It feels weird talking to a nameless void, so, in an attempt to make this blog my own, I decided to name the reader Glorp. I hope you, the reader, are okay with that.
Edit on 2.23.25:
I created the name Glorp when I woke up one morning with that word echoing in my head. I assume my brain created it in a dream I don't remember. I thought it was funny, so I added it to the blog. Just now realizing that I don't know if "glorp" has another meaning. Urban dictionary told me it has several other meanings, but none of those are the definition I imply when I call the reader Glorp. I just think it's fun to say.
Hi Glorp! This blog is not just a measly research blog, no. Oh no, no, no, my dear friend. This blog plans to answer all the questions my little snotty-nosed gremlin-toddler brain has. And since my grade relies on also researching a media theory, I'm going to do that too. These blogs have no word limit; be prepared for the most in-depth data you've ever seen. I woke up this morning with a wack ton of energy, and I'm going to USE IT!
Question #1: Were female cowboys (cowgirls) a thing? If so, where they riddiculed or insulted for being women?
First, what is a cowgirl/boy? Western movies gave me this vague idea that they were just people who rode horses, maybe traveling long distances and lassoing wild animals. No, that's not accurate. It turns out that they are people who own and tend to livestock. ¹ Back then this required the skills often seen in western movies: sharpshooting, horse breaking, and herding cattle. Rodeos were later created as a way to show off these skills and entertainment. From here, a cowgirl is the wife or daughter of a cowboy who learned the same skills as her male counterpart. ¹
A very brief Google search led me to a page of cowgirls, outlaws, and gunslingers. A briefer skim convinced me all of them were "not to be trifled with" as heck (english.stackexchange.com 2014). Here's my favorite one from the list:
Mary Fields (1832 - 1914)
The page never states if she's a cowgirl, outlaw, or gunslinger. I assume she's a gunslinger, since she never owned land (so no livestock) and never reportedly did anything illegal.
The most striking thing about her is her color. No other women on this page were Black, and from what I can find, she's the first African American to work in the postal service. Journalofantiques.com (2025) describes her as "a pioneer of the Old West as the first female African-American Star Route mail carrier." Saloons back in the day (late 1800s) often served the purpose of being a social area for men to relax from work and family life. They had a sacred place to interact with other men. A woman in a saloon would mean a violation of that idyllic manliness and therefore a threat to male dominance. As such, women were usually not allowed in the main area of the saloon and were usually segregated to another room. Back then, this separation protected women from judgment and the men's desperate need to have an area dedicated to their disgusting quantity of body hair and beer. ⁴ In Montana, a law made areas dedicated to women in saloons illegal. ⁵ However, Fields was such an "epic fella (english.stackexchange.com 2014) that the mayor of Cascade made an exception for her.¹ She was allowed to drink, smoke, and hang out with men as she pleased.
Also, let me note that she was six feet tall. I'm 5'2, and from my knowledge, the lack of proper nutrition and health services in the past made people shorter. Meaning that the amazing individual known as Mary Fields was probably a tower of badassery compared to the people around her. Should I have been born in the same time and place as her and met her, I would be terrified. I'm sure the mayor of Caacad felt the same. All jokes aside, Mary Fields was probably allowed into saloons and such because she behaved and had the height of a man. Demanding and quick to anger, tall, intimidating. I assume she never let people tell her what to do. She probably had to play a masculine role to be seen as equal to men, hiding her femininity to protect herself from ridicule. Which, to me, is depressing but makes sense. Back then, women were seen as weak, needing to be protected. Though that's not the case anymore, through the writing of my character, I should show this suppression of femininity. Something else that's a shock to me is that Fields is wearing a dress. This brings me to my next question.
Question #2: Why were women restricted to dresses when they had to do a lot of housework? Wouldn't that be inefficient for pulling weeds and stuff?
This one is piggybacking off the last one. You'd think that, on a farm where an individual is almost completely self-sufficient, there'd be a priority of efficiency over visual appeal. Why did women still wear dresses if they spent the day milking cows and pulling weeds? Especially in the supposed heat of the western landscape, what's the point?
