The Feminine Mystique

After World War II, the nation was blooming. Everything was growing, people were going to college, and wealth grew. The idea of the perfect American life was developed, this included a husband that worked and a wife that stayed home and took care of the house and children. To look at how women are affected by this perfect life I am analyzing “Governor Adlai Stevenson Tells College Women about Their Place in Life, 1955” and “Good Housekeeping: Every Executive Needs a Perfect Wife, 1956”.

In her Feminine Mystique essay, “The Importance of Work”, writer Betty Friedan talks about how the identity crisis of American women beginning about a century ago. More and more of the work that was used by human abilities in which they could find self-realization that was taken from women. The identity crisis for women did not begin in America until the fire, strength, and ability of the pioneer women were no longer needed. Women today whom feel that they have no goal, purpose, or future will commit suicide. Betty Friedan attempts to explain the causes of women’s unhappiness as she tags it, “the problem that has no name”. (Friedan, pg.790, 1963) Friedan’s rhetoric in the essay is constructed and based upon three persuasive techniques, which are known as ethos, pathos, and logos. In her essay, her main goal was to bring about how successful her approach in determining the role of women in society. She did an excellent job at defending her argument with facts from history to back it up.

A house is not a home if no one lives there. During the nineteenth century, the same could be said about a woman concerning her role within both society and marriage. The ideology of the Cult of Domesticity, especially prevalent during the late 1800’s, emphasized the notion that a woman’s role falls within the domestic sphere and that females must act in submission to males. One of the expected jobs of a woman included bearing children, despite the fact that new mothers frequently experienced post-partum depression. If a woman were sterile, her purposefulness diminished. While the Cult of Domesticity intended to create obliging and competent wives, women frequently reported feeling trapped or imprisoned within the home and within societal

The Feminine Mystique is a first person narrative about the struggles of feminism. It highlights the problems of women in the 1950s to the 1960s and challenges gender roles. The book includes several first person interviews and discusses the Second Wave of feminism. It introduces the idea of the sexulization of women being used in consumerism and the lack of sexual education in school during the time. The Feminine Mystique is a useful resource because it is considered the groundbreaking book about feminism and lists issues that women have had to deal with from the 1960s until now. The book could be used to argue the struggles that women have faced and continue to face.

In the Victorian Era an ideal american woman was to be quiet, domestic, obedient, and beautiful. A woman’s role was to take care of children and accommodated guest all while directing glory to her husband was considered her most important duty. The illustration of this theme in americanism was brought to attention by the inner struggles of Edna Pontellier when it came to her domestic life and her duties to her children and husband and the reaction of her peers when she tries to escape them.. Mrs. Pontellier felt trapped in her home life: feeling more like a possession than a person and was met with shock and disdain when she expressed her unhappiness with her life. This reaction of disdain and shock shows how unusual and frowned it was for women to seek a major source of joy outside of her domestic

Based on the poems “Gravy” by Corrie Lynn White and “She lives in a Pat of Butter” by Jade Ramsay, women are forced to be a role model in family life and domesticity. Although women generally need to give a great amount of effort to be the best mother or wife, the social expectations from both of the poems want women to be perfect especially in domestic life. In fact, there was even a time when female domesticity became the culture of some upper and middle class Americans back in the nineteenth century (The Cult of Domesticity). Their purpose was to limit woman’s influences only to family life or handling chores around the home. Both of the poems show that the expectations of seeing every woman must definitely have a happy life after marriage

The American women served many roles. Some of which include nurturing, friendship, companionship, farmer and rancher, and housekeeper. Being a farmer and rancher was of great work. “Peace attended their labor; and they had nothing to alarm them, save the midnight howl of the prowling wolf, or the terrifying shriek of the ferocious panther, as they occasionally visited their improvements, to take a lamb or a calf to satisfy their hunger” (Seaver, (1992), p.63). As farming and ranching was the man way of life for those who lived in the rural areas, these American women needed to be on watch for their land and livestock when the men weren’t around. Along with this, these American women still served as the role maker for their other roles. They

Today has been a rather exciting day! I was summoned by my colleagues to a dig site in Florida in which my colleagues had unearthed a time capsule from the 1960’s. After clearing off the capsule and carefully opening we found an assortment of things that gave us insight into the era of the 1960’s. With it being the year 2325 and the 1960’s being over 365 years ago it was astonishing to see the items we found within the capsule. Some of the items we came across were a picture from a rocket launch dated May 5, 1961; a newspaper clipping from the day President Kennedy was assassinated, a book “The Feminine Mystique” by Betty Friedan’s,

Betty Friedan wrote the Feminine Mystique in 1963. It acted as a catalyst that started discussion of the elephant in suburbia’s living rooms. Wives and mothers were fed up with simply being wives and mothers and wanted to do more with their lives. While this may seem like a simple issue with a simple fix such as getting a hobby or extracurricular activity, Friedan present’s this as a multidimensional issue rooted deep within the nation’s history.

