Hes young, hes charismatic. He had platformed on a number of promises. So this should give a little bit of context where the Womens Movement is coming into play as we work through some of these overview issues. Now, the 60s, as much promise as there was, we also know there are a lot of issues, particularly racial issues. But there was a period of great change, warfare, and for those who did find promise in the 1960s, there were those who didnt get access to that. And so there are a number of individuals and groups fighting for that access. If you look at the 1960s, we had the 1967 detroit riots, a series of political assassinations, jfk in 1963. In 1968, he also have the assassinations of Martin Luther king jr. And bobby kennedy. So there is also a lot of fear about what this change means and a lot of people are reacting to that. Focussing in on jfk because were going to be talking mostly about women in the Civil Rights Movement today. We will be focussing in on other womens experiences on wednesday. But to given you an idea, jfk was initially hesitant. We have a leg ski now of him as a major shaker in the Civil Rights Movement, but he was very hesitant and cautious about the Civil Rights Movement in the initial year or so of his presidency. He was very concerned about alienating southern politicians and voters because were still in a period of deep segregation in the south. Fwu in 1963, he issues the report to the American People on civil rights. This is his response to black americans who argued with him that you made this response to civil rights and youre not making very much progress on them. And he realized that civil rights wasnt just a general issue, but that it was a moral issue for the nation. And so he starts moving beyond some of that initial hesitation. So that signaled there was a change happening at the administrative level. But after kennedys assassination later that year, the question is will that progress continue . Will the promises that jfk offered come to fruition and there are concerns about linen baines johnson, his Vice President who takes over in 1963, but johnson was very shrewd as far as politics go and he takes the legislation and the content of that earlier speech and he incorporates that into what would become the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Now this act was part of the Great Society legislation, this domestic policy platform that lbj adopts after becoming president. The Civil Rights Act prohibited discrimination based on race, color, sex, national origin. It was designed to inhibt unequal application of Voter Registration requirements, Voter Registration in schools, public accommodations, etcetera. Now, this act was significant, but it still takes time for the administration to implement those pieces, particularly in areas where people were not as keen on this legislation. Johnson also puts forth the Voting Rights act of 1965, which some say is the most significant piece of the Civil Rights Era legislation. But this prohibited Racial Discrimination in voting. Now this is all well and good, but during both jfk and lbjs presidencies, we also see a significant increase in our involvement in the vietnam war. Its r in viets name, it is known as the american war. It started in 1955 for us, lasted until 1975, but its really the 60s that we see that credit. We go from having fewer than a thousand troops in 1959, by 1963, we have about 16,000 troops involved. Of the start of 1964, we have 23,000 troops and by the end of 1964, lbj has increased troop presence to 184,000 troops. So you can see that rapid increase in the 1960s. This also is a periods where we see deployment of Ground Troops for the first time. And so americans are becoming more conscious of what our involvement in vietnam means. And youre going to see a rise in protest movements, antiwar protests in particular. Fatalities in the vietnam war, also, the more troops you put in, the more lives will be lost. At the end of the vietnam war, over 58,000 americans are killed. That is a significant number and a reason for protests in the u. S. But protesters were also keenly aware of the fatalities happening in vietnam. Not just soldier, but civilian casualties. Estimates range from 966,000 vietnamese soldiers and civilians to upwards of 3. 8 million, depending on which records youre looking at. There are hundreds of thousands of cambodians killed during the war. And women are playing a very Important Role in these antiwar protests. Part of it you see the increase in draft issues. Women are not being drafted, but their husbands, their sons, men in their life are. So theyre home trying to get involved in this movement. Were also in the era of the Civil Rights Movement. Now its a movement that has a very long history. We are going to see significant strikes happening in the fiction and 60s as the Movement Fights for Constitutional Rights and protections that are being granted to americans everywhere. The Civil Rights Movement is going to inspire a series of other movements during this time period. Some more well known than others. The womens Rights Movement, what well be talking about as the second wave of feminism well define what that means in a american. Mexican americans are fighting for bilingual Program Necessary schools, worker protections, the unionzation of farm workers, you have indigenous americans demanding the federal government recognize land rights and indigenous sovereignty. Theyre seeking control over inge ding news lands and resources and attempt to go preserve indigenous cultures and women take a key role in that, as well. This is also the era of the lgbt movement. Yes. Go ahead. This is where gay and lesbian individuals at the time are focussing on ending discrimination on the basis of compel orientation. This will particularly take off at the end of the 1960s with the stonewall incident in 1969, but were going to start to see how that movement is taking shape in response to the Civil Rights Movement. So this is sorted of our context in which women are operating, women are recognizing their roles and the ways in which they can affect change locally and nationally. So if we think about second wave feminism, this idea of feminism as a wave is really the result of martha wainwrights New York Times article the second feminist wave. Prior to this, people werent thinking about feminism in those terms, but she argues, quote, feminism, which one might have supposed as dead as a polish question is, again, an issue. So right now, as shes writing