The World Split Open: How the Modern Women's Movement Changed America

by Ruth Rosen

The Newly Revised and Updated Edition

In this enthralling narrative-the first of its kind-historian and journalist Ruth Rosen chronicles the history of the American women's movement from its beginnings in the 1960s to the present. Interweaving the personal with the political, she vividly evokes the events and people who participated in our era's most far-reaching social revolution. Rosen's fresh look at the recent past reveals fascinating but little-known information including how the FBI hired hundreds of women to infiltrate the movement. Using extensive archival research and interviews, Rosen challenges readers to understand the impact of the women's movement and to see why the revolution is far from over.

Genres: History, Feminism, Nonfiction, Politics, American History, Gender, Womens

544 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2000

Reviews

[Tope · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a very good introduction to second wave feminism from a historical perspective - that is, if one is willing to overlook its significant limitations. Rosen focuses almost exclusively on white, middle-class feminism and has very little to say about black or Chicana women's movements. Minority women's experiences and movements are relegated to a few cursory paragraphs inserted (in what at times seems a random fashion) into a narrative mainly concerned with white feminism.

To be honest, I didn't really expect Rosen to say much of substance about minority women's movements, but it would have been nice to see her acknowledge in a more explicit fashion that she is approaching the history of the second wave from a particular angle. More troubling was the fact that, in the one chapter in which Rosen does discuss race at length, she does so from an overwhelmingly white perspective. This is particularly odd given that she is discussing white women's experiences of sexism as members SNCC, a mostly black student activist organization. To discuss black male sexism in a black organization only from the perspective of white women, without giving much of a voice to black female members of the organization, and without giving any voice at all to the black male members, seems to me to be an odd and problematic approach.

Long story short, if you're interested in learning more about minority women's movements in the sixties and seventies, this is not the book for you. In other respects, however, this is an excellent book. Rosen does a fantastic job of explaining the severe cultural anxieties and tensions over gender roles that characterized white middle class society in the fifties and sixties, the generational gap between baby boomers and their parents which led to the rise of the New Left, women's increasing disillusionment with men in the New Left and the formation of a separate women's movement, and the impact of the women's movement in American homes and workplaces. If nothing else it is a compelling account of how the women's movement dramatically changed American culture to the degree that subsequent generations of women find it difficult to imagine just how restrictive life before the movement was for their mothers and grandmothers. So I would recommend this book for anyone interested in learning more about the women's movement, with the caveat that it offers a limited perspective on the movement.

[Erik Graff · Rating 3 out of 5]

A little too dense with names to be an easy read but a good general survey of women's movements in the United States during the second half of the 20th century. Author Rosen was there for much of it and occasionally puts herself in the thematic narrative.

Personally, I'm more fortunate than I had known for having been just a little too young to have experienced the conflicts over feminisms in the New Left with which I identified. At Grinnell College in 1969/70 the left was basically 'run' by a senior-year couple, the woman being dominant, and both female and male consciousness raising groups existed without conflict, the latter of which, to which I belonged, being primarily concerned with matters of gender identity. (Grinnell gets one mention and that for the Playboy demonstration in 1968/69--a factor in my choosing the school).

The overturning of Roe v. Wade was decisive in leading me to this book. May the response be as powerfully fertile as the 'Second Wave Feminism' described herein was!

[Olivia Ramsey · Rating 4 out of 5]

a very well-written and well-researched look into the modern women’s movement! this book was incredibly readable and interesting, although any book on feminist history/theory usually ends up filling me with a very specific type of existential dread that men will simply never understand.

“But valuing women’s difference only underscored a central paradox of feminism, namely, how to pursue equality while still honoring women’s difference from men.” ugh.

rosen’s book is certainly not without its flaws—namely, the very little discussion of minority women’s experiences (though that omission is an aspect of rosen’s argument). the book is definitely a product of its time—it was published in 2000—but knowing that, rosen’s choice of argument makes more sense.

read for school, postwar u.s history

[Jela · Rating 4 out of 5]

