We can do it! The popular slogan reflected the tens of thousands of women working during World War Two. This slogan paired with positive propaganda, empowered women to step out of their homes and into the workforce in support of the war effort. Rosie the Riveter was the main character symbolizing the patriotic role of women working for the war. “Rosie the Riveter” was a song about a strong working female factory worker that was also turned into a magazine cover by Norman Rockwell and a propaganda poster for Westinghouse Electric. Women hung up their cooking aprons, took their kids to daycare, and started working in a “man's job”. The American woman was increasingly discontent to remain at home, raise children and serve their husbands in …show more content…
a supporting role. The women enjoyed the importance of doing of skilled work and found their limitations diminishing and their self-worth increasing. Even though many women relinquished their jobs after the war, the pride that they felt working could not be taken away and the message that Rosie the Riveter represented of being a strong, skilled, important woman was carried beyond its original intent for the war into a motivational slogan for the women's movement of the 1960s and even today. During the war, men were being drafted for the war effort leaving many necessary jobs in manufacturing and industry unfilled. Women needed to step in to fill the demand and do the jobs that would normally go to men in order to keep production running and the economy stable during the war. According to Stephen Kotkin in his journal article “World War II and Labor” , “Working in the war, women experienced a type of freedom that they had never felt before”(Kotkin 181). Many women loved working and making their own salary. Women became increasingly independent and noticed that they did not need to rely on men to provide for them. After the war, the men returned to the workforce expecting their old jobs to be waiting for them. Women were immediately sent back to their homes with the expectation to continue their lives as they were before the war. Even though many women loved working, many acquiesced and gave up their jobs. For next few decades, women who had remained in the work force faced oppression and discrimination in the workplace (Kotkin 187). Women had taken a giant leap forward in the area of gender equality during the war and demonstrated their abilities beyond their own expectations, but after the war, they seemed to take a step back. Historians are divided on whether Rosie the Riveter had a direct impact on the women’s movement. Jerome L. Toner believes that the fact that women had jobs during the war, had little to no effect on the women's movement a couple decades later (Toner 45). At this point, the women who worked in the war had already settled down and their window of work action had long closed. Therefore, the effect that Rosie the Riveter had on women during the war did not carry on to impact women during the women's movement. By contrast, Ruth Milkman believes that because of the jobs women held in WWII, they maintained interest in equality and independence were able to propel themselves forward into the women's movement(Milkman 420). Milkman believes that Rosie the Riveter was an inspiration for women even years after the war. She believes that Rosie the Riveters message of ¨We can do it¨ applied to more than just women's jobs in the war, but to women in general. Prior to the war, women had very few job opportunities, the opportunities that they did have were often segregated by gender and seen as temporary. Once women married, they were expected to quit their jobs and focus on starting a family. Before the war, a woman's role in society was based upon dated patrichical views. From a young age, women were being taught by their mother's household tasks like sewing, cooking, and cleaning. Their mothers focus was much less on having girls receive a good education but instead focused on preparing them for their duties as housewives. If a women were to hold a job, it would be low maintenance, low mess job. They would also only allowed to have jobs until they were married. According to Ruth Milkman in her article Redefining Women's Work, “Managers explicitly defined some war jobs as “suitable” for women, and others as “unsuitable, guided by a hastily revised idiom of sex-typing.”(Milkman p418). Women were often steered away from any jobs that would change their reputation from dainty, simple, or pretty. Jobs that required industrial skill were always given to men. Rosie the Riveter depiction as a strong female worker inspired many women to enter the workforce. Rosie the Riveter, a fictional character first appeared in a song entitled ¨Rosie the Riveter¨ by Kay Kyser. This song depicted women as strong, independent and willing to work for their country. Norman Rockwell, a famous artist at the time, was inspired by this song because it depicted working women in a rare positive light. He took the character Rosie the Riveter and brought her to life when he published a drawing of her in the Saturday evening Post on May 29, 1943. Rosie is a muscular women dressed in a denim jumpsuit, resting a rivet gun in her lap. Her lunchbox reads ¨Rosie¨ and she is sitting tall on a stool, a copy of Mein Kampf resting underneath her feet. According to the article originally published in the Saturday Evening Post, Rosie is ¨ tough, calm, and capable¨ (Clarkson 22) . The media adapted Rockwell's picture and made it into posters, stirring motivation for women working and the war. A year before Rockwell's magazine cover, a war propaganda poster for Westinghouse Electric showed a muscular woman, in a denim jumpsuit, flexing her muscles. The poster read ¨We can do it¨, these words inspired thousands of women to enter the workforce (Milkman 418). Women working in skilled jobs during the war changed the lens by which, they and the rest of the world saw them from a mere housewife to a serious threat to a man's superiority. Women loved working during the war, many described it to be the best years of their lives. Women were finally able to experience a sense of freedom that they were never allowed to experience before. Many women were needed to work in jobs that were previously deemed ¨fit for men...women integrated into ¨men's jobs¨ on an unprecedented scale, but also, with some conversion to war production, entirely new occupations emerged-- with no clear sex labels¨(Milkman 420). Women became police officers, electricians, and factory workers. According to Nancy and Christy Wise in their article “The Third Force :Woman go to Work”. ¨They overcame discrimination, harassment, gritty working conditions, unfamiliar machines, acrophobia, transportation glitches, and homesickness¨( Wise 179). Woman were confident, efficient, workers who often worked faster and cleaner than the men who had previously had the jobs. As woman became more confident, they were less afraid to do things that they wanted to do, such as women started living with other woman, waiting to get married, and enjoying their freedoms of not relying on a man. “Their confidence and self-esteem increased as they saw how well they could perform their work”(Wise 179). Women stopped seeing themselves as being defined by men to being defined by their own personalities and abilities. On September 2nd 1945, the war officially ended. Veterans returned expecting to have their old jobs waiting for them. Women were expected to change out of their work denim jumpsuits and go back home to their dresses and aprons. When some women resisted and advocated to keep their jobs, members of the government were enraged. Some feared that women had experienced too much freedom during and that they would not be able to be “retamed” (Harvey 155). The press boomed with positive propaganda of woman at home and starting families. According to Melody Miller, Phyllis Moen, and Donna Dempster-Mc-Clain, in their research study “Motherhood, multiple roles, and maternal well being, Woman in the 1950’s,“ women in this postwar period were encouraged to bear and raise children, be good wives, and leave the full-time jobs to the war veterans. But even in this family-focused era, not all women were satisfied with domesticity as the sole focus of their lives. (Miller 566). Most women made an easy transition back to their pre-war lives. Some were frustrated, however, because they had proven themselves to be just as good as male workers, but now they were no longer allowed to work. During the war, all of the societal rules placed upon women changed and women had proved themselves as valuable workers for their country, ¨they produced faster and better than any of their male bosses had anticipated.¨ (Wise 182). Now their country was disregarding them, telling them to go home. When women went to the union to file a complaint the union “didn’t do a bit of good” (Wise, 182). After supporting their country through work, disproving all of the typical gender roles of the period, women were expected to step down, but they were not going to step down without a fight. Rosie the Riveters message stuck with woman and ultimately inspired the second wave of the women's movement in the 1960s.
Immediately after the war, the percentage of women in the workplace increased by twenty percent. Women experienced freedom and finally were able to live their own lives and not have to worry about starting a family right away. Over the next decade, this feminist pride continued to grow as more and more woman had the courage to stand up for themselves and pursue the life and careers they wanted. More woman started to go to college and graduate with a degree. According to Susan Ware in her article “Holding Their Own; “American Woman in the 1930s”, women even started to take substantial roles in government to promote women's rights. (Ware 158). With women achieving more high end jobs and focusing less on solely raising a family, the entire dynamic of society changed. Despite government propaganda to resist this societal change, Rosie the Riveters message of “We can do it!” was too strong in womens hearts. The women's movement in the 60s and 70s focused mainly on ending discrimination in the workplace. Without Rosie, many woman would never have had the courage to go to work in the first place.
Rosie the Riveter continues to inspire women even today. Her original message of incorporating women into the workforce has changed to feminism and equality for all
women. Even though many women relinquished their jobs after the war, the freedom and pride that they felt while supporting themselves remained. The message that Rosie the Riveter symbolized went beyond its original intent into being a motivational slogan for the women's movement of the 60s, 70’s, 80’s 90’s, 2000’s and even today. Prior to the war, women had very few job opportunities and were expected to quit work once they married in order to focus on family life. Before the war, a woman's role in society was based upon patrichical views. Rosie the Riveter depiction as a strong skilled female worker inspired many women to enter the workforce, which allowed women to feel freedom they had never felt before. Rosie the Riveter allowed women to step outside of their comfort zones and take on tasks that prior to the war, no one would have expected them to do. Rosie the Riveters message stuck with woman years after the war and ultimately inspired the second wave of the women's movement in the 60s.
