The "Girl Graduate" and the Graduating Girl: Constructing Identity in Class Books of the 1920s 192 views

This thesis examines thirteen class books from American high school and college students in the 1920s to determine how these books were used to construct individual and group identities. Given that these books were sold by companies with pre-printed section headings but completed by individual users, they represent a crossroads where commercial and personal influences meet. As they compiled various entries (including messages from classmates, newspaper clippings, academic ephemera, and personal photographs), the young women (and occasionally men) who owned these books interacted with the implicit assumptions of the pre-printed apparatus (epitomized in the archetypal figure of the "girl graduate"). This study focuses on how students shaped and were shaped by the "girl graduate" figure found in class books, particularly as they considered their social and gendered identities as soon-to-be graduates.

MA (Master of Arts)

class book; high school; social identity; gender identity; scrapbook; yearbook

English

2026-04-23