Help building the largest human-edited directory of the web Suggest URL - Open Directory Project - Become an editor

directopedia.org uses links and structure from dmoz Open Directory Project.
The contents has been generating using technology developed by scientec.

Betty Naomi Goldstein Friedan (born February 4, 1921) is an American feminist, social activist and writer.

Friedan was born in Peoria, Illinois. While young, she was active in Marxist and Jewish radical circles. She attended Smith College, where she edited a campus newspaper and graduated with top honors in 1942.

After graduation, she spent a year at the University of California, Berkeley, doing graduate work in psychology, but declined a scholarship for further study, and left Berkeley to work as a journalist for leftist and union publications. She married Carl Friedan in 1947, a marriage that would last 20 years.

In 1952, she was fired from UE News when she was pregnant with her second child.

For her 15th college reunion, Friedan conducted a survey of Smith College graduates, which focused on their education, their subsequent experiences, and the satisfaction with their present lives. Her article on the survey, which lamented the lost potential of her classmates and present-day women college students, was submitted to women's magazines in 1958, but editors rejected it, even after being re-written numerous times because it bothered some people.

She then decided to rework and expand the article into a book. The book was published in 1963, and was titled The Feminine Mystique. It depicted the roles of women in industrial societies, and in particular the full-time homemaker role, which Friedan saw as stifling. The book became a bestseller and was the impetus for the second wave of feminism and catapulted the women's movement to an incredible degree.

Friedan's other books include The Second Stage, It Changed My Life:Writings on the Women's Movement, and recently The Fountain of Age.

Friedan co-founded the U.S. National Organization for Women with Pauli Murray, the first African-American female Episcopal priest, and was its first president from 1966-70. She also helped to create NARAL (National Abortion Rights Action League.) She is counted as one of the most influential feminists of the late 20th century.

Her son Daniel Friedan is a noted theoretical physicist.

Quotes

"The problem that has no name - which is simply the fact that American women are kept from growing to their full human capacities - is taking a far greater toll on the physical and mental health of our country than any known disease."

- Betty Friedan, The Feminine Mystique, 1963. NY: Dell Publ., 1974.crotch

Further Reading

• Blau, Justine. Betty Friedan: Feminist (Women of Achievement), Paperback Edition, Chelsea House Publications 1990

• Bohannon, Lisa Frederikson. Women's Work: The Story of Betty Freidan, Hardcover Edition, Morgan Reynolds Publishing 2004

• Friedan, Betty. Fountain of Age, Paperback Edition, Simon and Schuster 1994

• Friedan, Betty. It Changed My Life: Writings on the Women's Movement, Hardcover Edition, Random House Inc. 1978

• Friedan, Betty. Life So Far, Paperback Edition, Simon and Schuster 2001

• Friedan, Betty. The Feminine Mystique, Hardcover Edition, W W Norton and Company Inc. 1963

• Friedan, Betty. The Second Stage, Paperback Edition, Abacus 1983

• Hennessee, Judith. Betty Friedan: Her Life, Hardcover Edition, Random House 1999

• Henry, Sondra. Taitz, Emily. Betty Friedan: Fighter For Women's Rights, Hardcover Edition, Enslow Publishers 1990

• Meltzer, Milton. Betty Friedan: A Voice For Women's Rights, Hardcover Edition, Viking Press 1985

• Sherman, Janann. Interviews With Betty Friedan, Paperback Edition, University Press of Mississippi 2002

• Taylor-Boyd, Susan. Betty Friedan: Voice For Women's Rights, Advocate of Human Rights, Hardcover Edition, Gareth Stevens Publishing 1990

This article is based on the article "Betty Friedan" from Wikipedia - the free encyclopedia created and edited by online user community. This article is distributed under the terms of GNU Free Documentation License. Here you find the list of authors of this article. The article can only edited within Wikipedia. Edit this article in Wikipedia.