Essay On Family And Education

1414 Words6 Pages
The American attitudes toward family and education have been changing throughout the years. The myth of the model family is a cultural institution that has been around for many years now and its fundamental elements have been transforming as well. While in the 1950s a family that included a husband, a mother, and two children seemed like the perfect family, today this family structure is unrealistic and therefore no longer relevant. However, most Americans believe that education is valuable due to the increasing power of educated individuals and the economic stability that education offers. The importance of tertiary education is present in schools, in households, and on the television. Because education is seen as equally accessible to everyone this causes individuals to believe that those who do not have a postsecondary education are just…show more content…
Women were “taught to pity the neurotic, unfeminine, unhappy women who wanted to be poets or physicists or presidents. They learned that truly feminine women do not want careers, higher education, political rights— the independence and the opportunities that the old-fashioned feminists fought for” (Friedan 16). Women had to choose between raising children or getting an education, and women who decided to defy the social norms were frowned upon. After years of accepting these roles as “natural”, women started to question their prescribed gender roles. Women realized that education gave them the power to contribute to society causing them to see the flaws of the model family. The civil rights movement of the 1970’s transformed the roles of women, and therefore the family structure itself. Women were no longer expected to stay at home and could finally raise a family without sacrificing their aspirations of having an education and a career. Consequently, women now are encouraged to pursue further education in order to be independent and
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