The World Spilt Open: How the Modern Women’s Movement Changed American, written by Professor of history at U. C. Berkeley, celebrated journalist and feminist, Ruth Rosen is not only a thoroughly researched and well written documentation of the modern women’s movement. However, it also stands as a personal record of the author’s own experiences as well as those of many other women, whose personal accounts fill the book, bringing the reader closer to the history. Rosen sets out to accomplish a mammoth task in adding a comprehensive history of the modern American women’s movement to the growing gender studies literature. Rosen asserts, “American political culture shaped feminism, and the women’s movement, in its turn, has transformed that culture.” She also goes on to explain that although as most readers know that American feminism bore out of the political culture of the 1950’s and 1960’s, it also is rooted in class politics, evolution of religious traditions and changing feelings towards centralized government (xiv). By using relying heavily on primary sources and oral interviews, Rosen succeeds in giving the reader an inside view of the women who experienced, felt, responded and created the movement and the opportunities that women today have available to them.

Rosen begins her book with a lengthy timeline that traces the American women’s movement from 1848, when married woman gained the right to own property to 2006 and the death of author of the Feminine Mystique Betty Friedan; however, for the rest of the book she focuses on the post- World War II period. Rosen begins by demonstrating the importance that Betty Friedan’s Feminine Mystique was in influencing American housewives to speak out about the “quiet desperation” that they felt as they spent their lives devoted to home and hearth and little else. Many of these suburban housewives felt pressured to stay home by the social rules, their husbands and even to combat Communism and the Feminine Mystique showed them they were not alone in their isolation.

Rosen goes on to demonstrate the problems that women faced in their quest to utilize their higher education, the opposition they experienced in the workplace and confusion they felt in the bedroom. All of these experiences along with the shackles of the Feminine Mystique laid the groundwork for future challenges to the status quo, which would later ignite the fires of activism, especially in their daughters, who did not want to grow up to live the lives their mothers had.

The author goes on to describe each victory and set back women faced during this turbulent time. For instance, the addition of the word “sex” to Title VII and the subsequent “Bunny Law” backlash it created, the founding of the National Organization of Women (NOW) by nervous but courageous women, including its first president, Mystique author Freidan and how NOW was not radical enough for the young women participating in the women’s liberation movement. Rosen does an excellent job of letting the reader peer into the lives of the activists and the juxtaposition of their activist life versus the life they lead when they came home and “slept with the men they had just criticized in front of other women” (133). Even as activists, women faced opposition even within their own movement, experiencing harassment, jeering and threats, which encouraged them to branch out into other political arenas, making a change from organizations such as the New Left to ones that supported their need for equality.

Her strongest section is the section on the role sex played within activist culture. Rosen demonstrates sex within activist culture contradicted the feelings of value the women placed on themselves and the ideals for which they were fighting. Even further, some women who had once believed in the common creed, “Make Love, Not War” found that in it laid another sexual pressure, the pressure to say, “Yes” (147). This section also illuminates subjects as the Hidden Injury of Sex, such as “the faked orgasm,” lesbianism, birth control, rape and pornography.

Rosen’s technique makes for an interesting and deeply personal read. Her use of personal accounts, excerpts from oral interviews and a veritable reading list of books and articles is a recipe for understanding feminism and the American women’s movement. She does a good job of showing the reader their plight affected many women of this period and how they turned it into victories they could relish, using their own words, in turn making the history tangible to the reader. However, Rosen relies too heavily on Betty Freidan as the catalyst for changes made in the American women’s movement. Surely, other women had just as much of an influence on the women of this period. In addition, her small section on 1996 Welfare Reform is deceiving, as many of the TANF programs are accomplishing their goals, as countless poverty level women owe their success to these programs and subsidies (including education, housing, childcare and healthcare) they provide low-income families. Despite this criticism, the book is exhaustive in its aim is an easy read and its use would be welcomed in both undergraduate and graduate Gender Studies or American history courses and would be an excellent choice for those wishing to foray into the studies of the modern American women’s movement.

[Aisha Manus · Rating 5 out of 5]

If you ever wanted to know anything about the women's rights movement of the 1960s and early 1970s than this is the perfect book for that. It's clear, engaging, and easy to read without losing its place as an outstanding academic source. I highly recommend this book.

[Justice Tinker · Rating 3 out of 5]

A well written book that explores the complexities of second-wave feminism and other forms of feminism. Had to read for a class and I found several chapters enjoyable. I just think at times this book felt very dense and several pages kind of blurred into one.

[Joy H.]

