Suchergebnisse

How did ideas of masculinity shape the British legal profession and the wider expectations of the white-collar professional? Brotherhood of Barristers examines the cultural history of the Inns of Court - four legal societies whose rituals of symbolic brotherhood took place in their supposedly ancient halls. These societies invented traditions to create a sense of belonging among members - or, conversely, to marginalize those who did not fit the profession's ideals. Ren Pepitone examines the legal profession's efforts to maintain an exclusive, masculine culture in the face of sweeping social changes across the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Utilizing established sources such as institutional records alongside diaries, guidebooks, and newspapers, this book looks afresh at the gendered operations of Victorian professional life. Brotherhood of Barristers incorporates a diverse array of historical actors, from the bar's most high-flying to struggling law students, disbarred barristers, political radicals, and women's rights campaigners.

One of the last exclusively male professions in the United Kingdom, the English bar, resisted women's presence until 1919 parliamentary legislation prohibited gender-based disqualification. Following the efforts of Helena Normanton, the first female barrister to practice in England, to insert herself into the bar's masculine preserve, this article reveals a more complicated interwar feminism than previous scholars have suggested. Overall, women deliberately de-emphasized their femininity to accord with the Inns of Court's masculine culture and increase their chances of professional success. This did not prevent campaigners like Normanton, however, from pursuing an active feminist agenda. Focusing on architectural space and embodied ritual, this article explores the disadvantages created by spatial separations between male and female members of the bar. It also highlights the interwar press as a representational space for ambivalent debates over women's place in the legal profession.