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Elizabeth Klein

Mr. Balmer

Honors World History

23 May 2016

Feminism

We cannot all succeed when half of us are held back. This quote comes from Malala

Yousafzai, a Pakistani advocate for girls education. In 2007, the Taliban took over the Swat

Valley and forbade girls from going to school, claiming it was un-Islamic. Malala gave a

speech in 2008 protesting this, entitled How Dare the Taliban Take Away My Basic Right to

Education? After she gave the speech, the Taliban issued death threats against her. On October

9, 2012, a Taliban gunman boarded her bus and shot her in the head. Just because she wanted to

learn, like the men in her country could.

Malala is one of many feminists who have fought for the equality of women and men.

Feminism is the belief that women are entitled to the same rights as men, and that men and

women should be equally respected. The feminist movement dates all the way back to the 14th

century, when Christine de Pizan published her views on women in education. But feminism is

usually described in three waves: the first was in the 1920s, the second was in the 1960s, 1970s,

and early 1980s; and the third started in the 1990s and continues to the present. Although

feminists from each era fought for different specific rights; all the efforts went to the same basic

movement to empower women and bring them up to the level men are valued at.

In the 1920s, the main issue was voting. Suffragettes desperately wanted a right that was

extended to their male counterparts: a vote in the elections. At the time, they were not able to
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vote because they were not considered legal citizens. For the first time, the feminist movement

caught serious steam and attracted large groups of female protesters around the world;

suffragettes were located in the U.S., Britain, New Zealand, Australia, Denmark, Netherlands,

Sweden, and many more countries. In 1908, the National American Woman Suffrage

Association was formed with Elizabeth Cady Stanton as the first president. Stanton was very

public with her views about the role of women, she knew that voting rights were not the ultimate

goal; they were the launching point in the change of the views society had of women. She used

the momentum of the feminist movement and took it to a new level; she made people realize that

the suffragette movement was going to change the world for the better. In August of 1920, the

19th amendment was ratified in the U.S. and American women were able to vote. British women

were able to vote in 1918 with the Eligibility of Women Act, women in Denmark could vote in

1915. But the global passing of voting rights laws were only the beginning.

After the first wave of feminism came the second between the 60s and 80s. These

feminists focused on changing the role of women in society, allowing women to make choices

about the rights they're allowed, and the treatment of women. The causes of this wave of

feminism were lessened respect for women, gender discrimination in the workplace, the small

amount of legal rights women were entitled, etc. One feminist who ushered in the second wave

was Betty Friedan. She wrote a book called The Feminine Mystique that encaptured the feelings

of entrapment and frustration that many housewives all over the world felt. The second wave

picked up at about that point, starting in the U.S. and spreading to places like the U.K., Canada,

Egypt, Turkey, Israel, Japan, and many more. This spread of beliefs led people to understand

that feminism was not local to any one region. Women were being oppressed all over the world
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and had been for many years; the second wave focused on stopping that. In 1963, the Equal Pay

Act became a law in the United States, making wage discrimination illegal. In Italy in 1970, the

Womens Revolution formed and published their manifesto. In 1985, the Japanese Equal

Employment Opportunity Law was passed. These milestones were incredible patches on the

sash of feminism, but they were not enough.

The third wave of feminism began in the 1990s and is still continuing today. This era is

focused on achieving what the second wave did not. One of these things is changing the

portrayal of women in media and the stereotypes people have about them. Third wave feminists

are invested in changing the view of women from weak and passive to strong, assertive, and in

control of their own identities. They also seek to include the minority women whose opinions

were often dismissed during first and second wave feminism, and to answer to the needs of

women in countries where feminism is a denoted word. This wave is continuing all over the

world currently on every human-inhabited continent. One important third wave feminist is the

one mentioned at the very beginning of this paper: Malala Yousafzai. Malala fights relentlessly

to allow women to have the basic rights theyre entitled to in her country, the middle east, and

the entire world. She is a speaker for girls education, and she wants to include the feminist

voices that are drowned out in many cultures across the globe. She also fights for women to

make their own choices about themselves. In October of 2014, she won the Nobel Peace Prize

for her efforts.

The effects of all these waves of feminism are the changes in society that make life more

equal for every woman on the planet. They fought to get the right to vote, to choose to leave the

household lives they were traditionally destined to, to make wage discrimination illegal, to allow
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marriage equality, to stress the importance of birth control, to give women an opportunity that

was more than theyd imagined for hundreds of years before the feminist movement. While

protesters constantly shot them down and tried to silence their voices, they progressed on;

growing stronger after each obstacle. They continue to revolutionize the world to this very day,

because there are still copious amounts of gender discrimination and misrepresentation in

society. So every time women go to school, vote in the elections, register for citizenship, wear

short skirts, become part of the workforce, run for a political position, or speak up for

themselves; they are able to because of the work of women before them who envisioned a life

where they were equal to men. Feminists are still working to reach that goal; but nonetheless,

the world is a better place because of them and their efforts.

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Works Cited

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24 May 2016.

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Burkett, Elinor. "Feminism - The Third Wave of Feminism." Encyclopedia Britannica Online.

Encyclopedia Britannica, n.d. Web. 24 May 2016.

"Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women." Wikipedia.

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"Gendercide Statistics | All Girls Allowed." Gendercide Statistics. All Girls Allowed, n.d. Web.

24 May 2016.

Maxwell, Zerlina. "23 Ways Feminists Have Made the World Better for Women." Mic.

Identities.Mic, 22 Apr. 2014. Web. 24 May 2016.

Sadia, Halima. "The Global Women's Movement & Feminist Perspective in 21st Century."

Academia.edu. Academia, 22 Sept. 2013. Web. 24 May 2016.

Second-wave Feminism. Wikipedia. Wikimedia Foundation, n.d. Web. 24 May 2016.

"The Issue." Invisible Girl Project. Invisible Girl Project, n.d. Web. 24 May 2016.

Third-wave Feminism. Wikipedia. Wikimedia Foundation, n.d. Web. 24 May 2016.