RE: The World Split Open: How the Modern Women's Movement Changed America by Ruth Rosen

Added 3/18/10.
READ A SAMPLE HERE: https://play.google.com/books/reader?...

I first heard about this book at our local library's book group when someone mentioned it in passing while we were discussing the book Mudbound. As our group leader has said: "Our conversation evolved to explore the issue of oppression in general - from the roots of racism to the foundations of feminism."

Below is an excerpt from the GR description:
=================================
Ruth Rosen introduces her book by reminding readers of discriminatory practices that were common in pre-1960s America: "Harvard's Lamont Library was off-limits to women for fear they would distract male students. Newspaper ads separated jobs by sex; bars often refused to serve women; some states even excluded women from jury duty; no women ran big corporations or universities, worked as firefighters or police officers."
=================================
Them's fighting words! :)

ADDENDUM: 4/1/13
The World Split Open :
The World Split Open: How the Modern Women's Movement Changed America
by Ruth Rosen

I wondered about the origin of the above title: "The World Split Open".

The title comes from the following quote:
"What would happen if one woman told the truth about her life?
The world would split open."
-line from a poem* by Muriel Rukeyser (1913-1980)

*NOTE: The above lines are from a poem by Muriel Rukeyser. My research indicates that the poem is entitled: "Kathe Kollwitz" and that it can be found in the book: Out of Silence: Selected Poems (first published 1992) by Muriel Rukeyser, Kate Daniels (Editor).

SEE THE POEM HERE: http://iambecauseweare.wordpress.com/...

[Käthe Kollwitz (1867-1945) was a German painter, printmaker, and sculptor whose work offered an eloquent and often searing account of the human condition, and the tragedy of war, in the first half of the 20th century.]-wiki

ABOUT THE BOOK OF POEMS MENTIONED ABOVE:
http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/75...
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0810...

MORE about Ruth Rosen's book, The World Split Open:
https://play.google.com/store/books/d...
READ A SAMPLE HERE: https://play.google.com/books/reader?...

See this same info at my topic at my Goodreads group:
http://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/3... [MESSAGE #37]

[Jonathan · Rating 2 out of 5]

Full of detail but deeply flawed. Rosen embraces a single-track concept of progress and evidently cannot fathom other models of social reform or regeneration. To be sure, she does depict the contradictions of the women's liberation movement. In fact, her model actually makes these contradictions appear fatal because she assumes that all forms of feminism fall along a single trajectory and belong to a single tradition. Yet she dismisses out of hand any suggestion that this movement could have been counterproductive. For someone who evidently admires pioneering leftist women, she never considers the implications of the socialists' idea that bourgeois liberty and self-fulfillment mask exploitation and degradation. She captures a variety of voices within the movement pretty well, but has a terrible tin ear for any voices critical of it. Sometimes she just gets her facts wrong; she writes, for example, that Christopher Lasch was a critic of feminism but not consumerism, which is something one could say only if one slept through everything Lasch ever published or said. She also tries to pass off tendentious interpretations as facts; the timeline at the beginning of the book, for instance, labels the Meese Commission's report on pornography -- a report praised by some leading feminists -- as an expression of "backlash." (So, apparently, was the invasion of Iraq. I'm still puzzling over that one.) With so much interpretive weirdness in the sections concerning things I know, I simply don't trust Rosen to be right about things I don't know.

[Heather · Rating 5 out of 5]

My professor wrote this book and she was fabulous! I was actually in her very last class ever; she job changed to be a newspaper editor and I felt very lucky to have her. I didn't want to take a "woman" class but she taught me about so much in my life that I take for granted that for my mom's generation were new things (think birth control pill, etc.). Highly recommend this book!!

[Mert · Rating 3 out of 5]

3/5 Stars (%65/100)

I used this book quite a lot in my gender course. Even though this is essentially a historical book, it was very easy and fun to read compared to many other books I've read on this subject. There is a lot of useful information in the book. There are many specific examples and quotations in each chapter. The book is organized good but some chapters are too long.

[Oliver · Rating 5 out of 5]

Im 6'1 btw

[Steven H · Rating 5 out of 5]

A MARVELOUS HISTORICAL AND JOURNALISTIC ACCOUNT OF THE WOMEN’S MOVEMENT

Ruth Rosen is an author and journalist, who is Professor Emerita of history at the University of California at Davis.

