“I’m beginning to feel I have no personality…I can do it all, and I like it…but who am I?”
-Betty Friedan, The Feminine Mystique
-Betty Friedan, The Feminine Mystique
Historical Context
As a woman who excelled in college, majored in psychology, and acquired a job as a reporter in New York, Betty Friedan was slightly odd in her time. However, that didn’t prevent her from feeling the emptiness of being a housewife. She experienced first hand the unfairness in the work force when her job was given to a man and was fired after her second maternity leave. Many hours at home being dissatisfying, she’d think to herself, “I’m beginning to feel I have no personality…I can do it all, and I like it…but who am I?” Friedan's interest in the topic sparked as she watched four women become simultaneously relieved after realizing they all shared the same “problem." She, too, noticed the lack of commitment to herself and the over emphasis of commitment to her family. She interviewed other women and at that time recognized “the telltale signs” of this problem. During that time feminism, being a wife, mother, and housewife, was the idea many people, substantially the men and the media, advertised as the way to live. Friedan writes, “in all the columns, books and articles experts tell women their role was to seek fulfillment as wives and mothers.” With her statistics and many interviews, she created a research paper, which was denied, however, she did not give up. Soon after, her rejected research paper became the book known as, The Feminine Mystique.
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