Betty Friedan, The Feminine Mystique (New York:
Norton, 2001).
This book
is seen as one of the pioneering works of Feminism and is seen as the Academic
work that encouraged the Second Wave of Feminism. In 1963 when the book was
first published many were pleased with the book. Jessie Bernard says that it ‘gave
a much-needed shock to those who have unwittingly perhaps encouraged women to
surrender their claims to identity as Human Beings’[1]. Sylvia Fleiss Fava also
adds to this by explaining the book allowed Betty ‘to put her finger on the key
problem of American women today: recognition as individuals’[2]. Both points help to
stress how Betty’s book was a key part of recognising the problem in American society
regarding women and also helping in allowing Women to gain a voice in society.
However, over
the years The Feminine Mystique has been criticised regularly. For example,
Susan Levine states ‘her book articulated underlying discontents among American
Women – in particular, white middle class women’[3]. Katherine Turk supports
this by saying ‘emphatic and nuanced descriptions of the frustration that
gripped many white middle-class women in the early 1960’s’[4]. Both points have support in
an article made on the Atlantic Website by Ashley Fetters who declares that
Betty Frieden’s book was racist and classist[5]. This is a good example of
the criticism given to the book. Another condemnation of the book is one of the
passages that referred to Americans home as ‘comfortable concentration camps’[6]. This was ‘one of the most
shocking passages’[7].
Betty would later retract this statement in public, but it showed again that
this book was not as fantastic or as great as it seems. But maybe she had a
point. David Horowitz adds a third issue when he explains ‘Friedens portrayal as
so totally trapped by the feminine mystique it was part of a reinvention of
herself’[8]. This suggests she was
trying to escape her own life and that she herself felt trapped by her own domestic
environment. Finally, Nancy Whitter adds another problem of the book by affirming
‘a book cannot single-handle spark a social movement. But it can contribute to
change’[9]. Therefore, the book did
not kick start the second wave of feminism it only contributed to invoke change
and new thought.
What the
previous four examples of criticism underline is that the book is not perfect,
and it has several major issues with it. The use of comparing the home to The
Holocaust in the Second World War and the fact it has slight racist tendencies makes
the book quite controversial and confrontational. Nevertheless, it was revolutionary
for women as it allowed them to see a new future instead of the same old way.
As Cynthia Fuchs Epstein says ‘it argued against cultural mandates that it was
best for women and society for them to leave the workplace at marriage become
housewives and mothers of multiple children and support their husband’s
careers’[10]. It was a book that ‘acted as a catalyst for
the Western Feminist Movement’[11]. That, though all its
controversies, is what it should be remembered for. It helped to create that
second wave of Feminism so women could have more individual rights and a freedom
of choices.
[1]Jessie Bernard,
Marriage and Family Living, Vol.25, No.3 (1963), pp.381-82 (p.381).
[2] Sylvia Fleis Fava,
American Sociological Review, Vol.28, No.6 (1963), pp.1053-054 (p.1054).
[3] Susan Levine, ‘The
Feminine Mystique at Fifty’, Frontiers: A Journal of Women Studies,
Vol.36, No. 2 (2015), pp.41-46 (p.41).
[4]Katherine Turk, ‘“To
Fulfil an Ambition of [Her] Own”: Work, Class, and Identity in The Feminine
Mystique’ Frontiers: A Journal of Women Studies, Vol.36, No.2
(2015), pp.25-32 (p.25).
[5]Ashley Fetters, ‘
Four Big Problems with the Feminine Mystique’, https://www.theatlantic.com/world/,
(2013), https://www.theatlantic.com/sexes/archive/2013/02/4-big-problems-with-the-feminine-mystique/273069/.
(Last Accessed 19/03/2021).
[6]Kirsten Fermaglich,
‘"The Comfortable Concentration Camp": The Significance of Nazi
Imagery in Betty Friedan's "The Feminine Mystique"’, American
Jewish History, Vol.91, No.2 (2003), pp.205-32 (p.206).
[7] Ibid.
[8]Daniel Horowitz, ‘Rethinking
Betty Friedan and the Feminine Mystique: Labour Union Radicalism and Feminism
in Cold War America’, American Quarterly, Vol.48, No.1 (1996),
pp. 1-42 (p.2).
[9]Nancy Whittier, ‘Everyday
Readers and Social Movements: Considering the Impact of The Feminine Mystique’,
Gender and Society, Vol.27, No. 1 (2013), pp.112-15. (p.113).
[10]Cynthia Fuchs Epstein,
‘Revisiting "The Feminine Mystique’, Sociological Forum, Vol.29,
No.3 (2014), pp.763-68 (p.764).
[11]Rachel Bowlby, ‘“The Problem with No
Name”: Rereading Friedan's “The Feminine Mystique”’, Feminist Review, No.27 (1987), pp. 61-75, (p.61).
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