Was the 90's our Feminist glory days? Part I.

I served coffee to Susan Faludi Saturday morning and was inspired to talk about the current state of Feminism.

I found Backlash: The Undeclared War Against American Women when I was a teenager. I had only briefly pondered the chronology of how Feminism went from one extreme to the other between the 1960's to modern day. As a girl growing up in the 90's it seemed to me that Feminism had happened and while the mid 80's seemed like America was still trying to get the aftertaste of the prior decades out of its mouth, the 90's was when a more global Feminism began to take shape. I grew up when there was less focus on particular issues within Feminism. The cultural aspect of woman's rights were more apparent than the biological aspect. The first two waves had overarching themes that drove a particular issue to the forefront. The third wave of Feminism is about conflict and the reaction to the topics of the first and second waves. I hope to follow this post with a more in depth exploration of 90's Feminism and what is meant when the term "Post-Feminism" is used.

Faludi followed Backlash with Stiffed: The Betrayal of the American Male in 2000. She most recently authored The Terror Dream: Myth and Misogyny in an insecure America in 2008. She lives in Cambridge Ma. and is very polite to her albeit quirky coffee servers.