Modern Feminist Movement Summary

Women have been active since the beginning of the early 1800’s and struggle until today’s day, to fight for equality. There were two women movement waves. The first wave was focused on the equality of the women by working on voting rights. The second wave from 1963 to 1982 concentrated on social issues. As in “Collective Action for Social Change”, Aaron Schutz and Marie Sandy stated in their book “women were tired of being second class citizens”. The civil rights movement spillover inspired women to create social movements by acting and building organizations focused on the issues that affected the women. The social issues were child care, domestic violence, contraception, and women’s health. One of the major topics that the feminists focused on was domestic violence that still exists in today’s day worldwide.

Women’s rights have evolved over time; beginning with being homemakers and evolving to obtaining professions, acquiring an education, and gaining the right to vote. The movement that created all these revolutionary changes was called the feminist movement. The feminist movement occurred in the twentieth century. Many people are not aware of the purpose of the feminist movement. The movement was political and social and it sought to set up equality for women. Women’s groups in the United States worked together to win women’s suffrage and later to create and support the Equal Rights Amendment. The economic boom between 1917 and the early 1960s brought many American women into the workplace. As women began to join

July 13, 1848 marked the beginning of a movement that would shape the beliefs and rights of today’s society. It was on this day that the fight for social and political equality among America’s women began to develop. This renowned movement, the Women’s Rights Movement, had many goals in which mighty-powerful women would achieve with a mind-set to push them through any barrier or obstacle obstructing their path to equality. Lasting until 1920, the Women’s Rights Movement had a target towards changing how women were treated and looked upon within their “stereotypical” societies. Women advocated their rights through organizations and campaigns, as well as educating others of the unfair justice. With the help of the Women 's Rights Movement and the brave, fearless women who supported this reformation, the fight for women 's liberation was on the move towards success. This historic

Looking back with a historical lens, it’s evident that the fight for women’s rights has progressed in a step wise process. The nineteenth amendment opened a new door of opportunities for women to take advantage of. In modern times, the continued push for equal rights is evident through the fight for reproductive rights and equal pay. Even with the right to vote, women are still being under represented and out of control when it comes to their reproductive rights and in the workplace. Opposing beliefs regarding feminism have prevented the progression of more gender equality in the United States. What originally started as a plea for a political voice helped to shape the history of the nation. Women’s suffrage paved the way for countless groups and further feminist

The women’s rights movement was a huge turning point for women because they had succeeded in the altering of their status as a group and changing their lives of countless men and women. Gender, Ideology, and Historical Change: Explaining the Women’s Movement was a great chapter because it explained and analyzed the change and causes of the women’s movement. Elaine Tyler May’s essay, Cold War Ideology and the Rise of Feminism and Women’s Liberation and Sixties Radicalism by Alice Echols both gave important but different opinions and ideas about the women’s movement. Also, the primary sources reflect a number of economic, cultural, political, and demographic influences on the women’s movement. This chapter

Women in America were not always perceived as equals to men. It took a great deal of blood, sweat, tears, and most of all time, for women reach the quality of life in todays culture. American women had always pushed feminism, but it wasn’t until the time period around World War II, that equality for women initiated to more than a vision. From the 1940’s to the 1960’s there were several phenomena that nudged society in ways that would improve women’s life and bring forth the women’s movement.

Throughout the decades of 1930s through the 1960s, there were many changes happening to women. Women today are fighting for abortion, equal wages, jobs in congress, and many more similar rights. The progressive era was when the fight for these rights began. It started with a group of men and women who collaborated in Seneca Falls, New York to fight for women’s rights movement. During this time, no other public meeting had occurred, but the movement continued to grow. Susan B. Anthony, strong and outspoken advocate of women's rights, pushed for the inclusion of women’s and African-American male vote in the 14th amendment. This was the start of a large change through women’s history.

The role of women in society in the United States has undergone dramatic changes over the past several decades. For instance, an increasing number of women have taken on new responsibilities besides the traditional ones at home and taken up paying work. Besides making up a lot more of the work force than before, more women are also taking up leadership roles and have also made great progress on health issues affecting women. While World War II and the feminist revolution of the Sixties did a lot to redefine gender roles in American society, equality has not yet been fully realized for women in America.

Many women were unhappy trying to fit in and portray the image of the happy suburban housewife. Later that year women were so happy to hear that congress passed the Equal Pay Act, which made it illegal for a woman to be paid less than a man for the exact same job. Three years later, in 1966 the National Organization for Women (NOW) was formed and would demand women be treated equal on the job, with education, and in political participation. Women were becoming increasingly upset with the slow progress of reform. Another female revolt was beginning within the civil rights and student movements that was all about women’s liberation. Women felt that sexual relations, conditions of marriage, and standards of beauty were just as political as civil rights, and fought for women’s freedom (Foner

Before the 1960s, American women were contained within a rut that hindered them from living equally among American men. According to Dixon (1977), women had been without a voice to articulate the injustice and brutality of women’s place and without instrumentality to fight against their exploitation and oppression for nearly forty years. However, “[from] the late 1960s into the 1980s there was a vibrant women’s movement in the United States” (Epstein, 2001). This movement, fueled by feminism, promised drastic improvement in the lives of American women and also promised to “[…] equalize the status of all women” (Dixon, 1977). Due to the uplifting wave of the 1970s women’s movement, females in America anxiously awaited the freedom to live as

3. During the late 1960s and early 1970s, events occurred and organizations were formed to increase awareness of feminism and how it affected society. The Civil Rights Movement had the support of many women. However women were hardly recognized in their participation in the movement. Unrecognition motivated women to found organizations that would be recognized as the “Second Wave” of feminism. In the late 1960s, organizations like the National Organization for Women (NOW) were founded to help put forth the issues women faced during this time. NOW dedicated its focus to employment equality, and later extended its focus to child care,

Eventually Title VII of the 1964 Civil Rights Act passed which “prohibited employment discrimination on the basis of sex as well as race, religion and national origin” (Module 6 pg. 8). A huge political change occurs, “sex” was considered a reason of discrimination and therefore women could now strive for the same equality as their male counterpart. During this era, there started a movement were the Women’s Right Movement began to establish projects that would help women.

While Western Civilization: Volume 2: Since 1500 by Jackson J. Spielvogal and Wikipedia overlap at certain points, Spielvogal’s book provides a large overview of the feminist movement in the 1960s to 1980s. Compared to Spielvogal, Wikipedia goes more in-depth with the people involved, the issues they were fighting for, and the laws they were able to get passed. But even though they have their differences, both are informative and give the reader an acceptable idea as to the feminist movement of the 1960s to 1980s.

The women’s movement began in the nineteenth century when groups of women began to speak out against the feeling of separation, inequality, and limits that seemed to be placed on women because of their sex (Debois 18). By combining two aspects of the past, ante-bellum reform politics and the anti-slavery movement, women were able to gain knowledge of leadership on how to deal with the Women’s Right Movement and with this knowledge led the way to transform women’s social standing (Dubois 23). Similarly, the movement that made the largest impact on American societies of the 1960’s and 1970’s was the Civil Right Movement, which in turn affected the women’s movement (Freeman 513). According to

Although women experienced profound cultural change during the 1960’s many things including a male dominated society, the classic perception of women and opposition to equal work undermined women’s movements. Since the birth of the United States, men dominated almost every part of society. This did not change much during the 1960’s. Other movements, including the civil rights and anti-war movements, were controlled by men. This represents American’s view of women as being inferior to men. Women were kept behind closed doors during these movements because it was not seen as lady-like to publically protest and fight injustices in society. Men also dominated politics during