{"id":{"repo_id":"uiuc","oai_identifier":"oai:www.ideals.illinois.edu:2142/124657"},"canonical_url":"https://search.dev.ndltd.org/etd/uiuc/oai:www.ideals.illinois.edu:2142/124657","repository":{"repo_id":"uiuc","name":"University of Illinois - Urbana-Champaign","base_url":"https://www.ideals.illinois.edu/oai-pmh"},"display":{"title":"Living clean and shopping green: Environmental domesticity and the nineteenth-century roots of ecoconsumption","abstract":"“Living Clean and Shopping Green: Environmental Domesticity and the Nineteenth- Century Roots of Ecoconsumption,” traces current ideas of green capitalism—specifically “eco” or “green” consumption—back to nineteenth-century domestic manuals and domestic fiction. Emerging alongside the Market Revolution, these literary forms defined the model American woman as a white, middle-class domestic sentry, responsible for controlling the purity of the American domicile in its many forms. Using the concept “environmental domesticity”(a collection of ideologies and practices that treat domestic space as an environment in and of itself) as an analytical lens, this project illustrates how classist and racist theories of personal and environmental purity merged with consumer practices over the course of the nineteenth century to form a new kind of home economics based on purchasing, rather than production. This fusion helped establish the myth that white femininity—and the environmental power and perfection it promised—could be achieved by purchasing specific products. But as vocal critics of white femininity like Harriet Jacobs advertised, this power was fundamentally unattainable for the majority of American women. This was, in fact, white femininity’s selling point. By portraying the impossible standards of white femininity as always only just out of reach—just one more act or purchase away—nineteenth-century domestic authors kept it alluringly exclusive. In limiting its supply, they increased the demand, trapping women shoppers in a self-perpetuating cycle of consumption and shame that is mirrored in ecoconsumption today. By establishing this prehistory of ecoconsumption, “Living Clean and Shopping Green” explodes the scholarly binary between environmental studies and domesticity studies, illustrating domestic literature’s ability to inform and disrupt extractive capitalism’s seemingly endless loop of production and consumption.","abstract_html":"“Living Clean and Shopping Green: Environmental Domesticity and the Nineteenth- Century Roots of Ecoconsumption,” traces current ideas of green capitalism—specifically “eco” or “green” consumption—back to nineteenth-century domestic manuals and domestic fiction. Emerging alongside the Market Revolution, these literary forms defined the model American woman as a white, middle-class domestic sentry, responsible for controlling the purity of the American domicile in its many forms. Using the concept “environmental domesticity”(a collection of ideologies and practices that treat domestic space as an environment in and of itself) as an analytical lens, this project illustrates how classist and racist theories of personal and environmental purity merged with consumer practices over the course of the nineteenth century to form a new kind of home economics based on purchasing, rather than production. This fusion helped establish the myth that white femininity—and the environmental power and perfection it promised—could be achieved by purchasing specific products. But as vocal critics of white femininity like Harriet Jacobs advertised, this power was fundamentally unattainable for the majority of American women. This was, in fact, white femininity’s selling point. By portraying the impossible standards of white femininity as always only just out of reach—just one more act or purchase away—nineteenth-century domestic authors kept it alluringly exclusive. In limiting its supply, they increased the demand, trapping women shoppers in a self-perpetuating cycle of consumption and shame that is mirrored in ecoconsumption today. By establishing this prehistory of ecoconsumption, “Living Clean and Shopping Green” explodes the scholarly binary between environmental studies and domesticity studies, illustrating domestic literature’s ability to inform and disrupt extractive capitalism’s seemingly endless