Women In America

The topic I have chosen to discuss this week, is that of women in America.

Even though the right for women to vote were first seriously proposed in July, 1848 in America, it was in the 1920's when women finally wont the right to vote throughout the nation.

Being published in 1925, Fitzgerald's "The Great Gatsby" paints a portrait of the women of that day and age, and shows throughout multiple characters, different ways in which the women grew into their freedom and liberties.

Jordan Baker, a secondary/supporting character in the novel is a prime example of how women are motioning toward the new age of being able to do more. The name "Jordan Baker" that Fitzgerald lent to his sassy, golf playing character actually contributes to this point also; Jordan, also usually a man's name, and Baker were both big car manufacturers in the 1920's. It can be seen that Fitzgerald was layering on the masculinity to Jordan's character to create a new breed of woman, not only a flapper girl, but a woman of the future.

1950's America saw Marilyn Monroe star in no less than six motion pictures, usually film noir that dwelled on her seductiveness. This shows us that women have shot up in respectability, and are now even being admired for their work and their beauty.

In the 1960's women's rights and liberties has come on leaps and bounds. In 1963 the famed "The Feminine Mystique" by Betty Friedan was published; giving women in the US more movement, and ammunition to move forward and progress.

Women in the 60's also had beautiful, powerful, attractive women in the medias eye, to look up to. Audrey Hepburn's most famous movies "My Fair Lady" and "Breakast At Tiffany's" were released in the 1960's.

1970's see's women rising to absolute power. In the early 1970's little league baseball was opened up to young girls, and during the second half of the 70's rock band "The Runaways" wrote, toured and recorded six full length albums.

Not only was this a female revolution of women standing on stage, in leather trousers and holding guitars, this was also the first time the world had seen music like this coming from women. Initially, when founding band member Joan Jett approached her future management Kim Fowley, he was apprehensive to launch the first all girl rock band in America to make it big, but as history tells us, he got in on it, and it went big. Songs shocking the airwaves included; "Cherrybomb" "Do You Wanna Touch Me?" "I Wanna Be Your Dog" "I Love Rock n Roll" and "Queens Of Noise".

This kind of female empowerment has travelled through time, as music from this era and the aspects are still popular today. Kristen Stewart and Dakota Fanning both starred in a 2010 movie "The Runaways" portraying the band, and their rise to fame, and Joan Jett herself still tours to this day.

In conclusion, my point is that Fitzgerald's characters are on the brink of Women's rights, which soar through time, and become rockstars standing on stage today. It just shows that women can go from being, as Daisy Buchanan quotes "Pretty little fools" to in 1997 Madeline Albright, being the first women secretary of state in the US.