Here we enter into the large, complex, colorful world ten-
anted by women. Huge sectors of American manufacturing,
retailing, and the services exist only to serve the multifarious
demands of women. They constitute not only a huge market
for the things that they consume directly, but they also deeply
influence the purchasing of things jointly used by the family
as, for example, the automobile, and the clothing worn by
their men. Women, therefore, indulge in no idle boast when
they say that if they stopped buying for only one week they
would seriously cripple the economic structure of the country.

In this place, however, woman is not considered as a mar-
ket but is merely projected against the catalog mart to show
her as a flesh-and-blood person in her various roles of con-
sumer, worker, girl, wife, mother, and grandmother.
Through the things that she uses and wears, she is related to
the social-economic structure, of the times, to the changing
place and status of woman in American society, and is seen
as a reflector of contemporary manners and morals.

This section deals with: typewriters and contraceptives;
cosmetics and fashion; hair, millinery, silk hosiery, corsets,
underwear, and bathing suits, labor-saving devices in the
home, and gardening.

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