about it, making the case that this isnt new, that women have a history of activism and fighting, that it is just now becoming a National Issue once again. She says proponents call it the second feminist wave, the first having ebbed after the gloerus victory of suffrage and disappeared finally into the sandbar of togetherness. Now, there are some issues with the terminology, this idea of the wave as a metaphor. Feminist historian Linda Nichols argues that yes, this can be a very useful term in terms of reminding people that the Current Movement had a pass. But it can be reductive. It suggests whether explicitly or implicitly, that each wave of feminism is some sort of monolith, that it has a unified agenda, that women of all types are fighting together for the same common causes. And it implies also that feminism peaks at certain times and recedes at others. And so it ultimately can ignore the conflicting golds, ideaels, agendas of different groups of women. For example, the women well be talking about today, black womens experiences in activism is not going to be the same as white womens experiences. And their goals are not going to necessarily be the same. Women in the workforce, for example, equal pay, equal work. On its head, that sounds like it would apply to all women. But the issue is that the despite the fact that women of color and white women might both be fighting for equal pay for equal work, it ignores the fact that women of color, black women especially, made less than their white female counterparts. So there is a race issue along with the gender issue that is not affecting white womens activism. Women are fighting for things like contraception and Birth Control. We will see landmark cases which gave women, married and unmarried, the right to use Birth Control. We have griswold versus connecticut in 1965 which had struck down a law stating that married couples would not use Birth Control or inform themselves about it going back to the come stock law era. So this particular court case allowed married couples to access contraception and contraceptive information. Its not going to be until 1972 that eisenstat versus buried, that argues that unmarried women should have the same access to contraceptive use and information, as well. By the end of the 1960s, over 80 of married women of the child bearing age were using contraception. Part of this is made possible because in 1960, the federal government made approval of the Birth Control pill. So this made it easier for women to take personal control over their bodies as opposed to other contraceptive methods. Women are fighting for the end of Sexual Harassment and domestic violence. The criminalization of marital rape, for example. That doesnt start until the missed 1970s. So throughout this time period that were talking about, the 1960s, as women are fighting for control over their lives and bodies, marital rape is not a crime in any state. Women are fighting for equality. Betty fernand comes out during this time period and she argues that women are fighting for this thing that has no name, this systemic issue, this systemic sexism that taught women that their place is in the home, that they should find joyment and fulfillment in caring for that home and raising up their husbands, rearing children, having children, theres another issue for you as a woman if you couldnt have children. And that if women cooperate find enjoyment or fulfillment in their role as housewives, it was because they were broken and per verse, its their problem. And ferdinand says i thought there was something wrong with me because i didnt have an orgasm waxing the floor. Shes putting it out there. Shes unafraid. But shes working in a context, the National Organization for women who are fighting for the equal rights amendment, it is formed in 1966. Protest the miss America Pageant as sexist, paternalistic, argues that women are being judged purely on their physical appearance, despite the fact that organizers of the pageant were like, oh, but theyre also talking to you about their plans for the world and what they know. The protesters were like, absolutely not. This is a huge issue. But contrary to popular belief, its not like all the women are out there, you know, going to dumpsters and throwing their bras in and burning everything. Its not how that works. Theres no bra burnings. I mean, there might have been one. One. As they protest the miss America Pageant, however and in various other protests against these sexist ideals, they are taking tokens or symbols or items that they feel represent oppression. So, the bra might be one of those, but theyre also running around collecting playboys and setting those on fire. You dont hear about that. I think thats far more interesting than setting a bra on fire. Theyre taking items from the home mops, brooms, whatever. Theyre destroying these ideals in a physical form. But frameworks like frudans the feminine mystique, theyre specific, if you get down to it, to white, middleclass women. Despite the demands of equal pay for equal work, its one thing if youre being denied the opportunity to work because you want to work, but its another thing to be denied the opportunity to work when you need to work. And when it came down to the families during the 1960s, far more women of color needed to work to supplement Household Incomes because even men of color are making less than their white counterparts. And so, again, theyre fighting for different things. Another example is that the right to contraception and contraceptive knowledge. While black and white women are fighting for that information, fighting for that right, fighting for access to abortions, theres something that black women have to focus on that is not part of the mainstream feminist movement, and that is to stop the forced sterilization of people of color and people with disabilities, because that had not been a lived experience of most white women at the time, there was not part of that mainstream feminist movement. So, there are a lot of different examples of how race and nationality, ethnicity, can play a role in the different lived experiences of women in the 1960s. You know, weve talked quite a bit about how that operated in the 30s, 40s, 50s, but despite the vast changes of the 1960s, were still seeing some of those same issues playing out. We know, for example, that black women specifically are playing a very prominent and Important Role in the Civil Rights Movement. Yet, how often do you hear their names . Who are you most