Our nation is entirely different from what it was 60 years ago. If you compare the 50's to our modern 2013, the way the family, motherhood and the American Dream is percieved is drastically different. In the 50's, woman's main responsibility was motherhood and raising children, while the father was out working to gain success and maybe be able to reach the American Dream of successful lives with the white picket fence. Now, in 2013, the family has been changed to be single parents, divorced parents, married and many other types of parents, with kids, stepchildren, adoptive, foster. The American Dream is simply to have a job to uphold you, and for some, to make their career the foremost responsibility to reach their greatest potential. My question is to see how feminist literature has enhanced the feminist movement, and how that has affected the society we live in now, whether for the good or the worst.
Policy Claim:
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| Feminist Literature from the 1890's |
To be able to understand our current world, a person should read the feminist literature to help them understand the feminist movement and it's affects on our society.
Definition Claim:
Feminist literature is a large part of feminism, which has changed the way our modern society functions.
Comparison Claim:
Feminist literature made a larger affect on society in the 60's than it did when a lot of it was written in the late 19th and early 20th century.
Evaluation Claim:
Pre-feminist movement literature was better than the current feminist literature and articles written in our day.
Cause and Effect Claim:
The use of feminist literature during the feminist movement has changed the perception of woman and their roles and responsibilities in family, business and educational lives.
I definitely like your policy and evaluation claims. I think I'm more inclined for your evaluation statement simply because pre-feminist movement literature still held a value for men in society. I recently came across a book on Facebook on men not marrying and raising families anymore because of the modern feminist movement.
ReplyDeleteThis is really interesting I am actually writing a similar paper to this, but more from the male perspective of how things have changed since the 50's and 60's. It'll be cool to see what we come up with.
ReplyDeleteThese claims are all too broad. You cannot begin to address or even give a definition or short history of the feminist movement in six pages. Also, you need to make literature (and specific works of literature) more central to your main argument. Solve both problems at once by making a claim about a specific work of literature rather than such a sweeping thing as feminism.
ReplyDeleteSome authors to look at are Kate Chopin, Simone de Beauvoir, Mary Wollstonecraft, Susan B. Anthony, Betty Friedan, and Gloria Steinem. The Feminine Mystique is the first work that pops into my head as one that had an actual effect in the real world. (I don't think we saw a rash of privileged female suicides after the publication of The Awakening, but hey, you could argue that angle if you find evidence for it.) That's a very twentieth-century work, though.
DeleteThis is basically a tweak of your Comparison Claim, but using actual '60s literature. Analyzing Friedan's rhetorical claims as compared to, say, Wollstonecraft's, could be more focused.
Also, I personally believe literature is as much reflective of the society that's already there (written by women, in this case, who live in that society) as a driving force for change. To paraphrase another midcentury figure, Don Draper, "we can't sell people what they don't already want."
Thank you so much for your comment, it will help me a lot with my paper.
DeleteI like the idea you're getting at with your last claim. As mentioned in other comments it might help to clarify one specific work that has changed the perception of women. Do you plan to stick to how women perceive themselves or how others perceive women (employers, spouses, etc.). Choosing one audience to perceive women might help focus your paper.
ReplyDelete