She wrote in the Preface to this 2000 book, “This is not a book just about an isolated section of society… Many readers… probably know that American feminism was shaped by the political culture of the fifties and sixties. But it also developed out of much longer and deeper political traditions---such as the disestablishment of religion as a state force and a profound distrust of centralized government… individual enterprise and initiatives; a class politics expressed mostly through race and gender… and a deep and abiding belief that in America one can always reinvent oneself.” (Pg. xiv)

She continues, “I did not write this book only for my generation, those of us raised to live as traditional women, whose lives were dramatically disrupted and transformed by the power of feminist insights… This book is also written for those women and men who did not participate in the women’s movement, who were too busy trying to survive, who felt excluded or estranged, were not yet born, are still not born.” (Pg. xv-xvi)

She notes that “[Simone] De Beauvoir [in ‘The Second Sex’] was not the first person to write of women’s subordination. But she was the first to address women’s modern dilemma---the fact that they possessed basic political rights yet suffered from extreme cultural, social, and economic marginality. Nor was her work without flaws… Her emphasis on individual choice ignored a movement’s need for solidarity and her wistful prediction that socialism would end female oppression underestimated the powerful constraints of class and race, as well as those of religion and global politics.” (Pg. 57)

In the late 1960s, “The rights of lesbians… proved to be [a] divisive issue… In 1969 and again in 1970 Betty Friedan had labeled lesbianism a ‘lavender menace’ that threatened to taint the women’s movement. Angry at being ‘purged’ by her assaults, many lesbians left the organization [NOW]. In 1971, after years of hiding in the organizational closet, lesbians demanded that NOW pass a resolution recognizing their civil rights… In 1973, NOW… repositioned the granting of rights to lesbianism and sexual preference as but another extension of civil rights.” (Pg. 83)

She reports that “In March 1968, an article by Martha Lear… in the New York Times Magazine… [titled] ‘The Second Feminist Wave’ christened the movement with a name that connected it to ‘first wave’ feminism in the suffrage movement.” (Pg. 85)

She recounts that Mary King recalled a meeting of SNCC, in which Stokely Carmichael said, “’What is the position of women in SNCC?’ Answering himself, he responded, ‘The position of women in SNCC is PRONE!’ Stokely threw back his head and roared outrageously with laughter. We all collapsed with hilarity…. It drew us all close together, because, even in that moment, he was poking fun at his own attitudes... His joke offended neither King nor [Casey] Hayden, who, at the time, regarded Stokely Carmichael as one of the men most sympathetic to their position paper.” (Pg. 108-109)

She reports on the September 7, 1968 protest at the Miss American pageant: “Into a large ‘Freedom Trash Can,’ [female protesters] threw ‘instruments of torture’---girdles, curlers, false eyelashes, cosmetics … and yes, bras… the plan was to light a fire in the can… Asked by a reporter why the city objected to the protest, Robin Morgan replied that the mayor had been concerned about fire safety… she added, ‘We told him we wouldn’t do anything dangerous---just a symbolic bra-burning.’ … by September 28, the [New York] Times referred to ‘bra burnings’ as though they had actually happened. By then, the media … had ignited … the most tenacious media myth about the women’s movement---that women ‘libbers’ burned their bras as a way of protesting their status in American society.” (Pg. 160)

In the 1980s, “The ‘anti-anti-pornography movement drew a variety of activists… [Some] attacked the antiporn movement for equating sex with abuse and humiliation… At times, the pornography wars seemed to deepen the gulf between straight women and lesbians… As Susan Brownmiller remembered it, ‘[One lesbian] took the microphone and said, “We do all the work in this movement and you go home and s_ck c__k.’ And I said, ‘If you hate men so much, why are you dressed in men’s clothes?’” (Pg. 193)

She recounts, “‘My feminist generation ate our leaders,’ wrote Phyllis Chesler. ‘Beheading of leaders was the name of the game in those days,’ recalled Ann Snitow. Trashing had ‘happened in the black movement and it had happened in the peace movement,’ recalled Susan Brownmiller, ‘but they didn’t destroy their leaders quite the way we did.’” (Pg. 232)

After the Redstockings accused Gloria Steinem of working with the CIA, “[Betty] Friedan compounded Steinem’s difficulties … by implying that a ‘paralysis of leadership’ in the women’s movement ‘could be due to the CIA.’ … Steinem didn’t respond, fearing that people would only remember the charges and not her answers.” (Pg. 236)

