With the rise of a consumer-oriented economy, mass entertainment and seismic cultural shifts, the 1920s is often hailed as a time of significant and lasting social change in the west. Did these changes permeate through the whole of society, however? Was this an era of social liberation for women as much as it was for men?
According to Professor Sarah Churchwell, the answer is a definite yes. “Women in the 1920S had a very different experience to what their mothers had,” she says. “It's not an exaggeration or a myth to say that their lives changed in this decade.” This can immediately be seen with some major victories for political emancipation right as the 1920s were beginning to roar: for the first time, many women were given the right to vote. A proportion of British women (those over the age of 30