loop of production and consumption.","abstract_has_math":false,"creators":["Becker, Leah Marie"],"institution":"University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign","degree_name":"Ph.D.","degree_level":"Dissertation","degree_discipline":"English","degree_department":null,"school":null,"contributors":["Murison, Justine S","Barnard, John L","Foote, Stephanie","Jones, Jamie L","Spires, Derrick R"],"advisors":[],"committee_chairs":[],"committee_members":[],"year":2024,"date_issued":"2024-05","date_published":"2024-05","updated_at":"2026-07-22T22:25:02Z","subjects":["Domesticity","Environmental Humanities","Eco Consumption","Green Consumption","Whiteness","White Women","Nineteenth-century American","Nineteenth-century Women","Infrastructure Studies"],"languages":["eng","en"],"rights":["Copyright 2024 Leah Marie Becker"],"rights_urls":[],"identifier_entries":[]},"links":{"outbound_url":"https://hdl.handle.net/2142/124657","outbound_label":"Handle","outbound_source":"dc:identifier"},"metadata_groups":[{"id":"people","label":"People","entries":[{"key":"dc:contributor","label":"Contributor","values":["Murison, Justine S","Barnard, John L","Foote, Stephanie","Jones, Jamie L","Spires, Derrick R"]},{"key":"dc:creator","label":"Author","values":["Becker, Leah Marie"]}]},{"id":"academic_context","label":"Academic Context","entries":[{"key":"dc:date","label":"Dc Date","values":["2024-05","2024-04-15"]},{"key":"dc:type","label":"Dc Type","values":["Text"]},{"key":"thesis:degree_discipline","label":"Discipline","values":["English"]},{"key":"thesis:degree_level","label":"Degree Level","values":["Dissertation"]},{"key":"thesis:degree_name","label":"Degree Name","values":["Ph.D."]},{"key":"thesis:institution_name","label":"Thesis Institution Name","values":["University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign"]}]},{"id":"subjects_keywords","label":"Subjects and Keywords","entries":[{"key":"dc:subject","label":"Dc Subject","values":["Domesticity","Environmental Humanities","Eco Consumption","Green Consumption","Whiteness","White Women","Nineteenth-century American","Nineteenth-century Women","Infrastructure Studies"]}]},{"id":"language_rights","label":"Language and Rights","entries":[{"key":"dc:language","label":"Dc Language","values":["eng","en"]},{"key":"dc:rights","label":"Dc Rights","values":["Copyright 2024 Leah Marie Becker"]}]},{"id":"identifiers","label":"Identifiers","entries":[{"key":"dc:identifier","label":"Identifier","values":["https://hdl.handle.net/2142/124657"]}]},{"id":"additional","label":"Additional Metadata","entries":[{"key":"dc:description","label":"Description","values":["“Living Clean and Shopping Green: Environmental Domesticity and the Nineteenth- Century Roots of Ecoconsumption,” traces current ideas of green capitalism—specifically “eco” or “green” consumption—back to nineteenth-century domestic manuals and domestic fiction. Emerging alongside the Market Revolution, these literary forms defined the model American woman as a white, middle-class domestic sentry, responsible for controlling the purity of the American domicile in its many forms. Using the concept “environmental domesticity”(a collection of ideologies and practices that treat domestic space as an environment in and of itself) as an analytical lens, this project illustrates how classist and racist theories of personal and environmental purity merged with consumer practices over the course of the nineteenth century to form a new kind of home economics based on purchasing, rather than production. This fusion helped establish the myth that white femininity—and the environmental power and perfection it promised—could be achieved by purchasing specific products. But as vocal critics of white femininity like Harriet Jacobs advertised, this power was fundamentally unattainable for the majority of American women. This was, in fact, white femininity’s selling point. By portraying the impossible standards of white femininity as always only just out of reach—just one more act or purchase away—nineteenth-century domestic authors kept it alluringly exclusive. In limiting its supply, they increased the demand, trapping women shoppers in a self-perpetuating cycle of consumption and shame that is mirrored in ecoconsumption today. By establishing this prehistory of ecoconsumption, “Living