likely to hear about or think of when you hear the phrase Civil Rights Movement . Youre most likely to hear Martin Luther king, you know, malcolm x and names like that, mostly all men, not the women. Exactly. First name thats probably going to come to mind is Martin Luther king jr. He is sort of the face that we associate with the movement. Malcolm x, partially because of his controversial nature, but he is a prominent figure. You might also think about john lewis or stokely carmichael. If you do think of a woman, you might think of rosa parks. But when ive asked my history students in the past if they can name another woman aside from rosa parks, it is often very difficult for them to do so. Many women in the Civil Rights Movement are facing gender discrimination and Sexual Harassment from within the movement. So, theyre facing external and internal pressures and harassment. According to the National Museum of africanAmerican History and culture, the 1963 march on washington provides us a really clear and concrete example of this. While the march pushed for equality, while women were instrumental in helping to organize and put the march together, the event was purely dominated by men. The formal program excluded women from speaking. No women were invited to be part of the delegation for meeting president kennedy later in the day. But, as well talk about some key individuals, i could go on and on all day about different women involved in the movement, but today were going to focus in particularly on those who took the stance of either education or who were student activists, because i thought for this class, with each of you being students, you can make some personal connections with their experiences. But black women are serving as strategists, advocates, activists, organizers, educators, and leaders in the Civil Rights Movement, despite the dangers of participating in the movement. Not only do they have to fear the same physical violence that their male counterparts were subject to, they had an added component that they had to fear, and that was Sexual Violence perpetrated against them. But these women participated anyway. So, ill start by introducing you to septima poinsettia clark. She was born to a formerly enslaved man, peter poinsette, and his wife, victoria warren anderson. She is the second of eight children. And she fought, spent her life fighting for Educational Rights for black individuals. She graduated from the Avery Normal Institute in 1916, which was the first accredited secondary school for africanamericans in charleston, where she grew up. After graduating, she taught in segregated schools throughout much of South Carolina. While doing so, she earned a bachelors degree from Benedict College in 1942, a historically black college. And she also, a few years later, in 1946, earned a masters degree from hampton institute, now hampton university. During that entire period, she recognized that, despite her best efforts, these segregated schools, no matter what she did, if they didnt have the same resources, the same funding as all white schools, her efforts to educate could only go so far. And so, she continued to fight for equal Educational Opportunities and rights. In 1956, she lost her job as an educator because South Carolina banned membership in the naacp, and she refused to comply. She had been a longstanding member of the naacp. And because of her work with the organization, she was ultimately hired to become the director of workshops at Highlander Folk School in tennessee, which was ultimately absorbed into the southern christian leadership conference, the sclc. During that time period, she and her cousin, bernice robinson, another prominent female figure in the movement, created the first Citizenship School to educate blacks in literacy, state government, and election procedures. And Martin Luther king jr. Relied very heavily on her expertise regarding education, literacy, and the roles in which literacy and education could help the voting movements that he was part of. She was so influential that he insisted when he won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1964 that she accompany him to sweden. He was adamant that she had to be there with him because of how much work she had put into supporting his overall movements. And she inspired many other women, particularly students, who are faced with further segregation. So, most of the following women come from the student nonviolent coordinating committee. So these are student activists, women who are getting involved at a very young age. And they have different experiences. So you just heard about clark, who was born to a formerly enslaved individual. Diane nash is born to a middleclass family in chicago. And in talking with her, historian scholars, journalists, she said that she didnt truly understand what segregation was because coming from where she was, it wasnt until she enrolled at Fisk University that she realized how impactful segregation was on the educational experience and on the lived experience of students. She became a member of the freedom writers, and she was also one of the most prominent student leaders of the entire Civil Rights Movement. While in tennessee as a student, she organized sitins in nashville. She was part of the nashville student movement. And ultimately, on those freedom rides, she led all of the rides from birmingham to jackson in 1961. She took the lead in each of those. Shes actually one of the founding members, one of the founding student leaders of the student nonviolent coordinating committee, sncc. She, along with ruby doris smith, who youll hear about, charles sher yad and charles joan, who were fellow sncc leaders, they led a sitin in 1961 in rock hill, South Carolina, in response to what became known as the rock hill nine. Has anybody ever heard of the rock hill nine . Youve probably, more likely, heard about the greensboro sitins, but the rock hill nine in 1961, nine individuals were arrested during a peaceful sitin, and they refused to pay bail, choosing instead to sit out their sentences. And this is going to spark a wider protest against that bail system. But she, along with three others, went down to rock hill and participated in a sitin there. Like the other nine individuals, they were also arrested and refused to pay bail. Again, choosing to sit out their sentences. Nash was then later arrested in 1961 for leading nonviolent workshops for black youth in jackson. Again, refusing to pay bail, to pay into a system which would