The Feminine Mystique was a hit as much as it was controversial, with many accusing Friedan of attempting to destroy the American family and demonizing happy housewives. The book centered on how unhappy American housewives were, and the need for women to be more than just a housewife and mother. Influenced by French feminist Simone de Beauvoir and her 1949 book, The Second Sex, Friedan published her own work titled The Feminine Mystique, in 1963. One housewife who had begun to question this “problem that had no name” was Betty Friedan. While the suburban lifestyle became part of the definition of the “American Dream,” for many women who were seen as nothing but a housewife it was anything but a dream. This expectation of domesticity was reflected in pop culture, as well as the emerging consumer culture that targeted suburbanites with items like new household appliances. But suburban life relied heavily on gender expectations and the idea of the nuclear family: where men were expected to be the breadwinner and provider, with women left at home to tend to the kids and all of the household duties such as cooking and cleaning. Post-war economic growth, a booming birth rate, and the development of suburban living appealed to many young families as the nation moved into the 1950s.

With men beginning to return home from the battlefields of World War II in 1945, many Americans were eager for a sense of normalcy.

Students will analyze the work of author Betty Friedan and singer Lesley Gore and their influence on women of the 1960s and 70s. In this lesson, students will investigate second-wave feminism and the fight for women’s liberation in the United States.

The feminine mystique 1963