplomats during the early Cold War. The major source base for the study included foreign policy articles from these two magazines and the papers of four women - Susan Mary Alsop, Marietta Tree, Jacqueline Kennedy, and Lee Radziwill. The biographies of this group of women help define the parameters of upper class women's role in fighting the Cold War. Research indicated that, at least in the opinions of editorial staff at the two most influential upper class women's magazines, upper class women were expected to live up to a very clear set of behavioral standards to help promote U.S. Cold War diplomatic interests. Women were supposed to have a clear and in-depth understanding of international foreign policy, help rebuild the postwar economies of key allied nations like France and Great Britain through purchasing luxury goods like fashion, and combat the image of the "Ugly American" abroad by acting as refined, cultured, and well-behaved examples of American womanhood. Susan Mary Alsop, Marietta Tree, Jacqueline Kennedy, and Lee Radziwill all established, shaped, and lived up to each of these standards.