This interpretation of Rosie was firmly entrenched in the concept of women entering the workforce as their patriotic duty. In the painting you can see that Rosie is stomping on a copy of Mein Kampf, Adolf Hitler’s 1925 autobiography and political manifesto. The message was clear; although men did the physical fighting on the frontlines, women were also doing their part to defeat the enemy (Hawkes). The war industry during WWII gave women the opportunity to earn their own living and contribute to the war effort. The imagery of “Riveters” we are accustomed to serve as an allegory; the war propaganda used “Rosie” as a metaphorical representation of the millions of women (of all colors and socio-economic classes) who took action during war time when patriarchal order was relaxed. These women joined the work force in order to help their country, to gain the benefits of employment, and to improve their quality of life
The film titled, “The Life and Times of Rosie the Riveter”, looks at the roles of women during and after World War II within the U.S. The film interviews five women who had experienced the World War II effects in the U.S, two who were Caucasian and three who were African American. These five women, who were among the millions of women recruited into skilled male-oriented jobs during World War II, shared insight into how women were treated, viewed and mainly controlled. Along with the interviews are clips from U.S. government propaganda films, news reports from the media, March of Time films, and newspaper stories, all depicting how women are to take "the men’s" places to keep up with industrial production, while reassured that their duties were fulfilling the patriotic and feminine role. After the war the government and media had changed their message as women were to resume the role of the housewife, maid and mother to stay out of the way of returning soldiers. Thus the patriotic and feminine role was nothing but a mystified tactic the government used to maintain the American economic structure during the world war period. It is the contention of this paper to explore how several groups of women were treated as mindless individuals that could be controlled and disposed of through the government arranging social institutions, media manipulation and propaganda, and assumptions behind women’s tendencies which forced “Rosie the Riveter” to become a male dominated concept.
Rosie the Riveter is a cultural icon of the United States whom represented the women who worked in factories during World War II, many of whom produced military equipment and war supplies. These women sometimes took entirely new jobs replacing the male workers who were in the military. The symbol of feminism and women's economic power was often amplified through Rosie the Riveter. "Rosie the Riveter" was a popular phrase first used in 1942 in a song of the same name written by Redd Evans. Auto factories were converted to build airplanes, shipyards were expanded, and new factories were built, and all these facilities needed workers. While the men were busy fighting in war, women were dominant in assistance. Companies took the idea of hiring women seriously. Eventually, women were needed because companies were signing large, lucrative contracts with the government just as all the men were leaving for the service. The various elements or figures of Rosie was based on a group of women, most of whom were named Rose. Many of these women named "Rose" varied in class, ethnicity, geography, and background diversity. One specially, who's had the biggest impact of all Rosie's was Rose Will Monroe. Rose Will Monroe, the most influential "Rosie" at the time, represented women during World War II by working most of her time in a Michigan factory.
The role of women in American history has evolved a great deal over the past few centuries. In less than a hundred years, the role of women has moved from housewife to highly paid corporate executive to political leader. As events in history have shaped the present world, one can find hidden in such moments, pivotal points that catapult destiny into an unforeseen direction. This paper will examine one such pivotal moment, fashioned from the fictitious character known as ‘Rosie the Riveter’ who represented the powerful working class women during World War II and how her personification has helped shape the future lives of women.
When the war started, women had to take over the jobs of men and they learned to be independent. These women exemplified the beginning of change. Coupled with enfranchisement and the increased popularity of birth control, women experienced a new liberation. When the men returned from the war they found competition from the newly liberated woman who did not want to settle for making a home (Melman 17). This new class of women exercised a freedom that shocked society.
Women had a role in the forming of our country that many historians overlook. In the years leading to the revolution and after women were political activists. During the war, women took care of the home front. Some poor women followed the army and assisted to the troops. They acted as cooks, laundresses and nurses. There were even soldiers and spies that were women. After the revolution, women advocated for higher education. In the early 1800’s women aided in the increase of factories, and the changing of American society. Women in America were an important and active part of achieving independence and the framing of American life over the years.
“I think a lot of women said, “Screw that noise”. ‘Cause they had a taste of freedom, they had a taste of making their own money, a taste of spending their own money, making their own decisions. I think the beginning of the women's movement had its seeds right there in World War Two."
During WWII, women took over the work force, and had such inspirations as Rosie the Riveter. This created a generation of women who wanted more out of life than birthing children, and keeping a nice home for their husband. The end of the war, however, brought with it a decrease of working women. In the 1950’s the rate of working women had slightly rebounded to 29% following the post-war decrease in 1945. These women were well rounded, working outside the home, and still having dinner on the table by 5PM.
Often historical events leading up to the twentieth century are dominated by men and the role of women is seemingly non-existent outside of reproduction. When one thinks of notable and memorable names and events of the Revolution, men are the first to be mentioned. The American Revolution was mainly dominated by men including George Washington, Samuel Adams, and Benjamin Franklin. There is no denying that men were vitally important to the American Revolution, but what were the women doing? Often overlooked, the women of the Revolution played a key role in the outcome of the nation. The women of the American Revolution, although not always recognized, were an influential society that assumed risky jobs like soldiers, as well as involvement
Throughout most of recorded history, women generally have endured significantly fewer career opportunities and choices, and even less legal rights, than that of men. The “weaker sex,” women were long considered naturally, both physically and mentally, inferior to men. Delicate and feeble minded, women were unable to perform any task that required muscular or intellectual development. This idea of women being inherently weaker, coupled with their natural biological role of the child bearer, resulted in the stereotype that “a woman’s place is in the home.” Therefore, wife and mother were the major social roles and significant professions assigned to women, and were the ways in which women identified and expressed themselves. However, women’s history has also seen many instances in which these ideas were challenged-where women (and some men) fought for, and to a large degree accomplished, a re-evaluation of traditional views of their role in society.
During the war, men were off fighting for America, and the women were left behind to take over their jobs in the factories. Women proved that they can do almost all of the same jobs as men. Rosie the Riveter, a picture of a woman flexing with a caption of “We Can Do It,” became the symbol for women all across the nation. After the war, years later, women began to receive equal pay for the same jobs that the men were doing. Many other minority groups, such as African Americans, played a huge
The 1940s provided a drastic change in women’s employment rates and society’s view of women. With the end of the Depression and the United States’ entrance into World War II, the number of jobs available to women significantly increased. As men were being drafted into military service, the United States needed more workers to fill the jobs left vacant by men going to war. Women entered the workforce during World War II due to the economic need of the country. The use of Patriotic rhetoric in government propaganda initiated and encouraged women to change their role in society.
But when the “Women’s Movement,” is referred to, one would most likely think about the strides taken during the 1960’s for equal treatment of women. The sixties started off with a bang for women, as the Food and Drug Administration approved birth control pills, President John F. Kennedy established the President's Commission on the Status of Women and appointed Eleanor Roosevelt as chairwoman, and Betty Friedan published her famous and groundbreaking book, “The Feminine Mystique” (Imbornoni). The Women’s Movement of the 1960’s was a ground-breaking part of American history because along with African-Americans another minority group stood up for equality, women were finished with being complacent, and it changed women’s lives today.
With all the new acts being passed women were able to go to school and work, and women pursued these new opportunities. There was a rising rate of women enrolling in colleges. Females surpassed the number of men applying (The Role of Women in the 70 's - Exploring the Seventies). Thousands of women were going to college and participating highly in clubs and sometimes sports. Not only were women participating in schooling, women started to hold positions in Congress. Three percent of our congressional representatives were women by the 1970s. There were many newspaper job ads created that were calling for the help of women, thus promoting more women to enter the workforce. Along with these changes there was more personal strengths created in the home. Husbands were getting regularly involved with family meals and housework, thus creating more financial and emotional strength in families (Eisenberg). In the late 70’s females were not only participating in college for their education but they were also obtain financial ground stating the employer 's can not discrimination against pregnant women (The 1960s-70s American Feminist Movement: Breaking Down Barriers for
We all know the famous Rosie the Riveter but how much do we know? What does she represent? Who was she represent? Why is she so important? In a 2014 survey, 78% of percipients said she was feminism icon. But she didn’t start of that way.