Audience of "You Don't Own Me"

The song “You Don’t Own Me” was written by John Madara and David White, and sung by Lesley Gore in 1963. Lesley Gore was a seventeen-year-old pop singer at the time of the song, so her target audience was generally teens in the 1960’s. More specifically, the target audience was likely comprised mostly of girls between the ages thirteen and twenty. The song was meant to empower girls and teach them that they do not belong to men. However, the song itself was sung as though Gore was speaking to a boy. This way, when teenage boys (and men of any age) heard the song, it was like she was speaking to them, telling them that they don’t own her or any other woman. In this sense the audience was also meant to be men. In the 1960’s, with the second wave feminist movement starting to take off, a song like this was very radical for a pop musician to have made. Many girls were hearing about feminism and equal rights, but not fully understanding it. Women were starting to fight for their rights, but younger girls weren’t even sure what those rights were. With this song Gore was attempting to convey to her audience, the younger generation of the 60’s, that women are strong individuals and not property, through the use of a medium that did not have the same extreme connotations of other feminist arguments.

-Ryan Young

Audience of The Feminine Mystique

In the excerpt from her 1963 book, The Feminine Mystique, feminist Betty Friedan addressed American women, specifically those who remained quiet in the face of growing discontentment. At the time, women were expected to maintain the household, raise children, and please their husbands. Friedan’s audience, therefore, would not necessarily believe that their discontentment was a legitimate problem in American society since every other woman was seemingly satisfied with her life. Furthermore, American women were taught to pity “unhappy” women who wanted to become poets or presidents. Friedan attempted to expel the belief that the average woman was happy to be at home, repetitively referencing the idea of this “ideal” woman—someone who made the beds and shopped for groceries, someone relatable to her audience—struggling with frustration and self-doubt. This excerpt from her book was a call-to-action for American women to recognize and speak out against the fact that they were being kept “from growing to their full capacities.”

Friedan’s words were as much a confrontation of the American public, including men, as a plea for women to stretch beyond their biological functions. The public, she argued, was responsible for shaping a culture that would free women from the societal expectations that prevented them from developing identities. Although this broader audience may have initially gravitated towards the traditional order, their enthusiasm for American values such as freedom and success may have also allowed them to connect with Friedan’s feminist cause. 

- Anjali Ravi

Stasis Theory of The Feminine Mystique

The main focus of the excerpt is defining and proving the existence of an often neglected problem women had in the 1950s and 1960s—”the fact that American women are kept from growing to their full human capacities.” Friedan pointed out that many women in America felt trapped because their lives were all about their husbands and their children. False social expectations were the main cause of the oppression of women. Women were forced to think that the best life they could have was marrying a man and raising children. They also learned to pity those women who struggled to find their identities through work. Friedan warned that the production of housewives who lack in identity and education would lead to the progressive dehumanization of the next generation. Friedan also encouraged women to take action and seek a better life for themselves. 'The Feminine Mystique' is a huge inspiration of many feminists in 1960s and it is credited with empowering the second-wave feminism.

- Pei-Jo Yang

Kairos of The Feminine Mystique

     Many women of the mid-20th century were dissatisfied with their everyday lives. During this time period, women were forced to be mentally, physically, financially, and intellectually submissive to men. During World War II, many women had the opportunity of taking over the mens' factory and more manual jobs that paid better, giving them a glimpse of what life could be like. However, after the war ended, the roles of their gender were again restricted to housework and taking care of the family. However, these women faced social pressures that idealized these roles and as a result, pressured them into not acknowledging their unhappiness.  Betty Friedan, the author of the The Feminine Mystique observed this general disillusion of the idealized housewife role in the late 1950s at a 15th year high school reunion. She began researching the problem, and after being denied publishing on many mediums, she complied her extensive findings into The Feminine Mystique, published in 1963. Many women identified with the issue addressed in The Feminine Mystique and were inspired to take action. Betty Friedan saw a prevalent issue in her current society, affecting women everywhere. Friedan's work was so successful because its timing was impeccable as it addressed a need in the rhetorical situation of her day. 

-Taylor Rezeppa

Kairos in "You Don't Own Me" by Lesley Gore

In 1963 the song “You Don’t Own Me” by Lesley Gore was released, not long after Martin Luther King gave his famous “I Have A Dream” speech and the March on Washington occurred. Many people were open to expressing how they felt about civil rights and when this song came out it was during the “girl group” era when young women were topping the charts with meaningful songs. This song threatened emancipation and reflected the growing popularity of feminism. 1963 was also the year of John F. Kennedy’s assassination, leading to Lyndon B. Johnson’s inauguration into presidency. About an hour after the assassination people wondered if this was part of a larger attack and the question of “Where were you when you heard about Kennedy’s assassination” would soon become a topic of discussion amongst everyone. Gore devoted a big portion of her life to liberal causes and even volunteered to campaign for Robert Kennedy, so when she heard about JFK's assassination she was most likely upset because she was very involved with presidential elections.  Lesley Gore was known as a “protofeminist” who held the No. 2 spot behind the Beatles for three weeks. This shows how effective her songs were in portraying her activeness in feminism awareness. Even forty years later her song was still a Feminism Anthem as it was used in 2012 to encourage women to vote.

-Casey Tarman