She continues, “Later, Friedan would conclude that the FBI has likely infiltrated… various NOW national conventions… [This] is just one example of how some feminists attributed the divisions within the movement---or the backlash against the movement---to intelligence activities.” (Pg. 253) Later, she observes, “This was hardly the first time in history that social activists became increasingly dogmatic as a movement grew larger and more diverse.” (Pg. 259)

She notes that “In 1993, Rebecca Walker founded The Third Wave, a multi-issue activist group whose average age was 25… To distinguish themselves from Second Wave feminists… it was the instability of identity, as well as the search for contradictions, that created her generation’s distinctive perspective.” (Pg. 276)

She points out, “black women… took an active part in shaping feminism in national organizations… With the collapse of the black nationalist movement, African-American women felt freer to take a second look at the sexism within their own community…. African-American women soon became engaged in what was now called ‘the black family quarrel.’” (Pg. 282-283)

She laments, “President Carter sent legislative recommendations to Congress and issued an executive order to establish a standing National Advisory Committee for women. But the recommendations were never implemented. By then, the New Right had created cultural and political gridlock. With the election of Ronald Reagan in 1980, memories of Houston would quickly [begin] to seem like a dream from a distant past.” (Pg. 294)

She reports, “What really shocked and demoralized many veteran feminists was Betty Friedan’s critique of the women’s movement in her book ‘The Second Stage.’ … Friedan tried to promote a new agenda that would… isolate radicals and bring the women’s movement into the mainstream of American life… some feminists viewed Friedan’s new emphasis on family life as ‘a reactionary retreat.’” (Pg. 335)

This book (which is exceptional in its providing DETAILS and EXACT QUOTES of famous statements) will be of great interest to anyone studying the women’s movement.

[Harley · Rating 3 out of 5]

I had to read this for my Recent American History class. If it wasn't for this class I never would have picked this book up. For the most part I more or less skimmed this. The subject matter of the book is not one that interests me, I'm more of an American Revolution kind of person. I did like how this book was easy to read and understand. It flew by fairly quickly. That being said I don't ever see myself picking this book up just for fun, or to even fully read it properly. This is just not something I am interested in reading.

[Jane · Rating 4 out of 5]

"The young women of today, free to study, to speak to write, to choose their occupation, should remember that every inch of their freedom was bought for them at a great price. It is for them to show their gratitude by helping onward the reforms of their own times, by spreading the light of freedom and truth still wider. The debt that each generation owes to the past it must pay to the future." (19th century suffragette Abigail Scott Duniway)

[Emmy M · Rating 4 out of 5]

4.5 a great deep dive into the women's movement and how consciousness-raising practices transform understanding. I think in a few spots Rosen would improve on investigating the impact of medical and technical knowledge on consciousness-raising and subsequently the impact on the women's movement.

In the end though Rosen has outlined that the women's movement functions by taking one step forward 2 steps back so this gives me some hope that even in the state of America right now the women's movement has hope.

[Brooke Agnew · Rating 4 out of 5]

Read this book for a class, learned so much about the Women's Movement in America and how it was formed out of other Civil Rights movements. Enjoyed learning about the movement and the major players involved in it. Also loved that Rosen included Black women and their role in the movement and did not tip toe around the struggles within the movement itself.

[Pri Srinivasa · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of the best feminist history books I have ever read. Rosen clearly describes second wave. A beginner's must-read to understanding historical feminist discourses in the west.

[Michael Murphy · Rating 5 out of 5]

A comprehensive history of the Women's Movement. Rich in detail and well-documented. A solid historical effort.

[Fernanda Amis]

turns out no one knows anything about second-wave feminism. well read this then. i feel like a genius

[Eliza Reynolds · Rating 4 out of 5]

so interesting! really made me see my grandmother and the history of women in this country in a different light

[Jillian · Rating 4 out of 5]

read for my sex and the sixties history class. great summary of second wave feminism. honestly very jarring at times.

[loey · Rating 3 out of 5]

As others have noted, this book gives a decent historical timeline of second wave feminism, but it focuses almost entirely on white feminists.

