Date: Sunday, September 18, 2016
Time: 4:00 - 6:00 PM
Location: Vinotecca, 417 S Main St, Royal Oak, MI 48067
Cost: Everyone pays for themselves
Parking: Free on Sundays
Point of contact: Irina Sullivan irina.n.sullivan@gmail.com
Other info:
Discussing My Life on the Road by Gloria Steinem
Review of The Feminine Mystique by Betty Friedan
Review by Irina Sullivan
In-brief: A feminist classic (and deservedly so!), the book is a must-read, however, limitations apply.
When I recommended this classic work for us to read as a group I didn't do it because I thought it would be specifically relevant to the issues still plaguing women in the workplace and at home, nor because I thought it would stir much controversy within or among us. That, however, is exactly what I got. Just about everyone familiar with the title knows that the gist of this book first published in 1963 is a call for a change to the 1950's American model of womanhood that a woman's only rightful place is at home, doing housecleaning, and raising children. As many of us at the club are working mothers, we could hardly disagree, but I did find Friedan's tone and explanation far more unyielding and uncompromising than any logic may permit. Despite the many joys and sorrows of dividing my life between a home and a career, I wouldn't agree with Friedan that a stay-at-home mother, for instance, infantilizes her son, makes him a homosexual, causes her children to become autistic, promiscuous, or bored. While these uninformed assertions have long been discredited by others and are not central to the thesis of the book, today we understand the human experience far better than to view at-home parenting as unable to provide a wholesome upbringing. And may be this realization is for the better. Especially because, in all the ways a female experience of the 50's and 60's, described so eloquently by Friedan, still resonates with us, we have this and other hard-won progress to claim in the 50 years that passed.
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