To answer this, let's start with what they wore. As undergarments, women wore a chemise (thin dress made of cotton), pantalette (image on the left), and petticoat (skirt). This was worn for modesty and hygiene purposes, since underwear as we know it wasn't a thing back then. I was under the assumption that women just didn't wear anything related to pants, so a pantalette really stood out to me. Most women wore a corset over this and then a dress of choice. But some loosened the corset or didn't wear it at all while doing domestic work. Also, according torecolections.biz (2023), women shortened their dresses and skirts a few inches to make manual labor easier. I think a big reason they didn't wear pants is for modesty and because it was just the standard for women to wear skirts.
Here, I planned to make a smooth transition into women's independence. But I can't think of anything because I need water and don't want to get up from my comfy chair. With the expansion into the western part of America, pioneers had very limited resources and people. Therefore, as long as you had the skills, you were needed to work. Gender was given no regard. As my mom put it, "There was no time to be sexist; cows had to be herded." One thing the western genre did get right is that laws didn't really apply in the lawless Wild West, so women joined the workforce when men couldn't. Sadly, women weren't entirely equal out in the west. "There were plenty more men than women out west, and many of them paid handsomely for female company." (historyhit.com, 2025)
Question #3: I know the center of America isn't all desert, so why is it portrayed that way in westerns?
I've been to the north and south ends of Texas; it's not that hot. Especially not enough to be deserted! So what gives?
When I wrote these questions, I wrote why I'm asking them (the statement above) and then googled for answers, opening only the sites that look genuine. Then I assume things from there. But with this question, I was just completely wrong. Every site I opened called Texas, California, and the general West a desert. I genuinely just got the geography very wrong. That is very embarrassing. I'm including this in the final draft, though. Why? Because it's my blog, and I can do what I want. Don't judge.
Question #4: Did people actually have a southern accent as we picture it today?
In the 8th grade, when I was learning US history, I genuinely wondered if the people in British colonies like Jamestown had British accents like we know today. Where did the American accent come from? Where did the southern accent come from?
I found this video; it answers one question of the 20 I just spouted.
So, according to this video, the original accent wasn't British; it was American. The British accent was formed by those from new money to differentiate themselves from old money. Over time, that accent became the British accent we know and love today. This was a complete shocker. I honestly thought the Americans might have created a different accent from the British to separate themselves from the country after the revolution.
Southern accents also originated as a way for people to distinguish themselves. "...wealthy British traders started dropping the 'r' sound from their speech as a distinction...of their class" (magoosh.com, 2025). These British traders then went to the New World and participated in the slave trade, picking up a little of the accents from enslaved African Americans over time. Especially once African Americans won their freedom and became a part of the working class. The white workers alongside them picked up their accents. Later events like the Great Depression would change immigration patterns and solidify the southern accent into southern culture. This means that your character not having a southern accent is completely historically accurate if we tie it into her backstory. As long as she grew up around people without a Southern or British accent, we are set. This way our actor won't have to fake an accent and possibly mess up her performance.
Finally, the Media Theory!
My group predetermined the media theory of gender performativity theory by Judith Butler. Personally, they are one of my favorite philosopher's I've read so far. I don't agree with everything they say, but their newest book (Who's Afraid of Gender?) is still very interesting. Butler's theory is the idea that gender is not a concrete part of human existence; instead, it is socially constructed and forced into individuals from a young age. A book I'm reading right now, Gender and Our Brains, talks about neuroplasticity. I'll be honest, I haven't finished the chapter yet. But I'll still try to explain what I learned to the best of my abilities. A world champion chess player has a different brain than a professional bus driver. Some parts, maybe the prefrontal cortex, are bigger on some sides than others. This is because their brains have adapted to be insanely good at what they do. This is called neuroplasticity; the brain adapts to it's situation. For all we know, gender could cause the brain to create a the gendered brain. Oh, yeah, also brains are probably gendered. PET scans show men and women have structures of different sizes. This doesn't mean one is smarter than the other, it's a little complicated to explain. Applying this media theory to our film opening might mean having a character that ignores the gender roles she was put into. She can behave like a man but keep her hair long, sort of like a protest against her gendered roles. She'd likely act like Mary Fields, independent, strong, and powerful. We can see this theory in my first two questions. Cowgirls and women had rights so long as they were skilled, but their scarcity in the west and judgment from their peers forced most into roles as housewives. This would be the performance part of Butler's gender theory. The interesting bit, though, is that even if my character behaves in a manly way, she is still subscribing to the gender roles in a society. Maybe not the ones she was born into, but since those around her were raised to see two boxes, she will still be categorized into one or the other. Even if that's contrary to her wishes.