[Talia Levy · Rating 5 out of 5]

The Evolution and Stagnancy of The Women's Rights Movement
The World Split Open written by Ruth Rosen is extremely telling and raw in its depiction of the evolution of the women’s rights movement in America and its impact on the world. The book chronologically explains the challenges women faced and endured over time along with their lasting effects and social impacts. One of the most complex and greatest challenges this group has yet to overcome is the fact that women have not been and are not completely free. From the beginning of this movement in the early twentieth century to the present day, the government has had its hand in holding women back from achieving the same titles, positions, and respect that come so easily to the Christian, heterosexual, white man through the push for consumerism, stereotypes, as well as the Cold War.
Stereotypically, the sole job of a woman in society is to be a mother and wife. However, the twentieth century brought about a third view of women as they were now the target consumer for advertisers who preyed on the idea that women needed new products to maintain their “good homemaker” status. These companies prayed on the insecurities of wives and mothers all over America, pushing them to scramble into employment. However, this led to endless consequences undertaken by women in that they would be shamed for working as this would make it impossible for them to be present enough for their family, yet if they did not work, they would be guilted for holding their family back from experiencing financial and consumer prosperity. This manipulative tactic used by corporations distressed women in America as the new “average” life grew to be more and more expensive. America’s capitalist government fully endorsed and encouraged this veiled attack against its own citizens and felt just in doing so as it was not a “communist threat”, which was the primary focus of the time. With these new consumerist demands, financial issues soon grew common in each household. How were women expected to work and sustain the lifestyle they were being told was necessary when they were simultaneously receiving no help and subtly being discouraged to work?
Due to the increasing paranoia of communist influence within the nation and its government, American women were denied public aid programs that may have been perceived as resembling communism. The American government criticized the Soviet Union for obtaining a steep control of its people and interfering in their personal lives, all the while acting in the same manner and hiding behind ideological differences. Although the rights of American women and their place in society was legally the most progressive they had ever been, socially, oppression remained an obstacle. They were still faced with little to no accessible support for the average working mother in terms of child care. Instead of the government helping, there was a great deal of time, funding, and energy wasted on trying to expose the majority of these women wanting a better life as communists through FBI infiltration of women’s rights groups. In this and many other ways the American government acted in every way that they condemned. Their deep fear of communism ultimately hurt and held Americans back instead of helping them prosper. However, women did not remain stagnant and submissive to these actions and were able to propel themselves somewhat forward. As a result of their steadfast foremothers, eventually women were able to work and infiltrate fields long reserved for men. Unfortunately, the long standing stereotype of women being solely responsible for the domestic duties did not disintegrate as their rights progressed. Instead they were expected to work as hard as a man, usually even harder as many women needed to prove themselves to their male coworkers and employers, and still be a present mother.
Women across America still face an inordinate amount of challenges. Being taken seriously in the workplace, being unfairly judged based on their appearance or equating their worth to their looks, and receiving equal pay are some of the issues still plaguing working women today. While progress has been made, as society continues to advance, new obstacles rooted in sexist ideology will arise. American society must be purposeful in prioritizing the needs of women in order to prevent a repeat of past events.

[David Bates · Rating 4 out of 5]

In The World Split Open Ruth Rosen provides an overview of second wave feminism from the early sixties to the nineteen eighties, charting the rise of the Women’s Movement and its impact on American society. “Activists didn’t hurl tear gas canisters at the police, burn down buildings, or fight in the street,” Rosen notes, but it left a transformed world in which women had far more individual choices and collective prominence in government, law, business, medicine and culture. A veteran of the movement herself, Rosen’s narrative reflects the experiences and preoccupations of the middle and upper class women who were at its center. For these women, a key experience of the movement was one of awakening, as personal experiences and political views were recontextualized within a critique of the subordinate place of women in society. With The Feminine Mystique, Betty Friedan set the tone for an initial wave of activism when she asked middle class housewives to face “the problem that has no name,” a gnawing discontent arising from being confined to the claustrophobic dimensions a homemaker’s career and identity. Instead of accepting a life of endless housework and childrearing, Friedan urged women to embrace personal ambitions for self-fulfillment and equality in the workplace. Individual acts in defiance to women’s assigned social role, and collective political action to open up opportunities for women and enforce full social equality, would eventually be pithily summed up by Carol Hanisch in a saying that became synonymous with second wave feminism, “the personal is political.”

