In The Great Gatsby, Nick describes Myrtle's sister, Catherine, the first time he sees her at the party in Chapter Two. Catherine is said to have been “...a slender, worldly girl of about thirty, with a solid, sticky bob of red hair, and a complexion powdered milky white” with drawn on eyebrows after she had plucked them off (The Great Gatsby 30). During the 1920s, many women had taken on this flapper appearance. The term “flapper” began in England to describe girls of an awkward age, who were “lovely, expensive and about nineteen” (“Flappers”). In the work of Fitzgerald, Catherine along with many other women such as Daisy, Jordan, Myrtle, Bernice and Judy, had attained this youthful, boyish look inspired by French designers.
These young women, bobbed their hair, wore short skirts, wore heavy makeup, smoked, consumed alcohol during a time of prohibition, and treated sex with a casual manner. By doing this, they showed their contempt for the acceptable behaviour of the time. In the novel, Fitzgerald portrays the new social and sexual freedom that these women enjoyed through the lives of the Daisy Buchanan, Jordon Baker and Myrtle Wilson. Apart from these three women, there are no other major female characters in The Great Gatsby, however, this hedonistic lifestyle is also shown through the numerous young women who attend Gatsby’s parties. Myrtle Wilson is introduced to us by her telephone call which disturbs the dinner party at Daisy and Tom’s house, bringing the tension between them into the open.
During this time period women started becoming more free and developed fashion trends. This time period changed history forever. Before the 1920’s there was not “fashion”. The 20’s changed everything; it changed the modest look of the past generations. Women started changing, their style was referred to as revealing and flamboyant.
In what ways did the lives of women change under the Nazis in the years 1933-39? In Weimar Germany, creditable progression of feminist work entitled women over the age of 20 the right to vote, this strongly encouraged a greater female interest in politics and by 1933 nearly one-tenth of Reichstag members were female. The women of Weimar Germany enjoyed social freedom; typically, they enjoyed a drink and were encouraged to smoke. They wore short skirts, wore make up and had their hair cut short. Rapid progress in female employment was strongly evident- many took up careers in professions and in some cases women earned the same pay as men.
Fashion of the Fifties This decade opened up a wide variety of original and distinctive styles, which was presented with a classic new twist. World War II was over, time was peaceful yet prosperous. More money would be spent on fashion, and a whole world of new materials would be available to designers, or anyone who wanted them. Women are said to have dressed “smartly” in the 1950’s. Acting and looking like a lady was taught to young girls from the time they were born.
Only men were known to smoke cigarettes. Even though this act seemed so drastic, the most dramatic change seen in women of the 1920s was when they began to drink alcohol. To make it worse, the 1920s was the era of prohibition. Women often carried flasks of liquor on their hips so it would be easy to access it. Flappers had a scandalous image as the "giddy flapper, rouged and clipped, careening in a drunken stupor to the lewd strains of a jazz quartet,"
Many more teenagers have been physically or emotionally hurt because of sororities. For example, in the non-fiction book Pledge there are numerous mentions of eating disorders developing after joining a sorority and many emotional issues caused by not being “pretty” enough. In addition to emotional damage there is also the physical hurt of date rape, binge drinking, eating disorders, and other drug addictions or other serious things that can almost never be avoided, much less be avoided at a sorority. Sororities are the worst organizations to be involved with. Teens and young adults should not join sororities when they go to college.
Another way the role of women changed during 1955 and 1975 was that they were becoming much more confident this is shown by Dominic Sandbrook: “the results was that the conventional, patronising view of women, which presented them as weak, unreliable and oversensitive, was no longer sustainable.” This shows that women (with some help from the new technology) were becoming stronger and more independent. Married women had more time to pursue their own interests, to go out and socialise, and to find some work. One other way in which the role of women changed during the years of 1955 and 1975 was that more girls and young women were able to get and go to further education (university). A girl in the 1970’s was far more likely to go to university than a girl in 1956 simply because women were seen as more independent. Dominic Sandbrook said: “She was more likely to pursue her own interests, to marry when and whom she wanted, to have children when and if she wanted and above all to decide whether she remained in the home or pursued her own career.” In conclusion,
Although ‘Mrs Dalloway’ is not so gender orientated, it too portrays women as the generally weaker sex. The social developments of the time period, known as the Jazz Age, also brought with it alterations in the way females dressed and behaved. Flappers, as they were called, became the new generation of young Western women in the 1920’s. They wore short skirts and excessive makeup, bobbed their hair, drove cars, smoked and drank; challenging traditional gender roles in any way possible. In ‘The Great Gatsby,’ Jordan Baker is representative of a flapper.
Fey makes choses to talk about the way women are treated in the entertainment industry with a joke on Betty White, which targets both sexism and ageism, which Fey repeatedly addresses, but with a softer approach through the use of humor. When Fey states “Science shows that fertility and movie offers drop off steeply for women after forty” she addresses both her ageing in the entertainment business and the concern that society places on women having a certain number of children by her age, but all centered around a funny tone in order to make her remark sound witty yet strong. The use of comedy made Fey’s argument regarding the negative portrayals of working women in the entertainment