Barbara Lloyd McMichael

“A Strange Stirring” — Stephanie Coontz
Basic Books — 248 pages — $25.95

March is Women’s History Month and a good time to check out “A Strange Stirring” by Stephanie Coontz, who teaches history and family studies at The Evergreen State College.

 

In this book, Coontz takes us back to 1963 to re-examine the furor unleashed when a volume called “The Feminine Mystique” hit the bookstores. Its author, Betty Friedan, struck a nerve when she challenged the prevailing assumption of the time that a woman’s place was in the home. The silent question she identified — “Is this all?” — ultimately became a rallying cry for American housewives.

 

Coontz delves into how the social conception of gender roles shifted so dramatically from Rosie-the-Riveter “can-doism” of the World War II era to the acquiescence and subservience of American homemakers just a decade later.

 

She uses a Saturday Evening Post article that came out just weeks before “The Feminine Mystique” was published to illuminate mainstream expectations of the time. The article, based on a Gallup poll, asserted that “few people are as happy as a housewife” and quoted women as saying “the man should be No. 1” and “being subordinate to men is a part of being feminine.”

 

Only a few years earlier, Coontz points out, no less a figure than two-time presidential candidate Adlai Stevenson advised the graduating class of Smith College (a prestigious women’s college) that women could best fulfill their own potential by helping the men in their lives to become “truly purposeful.”

 

This second-class status was reaffirmed in employment practices, bank policies and the legal system.

 

Help wanted ads were divided into male and female sections — with the higher status and more remunerative opportunities offered to men only. When a single woman who had her own credit card got married, she had to relinquish the account to her husband. Women who became pregnant were forced to quit their jobs. Double standards existed in matters concerning community property rights, grounds for divorce, even justification for murder.

 

This litany of imbalance and injustice may seem incredible to readers in the 21st century, but Coontz makes it come alive in interviews she conducted with nearly 200 women and men who had read “The Feminine Mystique” when it first came out. These people reflect on their reactions to Friedan’s book and how it affected their perspectives and subsequent decision-making.

 

In establishing the context for this popular book, Coontz probes why Friedan focused on the plight of middle-class white housewives to the exclusion of equally or even more disadvantaged women.

 

She also dismantles some of the myth that Friedan constructed around herself. In a 1970 interview Friedan commented, “Women needed a movement. So, I guess I started it.” As Coontz clearly demonstrates, many others were engaged in similar work at the same time — Friedan did not always give credit where it was due.

 

Finally, “A Strange Stirring” brings the discussion into the present day, touching on current attitudes toward work, partnerships, parenting and sexuality. It is a thought-provoking exercise.

 

The Bookmonger is Barbara Lloyd McMichael, who writes this column focusing on the books, authors and publishers of the Pacific Northwest. Contact her at bkmonger@nwlink.com.