Frustrated by the unresponsiveness toward women’s issues of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, created by the 1964 Civil Rights Act, Friedan and other women’s activists created the National Organization for Women in 1966 to advocate for greater equality. “By creating a feminist civil rights organization, NOW members did more than assert their independence from male-dominated liberal politics,” Rosen tells us, “they also freed themselves to consider the question of women’s rights from a more radical perspective.” As Friedan put it, “Everything was different . . .The problems looked different, the definition of the problems, the solutions sought, once we dared to judge our conditions as women by that simple standard, the hallmark of American democracy – equality, no more, no less.” Both an initial survey by Rosen of the position of women in society and a concluding tally of the achievements of the movement reveal the staying power of middle class preoccupations, focusing on college enrollment and education, and the number women working as doctors, lawyers, politicians and judges.

Nevertheless, Rosen’s account is largely defined by the growing diversity of viewpoints and issues embraced by the expanding Women’s Movement. For many African American women “who had spent the last century holding together families, churches, and communities” learned helplessness was not a primary problem. For working class women who were already trying to pull along families financially, Friedan’s advice to find a meaningful career was obtuse.

[Alessandra · Rating 3 out of 5]

“ARMED AND DANGEROUS-EXTREME” is just one of many accusations lodged at the women’s movement of the later 20th century (243). The unearthed FBI files Ruth Rosen cited above recall a legacy of the women’s movement as radical, anti-male, and extremist. The World Split Open enlarges such limited perceptions of Second Wave feminism, while also accounting for its radical factions. This engaging monograph presents a thorough analysis of Second Wave feminism from a woman actively engaged in the movement.

Rosen commanded a variety of sources to tell her story, from key national organizations, to letters from women in Munsie, Indiana. Yet, despite its relative depth and breadth, The World Split Open doesn’t completely outline the crevices of this revolutionary split. Race and class consciousness were key elements in the formation of the movement, yet this monograph fell short in the examination of the movement from a race and class viewpoint. White, leftist, and educated feminists largely obscured what subtle recounts of race and class perspectives emerge. Structurally, the topical organization often marred the cohesive chronological understanding of the movement as it ebbed and flowed through various socio-political environments. Despite the chronological confusion and analytical gaps, The World Split Open still provides a relatively holistic understanding of the complexities of Second Wave feminism, from its successes to its unfinished business. For Rosen, it is the Second Wave’s unfinished business that embodies the torch to be carried by the next generation of revolutionaries.

[Elizabeth · Rating 3 out of 5]

The World Split Open: How the Modern Women's Movement Changed America (Paperback)
from the library

how the women's movt learned from the black rights movt

Contents:
pt. 1. Refugees from the fifties -- Dawn of discontent -- Female generation gap -- pt. 2. Rebirth of feminism -- Limits of liberalism -- Leaving the left -- pt. 3. Through the eyes of women -- Hidden injuries of sex -- Passion and politics -- The politics of paranoia -- pt. 4. No end in sight -- The proliferation of feminism -- Sisterhood to superwoman.

[Stephanie · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very good history and the book I'd recommend to someone who knows little about the women's movement. If you are familiar with the history of second wave this won't tell you much that's new, but it's a good, readable and important book.

I'm looking for information about feminism and the women's movement in rural areas (states like Maine, Iowa, Arkansas, etc). If anyone can recommend books/websites/articles I'd appreciate it.

[Adam · Rating 1 out of 5]

Key quote: "Nonetheless, the growing New Right and social critics like Christopher Lasch blamed feminism - not consumer culture - for the loss of 'traditional values' and the unraveling of the family."¹ The only source given for this claim is an endnote citing an unpublished "Interview with Christopher Lasch, May 17, 1989, Berkeley, California."

¹Rosen, p. 330.

[Sarah · Rating 4 out of 5]

I feel like this is a good book for a basic history, but it tends to ignore or insufficiently cover issues related to trans people and women of color. They feel more like afterthoughts and get less than a quarter of the space that the white feminists get.

The work also has some structural/organizational problems.

[Michal · Rating 4 out of 5]

For women who came to adulthood as modern feminism became powerful(late 1960s and forward), and for whom that was a formative experience, this book explains those times within a clear framework and timeline, bringing back memories and giving perspective.