Groundswell: Grassroots Feminism Activism In Postwar America

In this paper I will talk about how Gilman, Cooper and Collins think about progress for women. Analyzing their writings, I will compare and contrast their initial concerns and focuses on progress for women, explanations of the causes of gender inequalities, and ideas of future activism. I will discuss what they assumptions they shared in common and how they differentiated with each other specifically.

Throughout the decades, the feminist movement has been portrayed in numerous ways, from feminism being a liberating thing to feminism being deleterious towards men, or even being anti-government. Countless readers believe that the writer Bobbie Ann Mason writes solely about the changes that the females made to change their own world. Instead, Mason portrays the feminist movement in a much different light. In one of her many short stories, “Shiloh,” Mason shows the conflicting sides of the feminist movement and the end result of female liberation in many of these individual movements. “Shiloh” shows a married couple that has been forced into a new phase of their lives through the newfound disability

Women have often played an important role in advocating social justice. However, they have rarely been credited for their efforts and actions. Indeed, the research or narratives on social movements too often focus on male experiences. Yet, a gendered approach to social movements is crucial, because women’s experiences differ from men’s, as do their reasons for becoming involved with any type of activism, be it political or social. The movie Salt of the Earth by Michael Wilson (1954) illustrates those differences and emphasizes the importance of understanding the role played by individual and collective identity in political action. How does one’s social identity shape one’s involvement in political action? In this movie, women get involved in a strike; they become visible activists and no longer just the shadows of their husbands. Yet, their depiction in the movie presents them as essentially mothers and wives, inscribing their actions in the realm of domesticity. Thus, their actual agency remains in question.

In her book Southern Horrors Women and the Politics of Rape and Lynching, Crystal Feimster aims to show the importance of southern women in the fight for women’s right during and after the civil war. This book tells the story of Ida B. Wells and Rebecca Latimer Felton as well as the hundreds of other southern women who campaigned against rape and lynching and championed for women’s rights. Feimster narrative focuses on both Wells and Felton because they were pioneers of their time in southern women’s empowerment after the war.

For my first article review, I chose to read Lorraine Gates-Schuyler’s ’ “Power from the Pedestal: The Women’s Emergency Committee and the Little Rock School Crisis”. Ms. Schuyler lives in Virginia and works at the University of Richmond, where she is chief of staff to the president. She earned her doctorate in history with a focus on twentieth-century southern history from the University of Virginia. Her book, The Weight of Their Votes: Southern Women and Political Leverage in the 1920’s was published by the University of North Carolina Press in late 2006. Her book would go on to be named an Honor Book in 2007 by the Library of Virginia, Literary Awards and also be awarded the Julia Cherry Spruill Prize for best book on Southern women’s history.

Pitman Hughes changed this. She stomped over barriers of race and class to meet women as they were: people who wanted better lives for themselves and their children. Through boots-on-the-ground activism, Pitman Hughes attacked women’s rights issue to make feminism into the movement it is today. She co-founded the Women’s Action Alliance, Ms. Magazine, and went on speaking tours with Gloria Steinem, encouraging equality for all women, regardless of their race, socioeconomic class, or sexuality. She co-founded the first shelter for battered women in New York City and the New York City Agency for Child Development. Pitman Hughes understood that the issues faced by women differed between groups, and worked to address them all. She created unity between divided groups, and built an interconnected, inclusive movement. She showed me the importance of including an accepting diverse viewpoints and lifestyles in social

In her essay she relates the rise of feminist consciousness in the 1960s to numerous changes in American society, especially the rise of other protest movements. Echols said, “On September 7, 1968, the sixties came to that most apple-pie of American institutions, the Miss America Pageant” (Echols, 308). The reason she said this was because one hundred women’s liberation activists descended upon Atlantic City to protest the pageant’s promotion of physical attractiveness as the primary measure of women’s worth. From there, the protestors set up a “Freedom Trash Can” and filled it with high-heeled shoes, bras, girdles, hair curlers, false eyelashes, typing books, and representative copies of Cosmopolitan, Playboy, and Ladies Home Journal. They wanted to burn the contents but couldn’t because of the laws for bonfires on the boardwalk. Also, word had been leaked to the press that there would be a symbolic bra-burning. However, there were no bras burnt that day. But the image of the bra-burning, militant feminists remains part of our popular mythology about the women’s liberation movement. The Miss America demonstration represents an important moment in the history of the sixties as well as the women’s movement (Echols, 309-310).

