Documentary Review: First and Second Wave of Feminism

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      This post is part one of a documentary review of Makers: Women Who Make America, Part One: Awakening. This documentary details the first wave of feminism in the beginning, but moves onto the rise of the second wave. The first wave of feminism occurred in the late 19th and early 20th centuries throughout the world, but most evidently in the United Kingdom, United States, Netherlands, and Canada. At the time, these countries were experiencing urban industrialism and a grow in liberal and socialist politics. The strongest goals of the movement were to allow women to have more opportunities and to vote. The Seneca Falls Convention in 1948 is accepted as the beginning of the wave, which is now modeled on the Declaration of Independence. The Declaration proposed that women are men's equal and it is against nature to exclude them, that men should be supporting women's opportunities and independence, and that women should have the right to vote. During the first wave, most of the activists were in relation to the racism and slavery abolitionist movements because both slaves and women had little rights in comparison to men. The second wave of feminism began in the 1960's and ended around the 1990's. The movement occurred in relation to the Civil Rights movement. Some of the events that took place included: creation of the National Organization of Women, the Women's Political Caucus, Title Seven of the Civil Rights Act, Equal Rights Amendments, and women's liberation. While the first wave of feminism was mostly empowered by middle class white women, the second wave became more radical and also included black women and females of other ethnicity. This phase was thought to arise during the Miss America Pageant in 1968, where women began to rally the ideals and expectations of women and their bodies as oppressive. (Rampton, Martha) 

Black Women in the Feminist Movement
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      According to Lori D. Ginzberg of Feminist Studies Journal, the waves of the feminism movement occurred and originated in response to the status of women created by society and men. The status of women in the American Republic was created due to politics and how they defined females based on their particular class, race, religion, marriage, and motherhood. The waves of feminism were collectively a movement that targeted politics and patriarchal ideas that excluded women from the rights of mankind. Citizenship was based on genders and had been defined by white men to only allow white men to hold superiority in the American republic. Although women were excluded as a whole, the author stated that there were two victimized groups: white women and black women. Black women suffered from discriminating dualism because they were both black and women, putting them at the very bottom of the social ladder. Most feminists were also in support of abolishing slavery, so many targeted slave struggles to advance in black communities and culture. White women were assumed to be homemakers and property of their husbands and men in their lives, rather than citizens with rights. (Ginzberg, Lori D.)

Sources: 

Ginzberg, Lori D. "Re-Viewing The First Wave." Feminist Studies 28.2 (2002): 419. SocINDEX with Full Text. Web. 2 Nov. 2014.

Rampton, Martha. "The Three Waves of Feminism." Pacific University. Pacific University, 23 Oct. 2014. Web. 02 Nov. 2014.