A Steady Pursuer Of Gender Equality-A Study Of Betty Friedan's Feminist Thought

Betty Friedan is the pioneer of modern American feminism and a leading figure of the second wave of women's movement, whose two major works The Feminine Mystique and The Second Stage were regarded as the guidelines of gender equality and women's liberation movement. Therefore, Friedan enjoyed a high reputation in American intellectual world.Although some studies on Friedan have been made in both China and abroad, they are mainly biographical, focusing on her life experience and the influence of personal life on her major work The Feminine Mystique. The feature of her feminist thought has not been thoroughly examined.This thesis aims at analyzing and interpreting the connotation of Betty Friedan's feminist thought, as well as its development and its meaning for women today. This study is arranged chronologically on the whole. By rereading Friedan's major works and discussing the slogan and programs of the feminist campaigns in which she had played the leading role, it reveals the nature and gradual improvement of Friedan's feminist thought.The study shows that Friedan is an egalitarian feminist, with the pursuit for equality permeating her academic and political career. However, at the beginning, she only focused her attention on the equal self-realization of women through work. Then she became gradually aware that the equal treatment, equal law and other factors are the preconditions for women to realize themselves equally. Therefore, she began to appeal to gender equality in more fields and her feminist thought became more and more mature.This dissertation argues that Friedan's feminist thought is still instructive and applicable for contemporary American women, because the feminine mystique is still imperiling them to some extent.