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Backlash: The Undeclared War Against American Women
A new edition of the feminist classic, with an all-new introduction exploring the role of backlash in the 2016 election and laying out a path forward for 2020 and beyond
Winner of the National Book Critics Circle Award • “Enraging, enlightening, and invigorating, Backlash is, most of all, true.”— Newsday
First published in 1991, Backlash made headlines and became a bestselling classic for its thoroughgoing debunking of a decadelong antifeminist backlash against women’s advances. A Pulitzer Prize–winning journalist, Susan Faludi brilliantly deconstructed the reigning myths about the “costs” of women’s independence—from the supposed “man shortage” to the “infertility epidemic” to “career burnout” to “toxic day care”—and traced their circulation from Reagan-era politics through the echo chambers of mass media, advertising, and popular culture.
As Faludi writes in a new preface for this edition, much has changed in the intervening The Internet has given voice to a new generation of feminists. Corporations list “gender equality” among their core values. In 2019, a record number of women entered Congress. Yet the glass ceiling is still unshattered, women are still punished for wanting to succeed, and reproductive rights are hanging by a thread. This startling and essential book helps explain why women’s freedoms are still so demonized and threatened—and urges us to choose a different future.
Winner of the National Book Critics Circle Award • “Enraging, enlightening, and invigorating, Backlash is, most of all, true.”— Newsday
First published in 1991, Backlash made headlines and became a bestselling classic for its thoroughgoing debunking of a decadelong antifeminist backlash against women’s advances. A Pulitzer Prize–winning journalist, Susan Faludi brilliantly deconstructed the reigning myths about the “costs” of women’s independence—from the supposed “man shortage” to the “infertility epidemic” to “career burnout” to “toxic day care”—and traced their circulation from Reagan-era politics through the echo chambers of mass media, advertising, and popular culture.
As Faludi writes in a new preface for this edition, much has changed in the intervening The Internet has given voice to a new generation of feminists. Corporations list “gender equality” among their core values. In 2019, a record number of women entered Congress. Yet the glass ceiling is still unshattered, women are still punished for wanting to succeed, and reproductive rights are hanging by a thread. This startling and essential book helps explain why women’s freedoms are still so demonized and threatened—and urges us to choose a different future.
608 pages, Paperback
First published October 1, 1991
About the author
Susan Faludi
23 books403 followersSusan C. Faludi (born April 18, 1959) is an American humanist, journalist and author. She won a Pulitzer Prize for Explanatory Journalism in 1991, for a report on the leveraged buyout of Safeway Stores, Inc., a report that the Pulitzer Prize committee commended for depicting the "human costs of high finance".
Faludi was born to a Jewish family in Queens, New York in 1959 and grew up in Yorktown Heights, New York. Her mother was a homemaker and journalist and is a long-time New York University student. Her father is a photographer who had emigrated from Hungary, a survivor of the Holocaust. Susan graduated from Harvard University in 1981, where she wrote for The Harvard Crimson, and became a journalist, writing for The New York Times, Miami Herald, Atlanta Journal Constitution, San Jose Mercury News, and The Wall Street Journal, among other publications. Throughout the eighties she wrote several articles on feminism and the apparent resistance to the movement. Seeing a pattern emerge, Faludi wrote Backlash, which was released in late 1991. In 2008-2009, Faludi was a fellow at the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study. She lives with fellow author Russ Rymer. Since January 2013, Faludi has been a contributing editor at The Baffler magazine in Cambridge, Massachusetts.
(from Wikipedia)
Faludi was born to a Jewish family in Queens, New York in 1959 and grew up in Yorktown Heights, New York. Her mother was a homemaker and journalist and is a long-time New York University student. Her father is a photographer who had emigrated from Hungary, a survivor of the Holocaust. Susan graduated from Harvard University in 1981, where she wrote for The Harvard Crimson, and became a journalist, writing for The New York Times, Miami Herald, Atlanta Journal Constitution, San Jose Mercury News, and The Wall Street Journal, among other publications. Throughout the eighties she wrote several articles on feminism and the apparent resistance to the movement. Seeing a pattern emerge, Faludi wrote Backlash, which was released in late 1991. In 2008-2009, Faludi was a fellow at the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study. She lives with fellow author Russ Rymer. Since January 2013, Faludi has been a contributing editor at The Baffler magazine in Cambridge, Massachusetts.
(from Wikipedia)
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Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
November 13, 2024
Testo, ancora, fondamentale, sia per le implicazione del concetto di backlash, sia per la mole di informazioni ed analisi del fenomeno, che si espande a 360° in ogni ambito del sociale, della cultura e della politica.
La parte che analizza i media e gli approcci narrativi alla donna in un'epoca di backlash, com'è anche quella in cui stiamo vivendo, mi ha portato a ripensare anche a opere che ho apprezzato, ma che, anche involontariamente, si sono trovate influenzate dalle condizioni socio-narrative contingenti.
In generale, sorprendente (ma, cinicamente, neanche tanto) come un libro di trent'anni fa che analizza la situazione sviluppatasi nel decennio precedente offra strumenti interpretativi applicabili anche oggi, con poche modifiche.
La parte che analizza i media e gli approcci narrativi alla donna in un'epoca di backlash, com'è anche quella in cui stiamo vivendo, mi ha portato a ripensare anche a opere che ho apprezzato, ma che, anche involontariamente, si sono trovate influenzate dalle condizioni socio-narrative contingenti.
In generale, sorprendente (ma, cinicamente, neanche tanto) come un libro di trent'anni fa che analizza la situazione sviluppatasi nel decennio precedente offra strumenti interpretativi applicabili anche oggi, con poche modifiche.
February 20, 2023
Datato (riguarda gli anni 80) e un po' di parte (evidenzia gli atteggiamenti sessisati e misogini nella cultura anni 80, ma non quelli pro attivi), ma interessante e acuto. Da leggere
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews