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A review by maximum_moxie
Backlash: The Undeclared War Against American Women by Susan Faludi
4.0
Would rate four and a half stars. There's a reason this book coined a new phrase: well-written, hard-hitting and deeply researched, I couldn't put it down.
It may be a bit dated now (all the data comes from the time period, largely the 80's), but the book fully addresses the myths of femininity which any woman would recognize; that fulfillment is found in relationships and child-rearing; that the "biological clock" can't be denied; that working women are always miserable and we "can't have it all". Faludi reveals these myths as what they are: projections of a fearful male culture onto women it can't control just as they are beginning to assert themselves.
As with any book with an ideological axe to grind, I did doubt the full validity of some points. Certainly men aren't entirely to blame for low female self-esteem or the lack of fully rounded female characters in movies. Yet even so, Faludi does an excellent job of balancing male responsibility with the ways men (and backlash-supporting women) suffer from backlash thinking and sometimes subvert it.
A ripping good read for anyone who wants to understand modern gender relations--though I would like to find another companion book which addresses the same issues in a more modern context.
It may be a bit dated now (all the data comes from the time period, largely the 80's), but the book fully addresses the myths of femininity which any woman would recognize; that fulfillment is found in relationships and child-rearing; that the "biological clock" can't be denied; that working women are always miserable and we "can't have it all". Faludi reveals these myths as what they are: projections of a fearful male culture onto women it can't control just as they are beginning to assert themselves.
As with any book with an ideological axe to grind, I did doubt the full validity of some points. Certainly men aren't entirely to blame for low female self-esteem or the lack of fully rounded female characters in movies. Yet even so, Faludi does an excellent job of balancing male responsibility with the ways men (and backlash-supporting women) suffer from backlash thinking and sometimes subvert it.
A ripping good read for anyone who wants to understand modern gender relations--though I would like to find another companion book which addresses the same issues in a more modern context.