have forced her to admit to wrongdoing that she didnt believe that she had participated in. She helped to lead the selma voting Rights Movement along with Martin Luther king jr. In 1963, she helped to organize the birmingham desegregation campaign. And so, she, too, had direct contact and offered direct assistance via her role in the sncc organization to dr. Martin luther king jr. Her colleague, ruby doris smith, later married name robinson, she, too, like diane nash, was born to a middleclass family. And so, she talked about how she had largely been shielded from the issues of segregation by her family, by her parents, but that she was always very conscious of her race, of her blackness, and she didnt shy away from that. She just had not faced or experienced the systems of segregation that many of her peers had. She was a student at spelman college, where she joined the atlanta student movement. She participated in sitins throughout the city of atlanta. Her experiences, especially joining with nash and the other sncc leaders at the rock hill sitin, she ultimately became the administrative secretary of the student nonviolent coordinating committees atlanta office. And she saw to it that the field secretaries throughout the area got anything and everything that they needed to be effective in their protest campaigns. She, along with nash, helped to popularize that jail, no bail, strategy. And in her capacity as the administrative secretary for sncc, she created the Sojourner Truth motor fleet, even incorporating it as a separate entity from sncc, in which they provided or found transportation for those participating in sitins, freedom rides, et cetera. In 1966, her work, being so effective and important to the larger movement, was elected to replace jim foreman as snccs executive secretary. She is the first and only woman to have served on snccs executive committee. She had done all of this before the ripe old age of 25. Feeling a little old. Unfortunately for smith robinson, her activism was cut short. I mean, if you can quickly do math in your head right here. I could not i had to use a calculator. At the age of 25, she died of terminal cancer. But she is quoted this is on her tombstone, a phrase attributed to her if you think free, you are free. That became sort of a rallying point for a lot of individuals involved, particularly in the student nonviolent coordinating committee. So, despite her short time in the movement, she left a really longlasting legacy. Another individual who helped out with the development of sncc, Ella Josephine baker. Like clark, she grew up listening to stories from her grandmother about life as an enslaved woman. She was raised in north carolina, and her grandmother would often tell her about the time that she was whipped for refusing to marry a man that had been chosen for her by her owner. And bakers grandmother told her many stories about these experiences as an enslaved woman. And this, from childhood, instilled in baker a desire, a drive to make change. All right. She understood from a direct level what it was like to be unfree. And again, this is sort of a situation that not all of the individuals involved in these Womens Movements understood. She studied at Shaw University in raleigh, north carolina. She graduated as class valedictorian in 1927. And she was active in many organizations. She was part of the naacp. She was in the southern christian leadership conference, served as executive secretary in that organization. And she recognized the power that the younger population had, if harnessed and given direction. So, as executive secretary of the sclc, she decided to organize a conference of student activists at Shaw University in raleigh. That conference is the founding of the student nonviolent coordinating committee. So though she herself was no longer a student, she recognized the importance of education and student activistism. She encouraged the students that she engaged with to organize from the ground up. She assisted them by leveraging her connections in the various organizations she belonged to, especially the naacp. And that enabled her to connect those students with powerful individuals. And so, sncc ends up joining forces in many cases with the congress of racial equality, and together, those organizations put together the 1961 freedom rides. So, you can see the generational interconnectedness between baker and the students that she engaged with. She helped them develop the freedom summer, which was the first Voter Registration project which attempted to Bring National attention to mississippis racism and to physically register black voters who had been intimidated via violence. And she also helped as the students grew into their activi activism, encouraged them to join these additional organizations and to help spread from where they were to other parts of the nation. And then the last woman im going to introduce you to, which should bring us to todays reading that you had, is ann moody. And if you did the reading, you will recognize this name. She was born in rural mississippi, the eldest of nine children. Her parents divorced while she was very young. And so, in order to help her mother out, particularly being the eldest, she worked for several white families in the area. She would clean their houses. She would help their children. She would do some tutoring with their homework, taking care of them, if the parents needed to be away at work, and she did so for only a few dollars a week. But she did what she needed to do to bring money in for her family. Despite the fact that she had to take on such responsibility at such a young age, she graduated with honors from a segregated, allblack high school in about 1960. And in 1961, the following year, she went to naches Junior College. She went there on a basketball scholarship, but thats where she became more involved with these grassroots organizations, particularly sncc. Now, she originally attributes her attention, her desire to join the Civil Rights Movement organizations as a direct result of the murder of 14yearold emmett till. And if you know the story of emmett till, he was a 14yearold africanamerican boy who was murdered in 1955 because a woman, a white woman, claimed that he had looked at her wrong, whistled at her, and her husband and his brother or cousin decided to take justice, if we can, in quotation marks there, into their own hands. And of course, those individuals were never held responsible for what happened to him. And so, his face, what happened