New Woman to New Deal 10.31.23

• HIS 379 The Family in America

New Woman to New Deal

The History of Family in America (HIST 379)
Dr. Caitlin Wiesner
Main Hall Room 213
October 31, 2023 (Week 8)

Victorian Values

• Frugality and Saving
• Restraint and Passionlessness
• Homosociality and "Separate Spheres" 

Modern Values

• Consumerism and Instant Gratification
• Expression and Permissiveness (to an extent)
• Heterosocial Leisure Culture 

The Modern Daughter 

In 1900, 4 out of 5 women in the labor force in New York City is single.

In 1900, 60 percent of women in NYC between the ages of 16 and 21 work outside the home for wages

Between 1890 and 1920, women’s workweek shrinks from 64 hours to 51 hours while wages rise 35%

"Cheap Amusements" emerge to absorb teenager girls' surplus time and money, while also serving as an  Americanizing function  

• Dance Halls 
• Amusement Parks 
• Movie Theaters

“Nowadays it is considered ‘smart’ to go to the low order of dance halls, and not only be a looker –on, but also to dance among all sorts and conditions of men and women."

-Ladies Home Journal (1914)

 In 1921, Stanford psychologist Lewis Terman (1921) determined that nearly 90% women born before 1890 were virgins at marriage, but this was only true in 74% born between 1890-1900 and 51% between 1900-1909. 

Discussion: Ellen Welles Page, "A Flapper's Appeal to Parents" (1922)

• According to Page, how has the emergence of the “New Woman” changed the relationship between parents and daughters in the 1920s?
• How might Page’s race, class, and gender be informing her perspective and experiences?
• Do similar conflicts between teenagers and parents still occur in the present day?

The Family in Depression

As businesses and banks failed and factories closed, national income plummeted from $81 billion in 1929 to $40 billion in 1932.

By October 1932, unemployment stood at 25 percent and more than 11 million Americans had lost their sole source of income 

During the Depression, the national birthrate fell below replacement levels for the first time in the history of the United States. 

A New Deal for Families

The Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) set aside $22 of their workers’ monthly pay to be sent “home” to “dependents.” 

Only 15% of respondents to a poll by Fortune magazine in 1936 agreed that married women should work full-time outside the home. 

“We are wondering what is going to become of this large number of widow women with and without children. I was in the [Public Works Administration] office a few days ago. A woman was there … she had five children and a husband [who] was not able to work. They told her to go hunt washings… The white people don’t pay anything for their washing. She can’t do enough washing to feed her family.”

Fair Labor Standards Act (1935)

• Establishes a federal minimum wage (25 cents per hour) and a 44 hour work week
• These standards only apply to 14 percent of jobs held by women and less than 5 percent of jobs held by African Americans

Social Security Act (1935)

• Establishes a federal system of old age pensions (Title I, “Social Security”) and unemployment insurance (Title III) funded through a payroll tax
• Agricultural laborers and domestic workers excluded from unemployment insurance and old age pensions (most African American workers)
• A married woman who worked a job covered under Social Security may draw an old age pension based either on her own earnings or her husband’s earnings, but not both.

Aid to Families with Dependent Children (1935)

• Title IV of the Social Security Act (“Welfare”)
• Chronically underfunded because benefits are calculated to replace the wages of a hypothetical absentee father, not a woman’s actual needs.
• Means-tested by social workers and administered by state governments rather than the federal government
• Unlike old age pensions or unemployment insurance, “welfare” is stigmatized as unearned charity

A fact is an objective and incontrovertible piece of information.
Evidence is the application of one or more facts to support an argument.
An argument is a subjective claim made to expand an area of knowledge.

We will begin discussion of readings each class with an FAQ (Fact, Argument, Question) Exercise. All students will free write the following:

     A fact that stood out to you in the reading (please include page number)
    An explanation of how that fact works as evidence for the historian’s argument
    A question that the reading raised for you

A fact is an objective and incontrovertible piece of information.
Evidence is the application of one or more facts to support an argument.
An argument is a subjective claim made to expand an area of knowledge.

FAQ (Fact, Argument, Question) Exercise

All students will free write the following:

1.  A fact that stood out to you in the reading (please include page number)
2. An explanation of how that fact works as evidence for the historian’s argument
3. A question that the reading raised for you

Discussion: Stephanie Coontz, The Way We Never Were: American Families and the Nostalgia Trap (2015)

Discuss how the following concepts have shaped the historical development of the American family: 

1) Individualism 

2) Self-Reliance 

3) Public Virtue and Family Values 

4) Privacy