Well, my eyes are starting to sting from the blue light of my laptop screen. I think I should call this a night. Goodbye Glorp!
Edit: I fixed a few grammar mistakes on 2/15, but this blog was posted on 2/14.
Resources:
Question #1:
1. Cowgirl by choice - cowboy by choice. (2024, September 4). Cowboy by Choice. Retrieved February 14, 2025, from https://cowboybychoice.com/cowgirl-by-choice/#:~:text=In%20the%20late%201800's%2C%20the,horses%2C%20and%20tending%20to%20livestock.
2. Carter-Lome, M. (2023, November 25). Women of the Wild West: 10 Famous Cowgirls, Outlaws, and Gunslingers - The Journal of Antiques and. The Journal of Antiques and Collectibles. https://journalofantiques.com/features/women-of-the-wild-west-10-famous-cowgirls-outlaws-and-gunslingers/
3. What is a polite substitute for badass (used as a noun)? (n.d.). English Language & Usage Stack Exchange. Retrieved February 14, 2025, from https://english.stackexchange.com/questions/117457/what-is-a-polite-substitute-for-badass- used-as-a-noun
4. Volkert, K. (2021, February 3). Old “Ladies’ Entrance” Signs Blur the Lines Between Gender Bias and Bar Ephemera. Hidden City Philadelphia. Retrieved February 14, 2025, from https://hiddencityphila.org/2021/01/old-ladies-entrance-signs-blur-the-lines-between-gender-bias-and-bar-ephemera/#:~:text=Working%2Dclass%20bars%20and%20saloons,and%20their%20sense%20of%20masculinity.
5. Montana Women’s legal History timeline. (2018, October 16). Montana Women’s History. Retrieved February 14, 2025, from https://montanawomenshistory.org/research/legal/
Question 2:
1. Recollections. (2023, February 20). Pioneer Clothing: What women wore in the Western Frontier. Recollections Blog. Retrieved February 14, 2025, from https://recollections.biz/blog/pioneer-clothing-what-women-wore-in-the-western-frontier/
2. Roller, S. (n.d.). What was life like for the pioneer women of the Wild West? History Hit. Retrieved February 14, 2025, from https://www.historyhit.com/women-in-the-wild-west/
3. The incredible perseverance of the woman pioneer (U.S. National Park Service). (n.d.). Retrieved February 14, 2025, from https://www.nps.gov/articles/000/the-incredible-perseverance-of-the-woman-pioneer.htm
Question 3:
1. Aaron. (2022, June 12). Why Sonoran Desert is the icon of the Wild West. TheTravel. https://www.thetravel.com/sonoran-desert-is-part-of-the-wild-west/ Wikipedia contributors. (2025, February 14).
2. American frontier. Wikipedia. Retrieved February 14, 2025, from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_frontier
3. Wild West with Ray Mears - Deserts - CUNY TV. (n.d.). CUNY TV. Retrieved February 14, 2025, from https://tv.cuny.edu/show/wildwest/PR2003992
Question 4:
1. Mental Floss. (2015, June 22). What did the original colonists sound like? - Big Questions - (Ep. 36) [Video]. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k7tZFqg2PqU
2. Pool, J. (2021, April 7). The Southern Drawl: Breakdown of an American accent. SpeakUp Resources. Retrieved February 14, 2025, from https://magoosh.com/english-speaking/the-southern-drawl-breakdown-of-an-american-accent/
Media theory:
1. Rippon, G. (2020). Gender and our brains: How New Neuroscience Explodes the Myths of the Male and Female Minds. Vintage.
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