to him was plastered among newspapers. His mother wanted that image out there because she wanted people to see what grown men were willing to do to a child. And so, moody was very familiar with the case. She had seen it, all right. She understood the devastation that could occur. And so, in college, she became involved with the congress of racial equality. She became involved with c. O. R. E. She became involved with the naacp. She joined sncc. She ultimately left naches Junior College and went to tugalu college on an academic scholarship and earned her bachelors of science degree in 1964 and used her knowledge and experience during that time to become part of the sncc freedom singers. So, in college, she joins this group. And in 1963, they participate in the march on washington. Now, the freedom singers, theyre coming from all different areas. And for moody, its her experience with the singers that really changes her outlook on who she is and what her role is in the movement. And so, today you guys read tanisha fords article in the journal of southern history sncc women, denim, and the politics of dress. To give you a little context as to who ford is and where this work is coming from tanisha ford is an awardwinning writer, cultural critic and historian. She is currently an associate professor of Africana Studies and history at the university of delaware. She describes her work and i think you can see this very clearly with the article as censuring the experiences of black women, girls, and nonbinary fems, using particularly the lens of material culture, fashion, beauty, and body politics. She has several books dealing with these issues, including liberated threads black women, style, and the Global Politics of soul, and a forthcoming manuscript coming out this summer, dressed in dreams a black girls love letter to the power of fashion. And in this article, i think she speaks to you about what physical appearance can mean, what it represents, how changing it changes a message. And she opens up with moodys experience. During this experience for moody, she feels very overdressed as a freedom singer because she shows up and she realizes that among her and her fellow singers, she is the only one in a dress. Because early on in the Civil Rights Movement, youll see individuals wearing what might be considered the sunday best. All right. They felt as if they had to present in a specific way. And so, heres moody in a dress, compared to her counterparts, who are in denim, skirts, and jeans. And she starts to rethink what choice it means or what it means to choose your physical clothing, what message that that can send. So, ford is exploring how black women in these movements, in their protest, abandon respectable, again in quotations, respectable clothing, and processed hairstyles in favor of denim and natural hair. And she asks you a few questions. She explores what this means in terms of ownership of the body, ownership of the movement, and how there are gendered experiences happening in the Civil Rights Movement. Right . So just to give you some framework, the Research Questions in particular that ford are operating with she says, why did these young women, why are these young, black women making these choices . Making the choice to abandon socalled respectable clothing, abandoning processed hairstyles, why . She wants to better understand what that meant not just for them but for their message more broadly. And then what does this journey, what do these womens experiences reveal about snc dri cs radical brand of activism, the intraracial class politics in the movement and Youth Culture more broadly. And then as were thinking about gendered activism and how gender affects peoples reality, particularly as they participate in these different activist movements, what does she say about how gender affected activism for women then . And as we move into talking about the reading today, i want to get a sense from you what you guys think about whether or not gender is affecting todays means of activism. You could think about the me too movement, the baltimore uprising, and the various reactions to Police Brutality and violence, because women are still playing very pivotal roles in those movements as well, and there is both gender and race and class components at play. So, again, im going to work through some of these questions with you, get a sense of your thoughts, and then i do have some questions from your classmates. So, well start just, why do you think, based on your understanding of fords reading and your understanding now of these different experiences, why do you think black women are abandoning this, i guess, this clothing, this persona . Anthony . I think its sort of a way of reclaiming their identity, because i think for so long, beauty has been seen through a white metric. And as a result of that, by taking that back and wearing denim and natural hair, theyre completely getting rid of that white metric and reclaiming beauty for themselves. So, i think its a really important part of the struggle for black liberation, especially black women liberation, is to claim something for themselves that stands in the face of white supremacy. To piggyback off of anthonys answer, i mean, its even quoted like in the first couple pages that women used dress to transcend the image of the workingclass world view of blackness and black culture. And to kind of i mean, not to repeat what you said, but it very much was like through a white lens and it was kind of, from my perspective and i mean, clearly, like this might not be accurate, but they were kind of like, if we want to make more movement in this movement, we need to be like authentically ourselves, and we cant just like keep portraying who we are or are not through like this lens that society has put on us. All right. And thinking about that, this idea of reclaiming identity of celebrating authentic selves, these are choices that these young women are making. What do you think that this says about the organization, sncc, the radical activism that these students are participating in . How do you think it affects their time at sncc, this shift in terms of how they are dressing . In the reading, it kind of mentioned it as like the sncc uniform, is that when sncc went and protested, that it was common to see females wearing pants, not wearing the skirts and wearing denim. So it became also a way of like sncc to identify themselves and also for black africanamerican females to express their inner self being as well. I