MAPACA

Mid-Atlantic Popular &
American Culture Association

During the Revolutionary war, a key symbol of freedom from tyranny associated with the American colonies was the Liberty Cap. This flopped over beanie was featured on many personifications of Liberty and America in the propaganda prints and cartoons that served to make a case for revolution. But as the country became more divided in the lead up to the Civil War, the Liberty Cap disappeared from such imagery. The cap’s origins in the ancient Roman tradition of manumission, or the freeing of slaves, made the Liberty Cap too contentious a symbol in the Antebellum period. In a more recent tumultuous period of our nation’s history, the pussy hat, a pink knitted hat with two pointed ends resembling both cat ears and vaginas, became a symbol of resistance against the Trump administration at the January 21, 2017 Women’s March. The name of the hat was in response to Trump’s recorded remarks that he could grab women by the pussy, using the term in a derogatory fashion. The pussy hats were meant to be a sign of unity and reclamation. But by the following year’s march, many fewer pussy hats were worn, as they came to be seen not as a symbol of unity but of exclusion of transgender women and women of color whose genitalia might not fit that visual model. While the connection has frequently been made between these two forms of rebellious headgear, few discuss their respective declines in popularity and how that speaks to their historical moment, which is the focus of this paper.