"The woman of our time has not only the right but also the duty to look good and well-groomed. Through her appearance, she represents the state of which she is a citizen." Thus wrote the encyclopaedia Die Frau in 1964. This study examines how the GDR urged its citizens, and women above all, to fashion themselves as well-groomed subjects, and how they responded to the expectations placed upon them. With the concept of "Looking Socialist," it extends Stephen Kotkin's "Speaking Bolshevik" into the history of the body.
The study connects four levels: the normative orders of the body and their institutionalisation, their mediation through the media, everyday beauty practices between the planned and the parallel economy, and the narrative work of remembering in the present.
It draws on records of the party, government ministries, the Fashion Institute, market research and the Ministry for State Security (Stasi), on advice literature, magazines, television programmes and films, as well as on group interviews with women who lived in the GDR.