was going to Say Something similar as to, like, they knew that they would set their own identity for other black people to follow outside of their organization. And it was also something that was hard for them to do, to go against the grain, because they were trained as little girls to look a certain way and to go against like their africanness or theyre not what they would say is natural beauty, but it wasnt seen to that in society. So, because, them having this uniform was necessary in order to have, like, the rest of the black community to follow in this specific uniform as well. So, it kind of made their movement more stronger because theyre not blended in with, like with the society was saying about them. Excellent. This is going to pull us into some of the questions that you guys raised that you sent to me from your reading. And i think it also speaks to gender affecting the reality of activism. So i want to come back to this question in a minute, but i do want to move to some of your questions, because i thought that you guys raised some really important points from fords reading. So, im going to start with this first one, because it sort of speaks to what you were talking about, alison. Why do you think black womens moral character, more than their male counterparts, were called into question when it comes to the ways in which they chose to dress and present themselves . So, why are they being sort of attacked for that choice more than their male counterparts at sncc . So, come to mena and then well come back to alison. I think i would say that the reason that, the femininity idea, women are considered very gentle creatures and should be presented in a very beautiful way, especially in activism. Like if they look presentable, then they might be considered more wanting to talk, but at the same time, if they dress in the sncc value, they look more, not robust, but in a way, like they can be more assertive and they can be more taken seriously. Theyre not going to follow the gender norms. Theyre going to be breaking from those molds. So i think its all about trying to break away. And men, no matter what kind of fashion, they can be in pants or a skirt or anything like that. I think theyll still be based on their gender alone are going to be still taken very seriously over a female. So, kind of going off what she said, but also, like, being that women come from being seen first before being heard, like, how theyre presented is whether theyre going to be approached or, like said, taken seriously. Black women, they were like, oh, if you go out without your hair pressed and you look, like, unpresentable or ugly even, because if it wasnt what the standard was, then you werent presentable or you werent professional. Or it also shows like your class. Like, oh, no ones going to listen to you if youre in the lower class because you dont really have a say as to what they thought. So, i think because it was more so towards women, like a big controversy because women are supposed to look one way, and there was only one kind of thing of what beauty was back then or one way that women are supposed to look, so i think that had a lot to do with that. Yes. I like that youre speaking to this idea of women being seen first, heard second, right . It goes a lot to this idea of, you know, be seen, not heard. I heard that a lot when i was a little kid. We want to see you. We dont want to hear you. And i think for women, that that is a phrase you hear more than, you know, male counterparts. Somebody over here had thoughts . I mean, i really dont have too much, anything new to contribute. I think everyone kind of said what i was going to say, but i definitely think that women especially are targeted for the way that they dress, and i think you hit the nail on the head when you said we want to see you and not hear you, and thats a very serious problem. I think that pervades our society today. But more specifically, i think race also has something to do with it, because i can remember when president barack obama was still president , fox news criticized him for the things that he wore. Yeah, the tan suit crisis. So, attacking people for what they wear is a means to discredit them, and its baseless. Its baseless. Theres nothing to it. Its just a way to discredit someone. So, i think there is, you know, one part to it where theres a gendered part to it, but i also think theres a racial component, too. And thats why i think it was really important for black women during this time to sort of reclaim beauty for themselves, so that way, they arent discredited. They know who they are. They know what their identity is. And yeah, thats my two cents. Yeah, and i think if we take the gendered component out of it, we could talk about president obama, but i think if we talk about first Lady Michelle obama, her appearance. I mean, i dont even know where to begin, but i will say that for whatever reason, this white idyllic beauty well take it to jackie, jackie o. She sort of was the base for beauty and for class and grace for the first lady. Like, people continuously went back to her as that icon of first lady beauty, and that is the person that they ultimately ended up comparing Michelle Obama to so many times. And it wasnt no matter what she did, if she dressed in a style that was seen to be whitefacing, she was criticized for that as trying too hard. If she dressed or presented herself in a way that felt authentic to her, she was criticized for that. And it brings together that race and that gender component. And i think you see that play out throughout this particular article. So, i think that actually takes us to this question at the bottom. So, as women are actively trying to liberate themselves, theyre still being told that the way they look must appeal to authority figures, particularly men, since men are still, especially in the 60s, the authority figures. Do you think that the men, white or black, impacted the ways in which women at sncc chose to present themselves . And do you think that men today still sort of call the shots as far as professional appearances . I completely agree that the men did impact the ways that the women dressed and presented themselves, because they were the ones, i think, kind of said that you should dress a certain way. But to what they think today, i think it is very much like a policy thing. The first thing i think of is like the army. Like, women of, like women of color and women who are white, their hair has to be a certain way, and it is very much like