Clean and Shopping Green” explodes the scholarly binary between environmental studies and domesticity studies, illustrating domestic literature’s ability to inform and disrupt extractive capitalism’s seemingly endless loop of production and consumption.","Submission published under a 24 month embargo labeled 'Closed Access', the embargo will last until 2026-05-01","The student, Leah Becker, accepted the attached license on 2024-04-12 at 16:35.","The student, Leah Becker, submitted this Dissertation for approval on 2024-04-12 at 16:46.","This Dissertation was approved for publication on 2024-04-15 at 16:06.","DSpace SAF Submission Ingestion Package generated from Vireo submission #20387 on 2024-09-16 at 00:49:19"]},{"key":"dc:format","label":"Dc Format","values":["application/pdf"]},{"key":"dc:title","label":"Title","values":["Living clean and shopping green: Environmental domesticity and the nineteenth-century roots of ecoconsumption"]}]}],"canonical_facts":{"dc:contributor":["Murison, Justine S","Barnard, John L","Foote, Stephanie","Jones, Jamie L","Spires, Derrick R"],"dc:creator":["Becker, Leah Marie"],"dc:date":["2024-05","2024-04-15"],"dc:description":["“Living Clean and Shopping Green: Environmental Domesticity and the Nineteenth- Century Roots of Ecoconsumption,” traces current ideas of green capitalism—specifically “eco” or “green” consumption—back to nineteenth-century domestic manuals and domestic fiction. Emerging alongside the Market Revolution, these literary forms defined the model American woman as a white, middle-class domestic sentry, responsible for controlling the purity of the American domicile in its many forms. Using the concept “environmental domesticity”(a collection of ideologies and practices that treat domestic space as an environment in and of itself) as an analytical lens, this project illustrates how classist and racist theories of personal and environmental purity merged with consumer practices over the course of the nineteenth century to form a new kind of home economics based on purchasing, rather than production. This fusion helped establish the myth that white femininity—and the environmental power and perfection it promised—could be achieved by purchasing specific products. But as vocal critics of white femininity like Harriet Jacobs advertised, this power was fundamentally unattainable for the majority of American women. This was, in fact, white femininity’s selling point. By portraying the impossible standards of white femininity as always only just out of reach—just one more act or purchase away—nineteenth-century domestic authors kept it alluringly exclusive. In limiting its supply, they increased the demand, trapping women shoppers in a self-perpetuating cycle of consumption and shame that is mirrored in ecoconsumption today. By establishing this prehistory of ecoconsumption, “Living Clean and Shopping Green” explodes the scholarly binary between environmental studies and domesticity studies, illustrating domestic literature’s ability to inform and disrupt extractive capitalism’s seemingly endless loop of production and consumption.","Submission published under a 24 month embargo labeled 'Closed Access', the embargo will last until 2026-05-01","The student, Leah Becker, accepted the attached license on 2024-04-12 at 16:35.","The student, Leah Becker, submitted this Dissertation for approval on 2024-04-12 at 16:46.","This Dissertation was approved for publication on 2024-04-15 at 16:06.","DSpace SAF Submission Ingestion Package generated from Vireo submission #20387 on 2024-09-16 at 00:49:19"],"dc:format":["application/pdf"],"dc:identifier":["https://hdl.handle.net/2142/124657"],"dc:language":["eng","en"],"dc:rights":["Copyright 2024 Leah Marie Becker"],"dc:subject":["Domesticity","Environmental Humanities","Eco Consumption","Green Consumption","Whiteness","White Women","Nineteenth-century American","Nineteenth-century Women","Infrastructure Studies"],"dc:title":["Living clean and shopping green: Environmental domesticity and the nineteenth-century roots of ecoconsumption"],"dc:type":["Text"],"thesis:degree_discipline":["English"],"thesis:degree_level":["Dissertation"],"thesis:degree_name":["Ph.D."],"thesis:institution_name":["University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign"]},"updated_at":"2026-07-22T22:25:02Z"}