The Feminine Mystique is the title of a book written by the late Betty Friedan who also founded The National Organization for Women to help US women gain equal rights. I choose this topic because there has been a lot of media on the feminine moment and how it’s being negatively looked upon so I wanted to learn a little of how it started. She describes the "feminine mystique” she talks about the expectations women had and the box they had to fit in even as young girls, how being an uneducated girl wasn’t out of the norm and finally the role of wife/mother well really the housewife that all she does is clean nonstop stay pretty and always have a smile on her face

This article focuses on Betty Friedan and the Feminine Mystique. Fraterrigo examines the Feminine Mystique and the problem has no name. She focuses on Friedan disapproval of housework bring an ultimate fulfillment for a woman. Friedan says that society encourages women to embrace the role of a wife and mother. She blamed advertisers, experts, and educators for encouraging woman’s place in the home. During those time, women chose security over striving for a sense of self, because the only occupation they were encouraged to have was a housewife. The woman was confined

The Feminine Mystique, a novel written in 1963 by Betty Friedan, provided a strong wake up call for women in America about a problem that was negatively impacting them, but not spoken of. After women fought so hard in the 1930's for the right to vote and equality with men in many areas, the author describes how changes in attitude after World War II were convincing women that their most important role is to get married, have kids and take care of the home. However, these women then felt an emptiness and loss of purpose which led to depression and many other problems. Friedan’s book is very effective, for it is written like a thesis, filled with facts and first hand accounts to support her ideas and beliefs. She uses many different sources

Feminist critics seek to recognize the ways in which women are oppressed socially, politically, economically, and psychologically in a given society. Women cannot be satisfied due to the fact of their own gender being a superstructure. The “mystique” essence people use as the excuse for not being able to relate to women is impractical. The feminine mystique is the artificial notion that a woman’s “role” is to be a housewife. Women are at war with themselves based primarily by the influences and received idea on them and their place in society. It is an unanswered questions, why women cannot feel satisfied, and I believe it has to do with the relationships between a mother and daughter, as well as former stereotypes lingering in the minds. Women in the working world want their daughters to stay in the home, and the women who stay in the home want their daughters to distinguish themselves with education and/or a career. Why there is a reversal, I have no idea. But again, why is there a struggle with the women identity? Throughout the book, The Feminine Mystique written by Betty Friedan, it is apparent women are never satisfied with their identity from the affects by having a patriarch society. The problem that has no name will stay a mystery because the overwhelming stereotypes of women are conflicting within one another.

A key catalyst in the public reawakening of feminist consciousness was the publication in 1963 of Betty Friedan’s The Feminine Mystique. It’s most far-reaching impact on American society was the emergence of “second wave” feminism. Her opening chapter, “The Problem That Has No Name,” painted a devastating picture of talented, educated women trapped in a world that viewed marriage and motherhood as their primary goals. Somehow, after more than a century of agitation for access to the public sphere, women’s lives still centered on the home. The suburban housewife, widely pictured as the embodiment of the American dream, in fact lived lives of “desperation,” she wrote. Like the African American civil rights movement, The Feminist Mystique focused

Reading this book had made me realize a lot in life, well more on being a woman. I just hope I was able to read this during my youth. It just made me think and ask like what if this book was never published? Are women back then would have the courage to even fight for their rights? Or be awakened to what they think the way a women should be living their life should be? Even the title to me is a bit intriguing; “The Feminist Mystique” I literally searched the definition to find if what I think of the definition in fact the definition is that I know of. According to Merriam -Webster dictionary “Feminine means having qualities or appearance traditionally associated with women, especially delicacy and prettiness” and “Mystique is a word that originated in France and it is defined as a special quality that makes a person or thing interesting or exciting. Maybe this is one of the reason women in 50s’ are more “feminine” than now. This title itself made it more interesting for me try to comprehend what the writer Betty Freidan was trying to convey to her audiences. Published and Written by Bettye Naomi Goldstein Born on February 4th 1921 in Peoria, Illinois United States. Her parents were Jewish and were originally from Hungary and Russia. She attended college Smith College where she was the head of their