“Because middle-class students were associated with teaching and reform, the separate women’s colleges upheld the norms of social service for their students. Studies of the careers of the first graduates of the Seven Sisters demonstrate that this generation was instrumental in establishing the agenda of social reform for the Progressive movement in the United

Towards the end of the twentieth century, feminist women in America faced an underlying conflict to find their purpose and true meaning in life. “Is this all?” was often a question whose answer was sought after by numerous women reaching deeper into their minds and souls to find what was missing from their life. The ideal second-wave feminist was defined as a women who puts all of her time into cleaning her home, loving her husband, and caring for her children, but such a belief caused these women to not only lose their identity within her family but society as well. The emotions that feminist women were feeling at this time was the internal conflict that caused for social steps to be taken in hopes of

Not to dismiss the importance of mainstream feminist organizations such as NOW, but I believe more radical feminist protests had a larger impact on changing gender expectations in the second half of the Twentieth Century. These more radical protests captured the eye of the media which made the world (at least the USA) interested in what the feminist movement was all about. One of the more significant protest that captured the attention of the United States media that the documentary and article both mention, happened at the Miss America contest in 1968. The two main actions of the protest were the ‘Freedom Trash Can’ and the ‘Women’s Liberation’ sign unveiled during the actual contest. Women were filmed throwing symbols of their oppression

Viewing national movements at varying levels can provide a great amount of insight that may not be seen otherwise. This examination gets into the belly of the beast where it is possible to understand the motivations of individuals, as well as their effects on the movement as a whole. Enstam, Sklar, and DuBois all cover the women’s suffragist movement; however, each article is substantially different in its approach. From these articles, we are able to notice that on a local level, this movement’s methods needed to suit the community in which it took place in order to make headway while nationally, tatics were borrowed from other regions of the globe. Additionally, when grassroots tactics were used, they seemed to separate in how others

My associates and I lived in one expanse where we could simply saunter to each other’s house. Malls, theaters, and restaurants encircled us; everything was neighboring each other. Traveling from one place to another was easy because of the short distances and different means of transportation such as riding metropolitan trains or walking. Although the city had its advantages, it also had its detriments to people’s lives; the city was a precarious place! Living in the city, I was relentlessly hearing about deaths and delinquencies. Growing up in the city, I was petrified for my family and uncertain about their welfare.

The American Feminist Movement of the 1960s and 1970s fought the traditional ways of the workplace, including inequality among the sexes. This movement worked towards equal access to professions and salaries. If women worked outside of the home, job offerings included only those as nurses, secretaries, and teachers. Earnings were unequally distributed. Such events influenced the literature of the time, including Ursula K. Le Guin’s The Word for World is Forest. Within her novel, Le Guin criticizes the traditional ways of society. Women are seen as an integral part of the Athshean civilization, holding positions of power among their communities. Conversely, the lesser beings of the yumen population viewed women as sexual objects. Equality among

It is known that feminism, both as a theory and as a political movement, is manifold and heterogeneous. Different feminist organizations act in different ways and on different fronts, ranging from cultural actions and population awareness on gender inequality, production of theoretical material and media publication, practical action in peripheral communities, participation in political councils and forums, organizations in women association, participation in electoral disputes among many others.

“The idea that there is only ‘one road’ to the feminist revolution, and only one type of ‘truly feminist’ research, is as limiting and as offensive as male-biased accounts of research that have gone before.” ~Liz Stanley and Sue Wise, 1983, p. 26.