the mens hair has to be very put back, where women couldnt have their hair down. Or even with women of color, they cant have like it in braids. They cant do that, even if its short. They cant have it in that way because they cant express themselves. It has to be in a very tight bun. If you go to a professional job, a woman has to either wear a pencil skirt or slacks. But before, it only was skirt to show their femininity. But its also a doubleedged sword, if you think about it, because if a woman shows too much or too little, theyre considered a prude and if theyre showing too much, theyre considered a slut, so i think its a doubleedged sword on what your appearance is, but i think men controlled that completely. So, how do you think the women in sncc feel . Or do you think they were impacted by this sort of double standard by the men that theyre working alongside . I think the patriarchal norms that come, that are set up in society for women is directly what impacted the women in sncc to change the way in which they presented themselves. So, i think thats the impact that it has. They saw this as oppressive and they chose to react to it. And i think thats sort of how men impacted the women in sncc. I dont know if theres anything broader than that. I think just simply realizing that the norms set up for them were oppressive and simply choosing to reject that was the impact that men had. And in regards to do i think men today still call the shots on appearance, yeah, i still think there is a very sysgender, heteronormaltive white standard for fashion, and i think its applied to women, its applied to men, its applied to queer people, its applied to people of color, and its very seriously damaging. And to kind of go with that as well, i mean, i think though it did kind of motivate them to liberate themselves with the wear, i think it was also and i cant speak for them but especially almost conflicting and splitting because they have these two kind of sides pulling towards them because they want to kind of take back their fashion, take back their, you know, part of this liberation of wearing these denim skirts and really like claiming something for themselves, but also understanding that what they wear, even if theyre trying to do it as a sense of liberation, still gets pulled towards that kind of, like anthony said, kind of like that sysgendered expectation that they had. So it had to have been conflicting a lot of the times, knowing that, okay, we want to take back this liberation, but also have to fall within these norms of being presentable or being, quote unquote, like dressed well for that. So, as go ahead, steven. I was going say, one of the benefits from wearing the denim was the practicality for what they were doing. During the sitins, being thrown ketchup and mustard packets at and having all these stains, and also like being hosed down. Its kind of impractical to be wearing your sunday best clothing, where denim is kind of more durable. Its made for that farm work, so thats one of the practicalities of wearing denim. It was a fashion statement, like self expression, but it also benefited them for what they were doing sat tat the time. Yeah, absolutely. So, do you think that the members of sncc, especially the women, this idea of adopting the sncc uniform, this denim, whether thats denim skirts, jeans, the bib overalls that were fairly popular do you think that they changed their clothing to also become more relatable to the community . Do you think that if they did, do you think that this increased their credibility . Do you think it might have hurt their message . How do you think adopti the organization, but from outside of the organization . According to the reading, when they were saying, when they went into more rural areas and thats where most of the people that worked you know, they wore jeans and denim overalls and stuff, and theyre coming in all dressed up, probably made them feel like, hey, you know, make them shy away from even dealing with them because they probably felt like, okay, this person doesnt really fit in here. So, when i think when they changed their, to stop wearing that, the people downlo in the rural areas was more comfortable with them coming in and asking them questions and they would answer them for them better. Anybody else . Yeah, i think between the practicality of it, given the nature of the activism that the sncc members are participating in, as well as the fact that they are dealing with a variety of different kinds of people. So, not only are we dealing with issues of gender and race within sncc and within the larger Civil Rights Movement and what that means as far as appearance goes, were also dealing with class issues and class biases. And as mark said, you might feel less comfortable believing or trusting an individual if they are presenting to you in a way that suggests that you are the other, that they are coming in to take charge, or theyre coming in telling you what you need to be doing. If they present to you in a particular way, you might be intimidated. You might not feel comfortable and you might not feel like they understand you or could represent you. And i think for women in particular, when theyre coming into these situations and theyre operating as leaders of a movement, leaders in sncc, they have to find ways to be taken seriously in that capacity, because we saw in the march on washington just how, despite all of the work and organizing and effort that they had put into the larger movement, how they were still not taken as seriously as their male counterparts and not afforded the same opportunities to present their leadership, to present the ways in which they had contributed. So, i want to go back to this idea about gender affecting the reality of activism for women. So, well start talk to me about how you think gender is affecting activism from the ford article. Think about the 1960s. And we can move outside of the Civil Rights Movement as well, because again, well be talking more on wednesday about the various other movements that women are participating in, especially as we continue to move through the 70s and 80s, how physical appearance is affecting the ways in which women are treated in activist situations. But thinking about the 60s today, what do you guys think . How is gender affecting the reality of activism for these women . I mean, at the end of the ford article or kind of towards the end, it said that men were just more well known in the sncc, so no matter how much the women