Sayna Soleymanian & Ximena Palmro
Fun & Flappers in 1920s
The flapper’s embrace of fun, fashion, and sexual liberty raised the ire of many social commentators,
many adolescent girls saw the flapper as a role model. The Roaring Twenties also known as Wonderful
Nonsense Era ,Trendy young women of the 1920s were nicknamed flappers, and the flapper became the
image that represented the tremendous change in women's lives and attitudes during that period. In the
1920s, Flappers were women who were characterized by their choice of bobbed hair, short skirts, and
their enjoyment of jazz music. They were branded as brash for their enjoyment of casual sex, drinking,
and immoderate makeup, driving cars and smoked in public, and appeared to be in no hurry to marry. The
origins of flappers, ideologically, were seen as being rooted in liberalism. Flappers were increasingly
being regarded as a symbol of the larger, societal change that was underfoot, such as the first time women
were permitted to vote in the U.S. However, for all the talk and the recognition about how flappers were
part of the women’s movement and were symbolic of women’s empowerment, they also had their critics
among women. They were were considered a significant challenge to traditional Victorian gender roles,
devotion to plain-living, hard work and religion. Increasingly, women discarded old, rigid ideas about
roles and embraced consumerism and personal choice, and were often described in terms of representing a
"culture war" of old versus new. Flappers also advocated voting and women's rights.
Lipstick, eyeliner, Rouge, powder became extremely popular when the flappers started wearing since it
was used by loose woman before.
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Music: jazz. The Blues
A very popular form of entertainment in the 20’s was going to see a silent film. Movies appealed
to every type of crowd and going to Broadway theater
Reading newspapers, magazines gained in popularity
Dance marathons, flag pole sitting, circus-type events
Gambling, cards, horse racing, etc.
People played instruments and sang during their leisure time.
Sports gained popularity in the 1920's. School teams were formed for students. Several sports such as
golf, baseball, tennis, swimming, football and boxing that were previously been unavailable to the
middle-class became open. Record-breaking athletes also attracted many new people to various physical
activities. The 1920's were a transition period for many sports. The new events caught the eye of
promoters who could see an opportunity to capitalize and make money
One popular pastime was listening to the radio. At first, radios were expensive (They cost about 600
dollars in today's money) and they were also hard to use. They began broadcasting things popular music,
classical music, sporting events, lectures, fictional stories, newscasts, weather reports, market updates,
and political commentary. 60% of American families had radios.
The most significant new instrument of mass entertainment was movies.
50 million people went weekly from 1920-1990
People spend 83 cents per movie
¾ of the population went to the movies weekly
Reactions to the flappers:
 People who reacted to the flappers where the men and the elderly people
 They were too reveling
 The flappers broke the perspective of woman
 They worked outside home
 They drank
 They weren’t the type of women who waited in home for a man and it really shocked men since
they had just returned from WWI.
 Parents also reacted to their children who were flappers and were horrified and ashamed of it.
 Some poets also took advantage of people’s dislike in flappers and started publishing poems
about how they were a bad thing in the society. An example of these poets was Dorothy Parker.
Other Activities during their leisure time:
Many people established clubs (Speakeasies) offering illegal alcohol during the Prohibition era. The clubs
required a password to enter, and offered music and dancing in addition to drinks. These clubs had an air
of mystery and glamor, and were very popular with young city dwellers.
Inventions:
The Phonograph was one of the inventions of this time. It allowed people to listen to the music on the
radio anytime they wanted. In 1920s the sound quality of phonographs was greatly improved.
Phonographs also helped spread different types of music all around the country.