Woman Between Islam and Western Society
3. Western Woman
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civil rights and student protest movements,
including the anti-Vietnam War and youth
“counter-culture” movements, of the 1960s and
1970s. The latter group’s focus was less on legal or
policy changes affecting women than on a frontal
challenge to cultural definitions of maleness and
femaleness.
11
As a result of its varied composition, the women’s
liberation movement’s goals range from the modest,
sensible amelioration of the female condition to
extreme and revolutionary visions.
12
The first camp
emphasizes a more egalitarian society: equal pay for
equal work, a nation in which women are not
blocked from access to education, political influence
and economic power. The more radical wing of the
movement, however, is disdainful of such mundane
concerns and wants nothing less than a drastic
revision of society in general. In their view, the
sexual roles must be redefined to free both sexes
from the stereotypes and responsibilities that have
existed for ages. The concept of man as hunter and
woman as keeper of the hearth, these feminists
declare, is obsolete and destructive for both sexes.
