Boston University Guest Lecture Series in the History of Art & Architecture: Jennifer Le Zotte

On Thursday, October 17th, we will welcome Jennifer Le Zotte, Associate Professor of History and Material Culture, University of North Carolina Wilmington. She will present a lecture entitled "From Mother Hubbards to Feather Boas: Dressing Up Sex Work in Storyville." Associate Professor Jennifer Le Zotte (University of North Carolina Wilmington) charts a sea change in the expectations of lascivious feminine dress during the years when New Orleans had a decriminalized sex district, Storyville. In the 1880s, prostitution in the United States was commonly associated with a dowdy shift called a “Mother Hubbard gown” or later, a prairie gown. Between 1897 and 1917, the advertising dress of “octoroon” madams in New Orleans helped shift popular perceptions of sex workers from less Little House on the Prairie (1870-1894) to much more Pretty Woman (1990). From early vaudeville chippies to Mae West’s bawdy personas, New Orleans’ sex workers first drew from, then influenced, depictions of promiscuity that still inform perceptions of lavish, glitzy dress today.