Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Preface
- Acknowledgments
- PART ONE RETROSPECT
- PART TWO EIGHT REVOLUTIONS
- 6 Affluence
- 7 From Isolation to International Hegemonic Power
- 8 The Rise of the Military in American Society
- 9 The Reorganization of American Business
- 10 The Revolution in Racial Relations
- 11 The Revolution in Gender-Based Roles
- 12 Revolution in Sexual Behavior
- 13 The Demise of Privacy
- PART THREE COUNTERREVOLUTION
- PART FOUR EPILOGUE
- Index
11 - The Revolution in Gender-Based Roles
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 June 2012
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Preface
- Acknowledgments
- PART ONE RETROSPECT
- PART TWO EIGHT REVOLUTIONS
- 6 Affluence
- 7 From Isolation to International Hegemonic Power
- 8 The Rise of the Military in American Society
- 9 The Reorganization of American Business
- 10 The Revolution in Racial Relations
- 11 The Revolution in Gender-Based Roles
- 12 Revolution in Sexual Behavior
- 13 The Demise of Privacy
- PART THREE COUNTERREVOLUTION
- PART FOUR EPILOGUE
- Index
Summary
In a great number of societies men's sureness of their sex role is tied up with their right, or ability, to practice some activity that women are not allowed to practice. Their maleness, in fact, has to be underwritten by preventing women from entering some field or performing some feat.
Margaret MeadHumanity is now in the early phases of a transformation in the meanings of gender and the place of women and men in every society. The general direction of the change is clear: the lives and personalities of women and men are becoming more similar.
Daniel LevinsonThe new way in which white Americans regarded racial minorities was matched in the seventies by a dramatic change in attitudes toward women, and by women, about social roles based on gender. For the first time in modern history, maybe in all history, challenges to assumptions about women's place in society – in the family, in their relationship to their husbands and children, in the business and professional world, in government and politics – enjoyed significant success. Before 1970, it was common for both men and women to argue that women must be treated differently than men in law and in manners, that they must have different ambitions or aspirations, and, moreover, that women had of necessity unique social and family obligations. After 1970, such views would drift outside the mainstream.
In many ways the change was truly revolutionary. Almost certainly no one in the fifties would have predicted it.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- America TransformedSixty Years of Revolutionary Change, 1941–2001, pp. 137 - 156Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2006