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Betty Friedan and the Women's Movement in America
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On the front of eulogizing retrospection, it’s been the week of Coretta Scott King, and rightly so. But there’s another woman — another super woman — who died last Saturday having changed the world.

Feminist Betty Friedan blew the doors off the lives of quiet desperation of American women of the 1950s. Her earth-shaking book “The Feminine Mystique” pulled the trigger on history, said Alvin Toefler, and sent a generation of women storming out of the kitchen and into the political and economic fray.

Now, a new generation of women is picking and choosing from the feminist revolution.

Hear a conversation with women, across generations, on the legacy of Betty Friedan.

Guests:

Caryl Rivers, professor of journalism, Boston University and author of “Same Difference: How Gender Myths Are Hurting Our Relationships, Our Children, And Our Jobs” with Rosalind Barnett. Her forthcoming book is “Monsters, Mommies and Madonnas” about the representation of women in the media.

Megan Greer, a 23-year-old first-year law student at Harvard Law School and a member of the Alliance of Independent Feminists, a campus organization of moderate, conservative and libertarian women.

Masum Momaya, 28-year-old doctoral student in the Harvard School of Education. She is on the board of the Third Wave Foundation, an organization that supports young women and transgender activism.

 
  • http://www.facebook.com/people/Timothy-A-Dixon/1157625445 Timothy A Dixon

    Excellent recommendation.  Great discussion.  It’s very interesting how history has unfolded since 2006.  As it turns out, the conservative Third Wave Feminists have doubled-down on  non-vigilant stances with regard to protecting and expanding the rights of women and the result was a clobbering in the 2012 presidential race.  Thanks for sharing this program…I want to see equal opportunities for my wife, daughters, nieces, aunts, cousins and my mother.  

    Hey producers, consider this re-run if you ever need impromptu cover for a Tom absence.  

  • Erica Montano

    I have been in the same situation as the last caller. I worked in Financial Services and all women were in supportive roles, most of us were secretaries. All of the managers were men. It was like Mad Men. I recently went into a job interview/orientation at a Financial Service type firm, a very large global firm for an internship. In our group there were 20 male students and 2 female students being interviewed. When my first interviewer started talking to me about football, I realized that I either have to turn into a man or start absorbing parts of white affluent male culture in this country. 

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