At the height of the Cold War in 1959, Vice President Richard M. Nixon visited the Soviet Union to discuss political ideology with Soviet premier Nikita Khrushchev. In what was labeled the “kitchen debate,” Nixon presented Khrushchev with an American “model home” that highlighted the merits of capitalism to a global audience. But as the politicians entered the Americanized kitchen, Nixon took a step further. Instead of keeping the focus on economic systems, the Vice President turned the discourse to the two nations’ construction of gender roles. While looking at an American dishwasher, Nixon said, “This is our newest model…In America, we like to make life easier for women… I think that this attitude towards women is universal. What we want to do, is make life more easy for our housewives” (teachingamericanhistory.org).
While the accessibility of consumer products that reduced labor for homemakers was an achievement of American capitalism, Nixon’s comments promoted a new American vision of the family. The traditional family in Cold War culture, which featured men as breadwinners and women as homemakers, was now an important component of the American Dream. By referring to women as “housewives,” Nixon effectively reinforced the pervasive sentiment that women could not only be homemakers in a financially prosperous capitalist society, but that it was also expected of them. As these expectations became fully engrained into the mainstream, gender roles became increasingly rigid, which discouraged many women from considering professional careers, let alone pursue them. As the Cold War era prompted Americans to find refuge in the traditional family, women were expected to operate within the framework of the home and in resul...
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...represented an escape from the uncertainty of the future. But with the rise of a new traditional family in America, complete with strict and separate gender roles, women were denied opportunities in the workplace and forced to embrace the task of homemaker. While Nixon argued in the “kitchen debate” that American strength rested on each member’s ability to rise and fall, the marginalization of woman in Cold War culture masterfully highlights the distance between political idealism and reality.
Works Cited
Books
May, Elaine Tyler. Homeward Bound.
Friedan, Betty. The Feminine Mystique.
Movies
The Home Economics Story.
Online Resources
“The Kitchen Debate.”
Articles
Stevenson, Adlai E. “A Purpose for Modern Woman.”
Chambers, Whittaker. “Witness.”
One of the biggest fears of the American people is that the concept of communism contrasts drastically from the concept of capitalism, which the United States was essentially founded upon. The United States, as the public believed, was not a land of perfect communal equality, but rather a land of equal opportunity. However, what made communism so dangerous can be succinctly described by Eisenhower who compared the spread of communism as the domino effect. As his secretary of state, Dulles, put it, the propagation of communism “would constitute a threat to the sovereignty and independence” of America (Doc B). In addition, the Cold War also planted the seeds of rational fear of a global nuclear war. As Russia caught up to the United States in terms of technological advancements, they successfully developed the atomic bomb as well as the hydrogen bomb, which caused Americans to believe that the USSR would use these weapons of mass destruction to forcefully extend their ideologies to the USA. In fact, Americans were so frantic about a potential nuclear disaster that it...
Elaine Tyler May's Homeward Bound weaves two traditional narratives of the fifties -- suburban domesticity and rampant anticommunism -- into one compelling historical argument. Aiming to ascertain why, unlike both their parents and children, postwar Americans turned to marriage and parenthood with such enthusiasm and commitment, May discovers that cold war ideology and the domestic revival [were] two sides of the same coin: postwar Americans' intense need to feel liberated from the past and secure in the future. (May, p. 5-6, 10) According to May, "domestic containment" was an outgrowth of the fears and aspirations unleashed after the war -- Within the home, potentially dangerous social forces of the new age might be tamed, where they could contribute to the secure and fulfilling life to which postwar women and men aspired.(May, p. 14) Moreover, the therapeutic emphases of fifties psychologists and intellectuals offered private and personal solutions to social problems. The family was the arena in which that adaptation was expected to occur; the home was the environment in which people could feel good about themselves. In this way, domestic containment and its therapeutic corollary undermined the potential for political activism and reinforced the chilling effects of anticommunism and the cold war consensus.(May, p.14)
During WWII, women took over the work force, and had such inspirations as Rosie the Riveter. This created a generation of women who wanted more out of life than birthing children, and keeping a nice home for their husband. The end of the war, however, brought with it a decrease of working women. In the 1950’s the rate of working women had slightly rebounded to 29% following the post-war decrease in 1945. These women were well rounded, working outside the home, and still having dinner on the table by 5PM.
The American Yawp states, “And for all of the postwar celebration of Rosie the Riveter, after the war ended the men returned and most women voluntarily left the work force or lost their jobs” (3). The resemblance and/or uprising that the idea of women taking on jobs liken-to women of the Soviet Union. The Role of Women in the Soviet Union states,
With the beginnings of the cold war the media and propaganda machine was instrumental in the idea of the nuclear family and how that made America and democracy superior to the “evils” of the Soviet Union and Communism; with this in mind the main goal of the 50’s women was to get married. The women of the time were becoming wives in their late teens and early twenties. Even if a women went to college it was assumed that she was there to meet her future husband. Generally a woman’s economic survival was dependent on men and employment opportunities were minimal.