tried, like you gave up great examples of women that were in the sncc during the time, and theyre not really that well known, but the men made such an impact, so it just shows that gender really does matter because these women werent getting acknowledgement for all of the work that they were doing, kind of being overlooked. Yes, they were getting acknowledgement within the organization, but outside of it, i dont think anyone really saw the true impact that they were making. More so of having a choice. I think this is at the beginning of the 50s, 60s, when women are educated, thanks to the Land Grant College act, and everyone can speak up, theyre aware. And i think thats the forefront of choice. Too bad, you know, like the real choice of what can i do with my body comes in 1974, later on. So, i think that is the main thing is i have a choice. This is who i am. This is what i want to do. I think in terms of presenting. And think about even just the icons that women would have had at the time. I think two of the number one Television Shows in the 50s and 60s was leave it to beaver. So weve got, you know, june cleaver, and father knows best. And in both of those shows, we have a very particular type of woman that is presented. And i think even throughout the rest of pop culture in the 60s, there is a shift happening, what we would call the counterculture, most likely, but there is a reason its called the counterculture. Its counter to this dominant culture thats been in place, and its a reaction to that. I dont think that you see a significant push towards some of the ideas that we would see as more radical, the more natural hair. Thats going to be a big movement in the 1970s. When we get together next week and we talk about the 70s, well talk for example about angela davis, whos just, you know, brilliant. And she was very influential in promoting these standards of fighting against standards of beauty and using appearance as a means of furthering a particular message. So, i think well wrap up today. But before we do, do you guys have any final questions or thoughts on the ford reading . Well be using that as a launching point when we come together on wednesday as well to move into the experiences of other women in the 1960s. But i want to see if there are any final thoughts. I guess kind of just a final thought. Like we dont really have to go too far into it today. It might be a good segue for wednesday, too. But i was kind of thinking while looking over the ford article, like, because when i was reading it, like, i also think of like the 1960s and the fashion shift and the societal shift. Like, that was so influential. And when i was sitting there reading, i kind of thought of this question. And do you guys think, is there another time in history where fashion was so influential to societal change . Because like, the only thing i could kind of think of was when we made kind of the transition to wearing like bloomers, like as pants, and kind of, oh, its kind of acceptable for women to wear pants. But even up until 1960, women were still wearing skirts on a regular basis. It wasnt until tthe Dick Van Dyke show and that kind of era where it was pants were worked into womens fashion. So i was just kind of thinking, like even into 80s and 90s, like yeah, there was the punk rock phase, but that was just like a phase. It wasnt like using fashion to, like, change a major racial issue in our country. So i was just kind of putting it out there for you guys. Does it feel Like National tragedy, national war im sorry, war, in the sense of like, from the First Movement to the second movement, there is world war ii, world war i, and then there is korean war and all it seemed like theres a big gap between the Civil Rights Act, during the first suffrage, and then 1970 roe versus wade. Is it there is a tangible result, or probably from these wars that kind of inhibits Womens Movement from materializing . Like there is a 40 years gap and another one is 10 years, before you reach a next level . I definitely think that conflict can have an impact on the speed or lack thereof in terms of progress. A lot just depends on what the conflict is and whether or not you have a large Group Fighting together. So i mean, there is a big divide among Public Perception for vietnam. That same Public Perception, that public divide, you dont see that in world war ii, you know what im saying . So, i think it depends on how divided the publics attention is among different issues. And i think this is why we tend to talk about this Civil Rights Movement as separate from the Womens Movement, as separate from the gay and lesbian movement, as separate from theres all these different movements, but really, theres Common Threads throughout each of them, and they can help each other move forward to prevent some of those longer gaps that you sort of mentioned, and thats sort of why i wanted to start our week talking about the 60s, focusing in on black womens experiences, particularly, in the activist movements, because they are that bridge between the Civil Rights Movement and the womens liberation movements. And their experiences are unique in comparison. I do think conflict, though, can have an impact on how hong it takes us to get to whatever that next step is. Any thoughts on laurens question . Because i do think that this will make for a good bridge into wednesday, whether or not it will give you time between now and wednesday to think, is there another time period in history, particularly in American History, that you can think of where fashion, beauty, the physicality, has such a strong impact on societal issues . So, if there are no other questions . All right, so we will wrap for today. American history tv products are now available at the new cspan online store. Go to cspanstore. Org to see whats new for American History tv, and check out all of the cspan products. During our time in san antonio, the cspan cities tour visited various historic sites. Up next, well take you to Randolph Air Force base to hear about the citys military aviation history. When a fella learns to fly with the army air corps, he doesnt learn it all if a day, a week, or even a month. The gateway to the air service is a big schooling ground at san antonio, texas, the primary training point for army pilots. Were here at Randolph Air Force base, where air power, Aerospace Power begins, and were on building 100, the taj mahal, one of the great iconic buildings in air force history
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