However, social conditions made it less feasible for families to live this way. As the 1960s approached and consumption was in high demand, women were yet again, forced to join the work force; but only a quarter of the women joined the workforce, whereas in the 1990s about “two-thirds of women who had children were in the work force (Coontz 55). Coontz (1997) explains how by 1973, “real wages were falling for young families, and by the late 1970s, government effectiveness had decreased (Coontz 54). It was because of economic factors that the nuclear bread-winning family could only be a lifestyle a few can afford. Nonetheless, women joining the workforce created a new understanding of women-hood, changed women’s status in society, and created conflict within the household. Women did not have the time to complete all the household tasks which contributed to the increased divorce rates, but left women happier due to the fact that they had that ultimate
.... “The Economics of Middle-Income Family Life: Working Women During the Great Depression” The Journal of American History 65.1 (1978): 60-74. Web. 31 October 2013
As mentioned before, sociologists Coontz and Hochschild further elaborate upon Parsons and Bales’ concepts of the American family, but they mostly critique the idea of the male-breadwinner family. One of the main arguments Coontz and Hochschild present is the decline of the male-breadwinner family due to the economic changes of the United States and the arising social norms of consumerism. Because Parsons and Bales never considered how the changes throughout society would affect family, they believed the male-breadwinner family would continue to be a functional type of family for everyone. However, within her text, “What We Really Miss about the 1950s,” Coontz specifically discusses the major expense of keeping mothers at home as consumption norms...
In the 1900’s women were thought of as if there only respectable job was that, at home cooking, cleaning and looking after the welfare of the family. It was unthinkable that they should be allowed to vote and work as l...
Moran, Mickey. “1930s, America- Feminist Void?” Loyno. Department of History, 1988. Web. 11 May. 2014.
During the 1960’s women wanted to define their own identities in society, whether that is of a housewife role, establishing a career or both. This identity push into American society created the Women’s Liberation Movement for a majority of women within the 60’s. During this period several women stood out as activists to establish safeguards against discrimination on the bases of sex; Betty Fridan, Carol Hanisch and Gloria Steinam. Each activist clearly demonstrated in their tone and message within their articles, books and speeches how to achieve the overall goal to cease the myth that women were fulfilled in their role as housewives. This document will reflect an analysis of sources that substantiates that women wanted to define their own identities within our society and on issues and concerns for family values, women’s freedom to choice, and social change.
As centuries pass by, generations also pass their traditional values to the next generation. some people still think the way their ancestors thought and believe in what they believed in. During the beginning of 1890 people couldn’t have premarital sex, women had to be the caretaker while men were the breadwinner. During this century, those perspectives have changed, argued Stephanie Coontz, the author of “The American Family”. Coontz believes women should have more freedom and there should be gender equality.
Before the turn of the century, women were subordinate to men often oppressed not allowing them to explore new ventures or be independent. According to Julie Peakman, during the early nineteenth century, “All (woman) relay the difficulties in pursuing an independent role of life”. They were required to stay home and take care of children or keep the house in order. However, in the late nineteenth century and early twentieth century, woman began experiencing new found civil liberties and freedom. Susanne Weil comments, “In the nineteenth century as the nation became increasingly industrialized… women's roles as well as the nature of work itself were being radically transformed.” Woman now were no longer required to take care of children but could pursue careers themselves and no longer be dependant on a man. This change was a sudden shock to many men during this time. Not only were they once the only source of income, but now women had much more a voice in the household thus leading many men to oppose these changes. According to the Gale Encyclopedia of the progressive era, even the president opposed these changes, “... former president Grover Cleveland wrote that allowing women to vote would upset the “natural equilibrium” between men and women and cause chaos.” This clearly show how change in women’s statutes not only affected the common men, but also the president of the United States. Many of these men’s objections were transformed and broadcasted into their pieces of literature thus illustrating how many of the men at their time felt as
During the Cold War, the United States and the Soviet Union were in a race to who would reach space first. While the United States is often thought of as the best in many ways, the Soviet Union was able to get to space first with Sputnik. This was scary for the United States because the Soviet Union was able to send people and missiles into the air and the United States could not do that same. There was an urgency for the United States space program.
Due to the idealization of domesticity in media, there was a significantly stagnant period of time for women’s rights between 1945 and 1959. Women took over the roles for men in the workplace who were fighting abroad during the early 1940s, and a strong, feminist movement rose in the 1960s. However, in between these time periods, there was a time in which women returned to the home, focusing their attention on taking care of the children and waiting on their husband’s every need. This was perpetuated due to the increasing popularity of media’s involvement in the lives of housewives, such as the increasing sales of televisions and the increase in the number of sexist toys. During America’s involvement in World War Two, which spanned from 1941 until 1945, many men went off to fight overseas.