Gloria Steinem - HERSTORY

"I think the fact that I’ve become a symbol for the women’s movement is somewhat accidental. A woman member of Congress, for example, might be identified as a member of Congress; it doesn’t mean she’s any less of a feminist but she’s identified by her nearest male analog. Well, I don’t have a male analog so the press has to identify me with the movement. I suppose I could be referred to as a journalist, but because Ms. is part of a movement and not just a typical magazine, I’m more likely to be identified with the movement. There’s no other slot to put me in." Gloria Steinem

The oral biography of Gloria Steinem, whose dedication to feminism and social justice continues to improve life for millions of people worldwide.

Gloria Steinem - On Women in Society

"We’ve gotten where we are today, I think, mainly through individual women telling the truth. I mean, the consciousness-raising group is still the cell of the women’s movement. That means that one woman dared to say that she thought it was unfair that she had to both have a job and take care of the kids while her husband only had a job, and she said this unsayable thing that all of Ladies’ Home Journal was devoted to keep her from saying. And then ten other women said, “Oh, you feel like that? I thought only I felt like that.” And we began to realize that was political, there was a reason why that was true. Or one of us, or a few of us, spoke out about having an abortion and what it meant to have to get an abortion and risk your life. As more and more people spoke out, we began to realize that one out of three or four adult women has had an abortion, so we began to see the politics behind that, that we’re the means of reproduction and that patriarchy was the basic reason for our being in the trouble we were in the first place. " Gloria Steinem

The oral biography of Gloria Steinem, whose dedication to feminism and social justice continues to improve life for millions of people worldwide.

Bella Abzug -- On Becoming a Lawyer.

"Since there were only a few women lawyers, I knew that it was going to be very rough. I applied to Harvard Law School because I heard it was the best law school. Harvard wrote back and said they didn’t accept women. I was outraged. I always tell this story because it’s so cute about my mother. I turned to my mother and I said, “Can you believe this?” I always say “I turned to my mother,” because in those days there was no women’s movement so you always turned to your mother. Now I always say, my two daughters have the best of both worlds. They’re able to turn to me and the women’s movement at the same time. But anyway, I turned to my mother and said, “This is an outrage.” (I always had a decent sense of outrage.) My mother said, “What do you want to go to Harvard for? It’s far away. You haven’t got the carfare anyhow. Go to Columbia. It’s near home. They’ll probably give you a scholarship and it only costs five cents on the subway.” And I did that. I got a scholarship and it only cost five cents on the subway. I always say that’s when I became an advocate of low-cost public mass transportation." Bella Abzug

The oral biography of Bella Abzug, an outspoken crusader for peace and human rights who heralded in an era of social change.

Bella Abzug -- On Becoming Socially Conscious.

"I grew up during the Depression and my life was very much affected by it. No matter what the hardships, my parents believed deeply in America and in their lives and the lives of their children. As children we believed we had to influence our own lives, not only by making something of ourselves, but also by making sure that society would make for us and do for us as a result of our influencing and affecting it. So for all these reasons, I have been a socially conscious human being from the day I can remember." Bella Abzug

Particular Passions: Talks With Women Who Shaped Our Times, by Lynn Gilbert.

Betty Friedan -- HERSTORY

"All revolutionary movements have been made by intellectuals, the educated. It’s nonsense to fool around with any silliness about whether or not the modern women’s movement was a white, middle-class movement. Absolutely. It was a white, middle-class movement from the beginning, though it always had blacks in it and it always had to do with the problem of poverty, which for women cuts across class lines. The people who could articulate the philosophy of this movement were people who had education, although for some, the education had come in the labor movement and not in college. That’s how movements happen." Betty Friedan

The oral biography of Betty Friedan, who fueled the women’s liberation movement that continues to work toward equal rights for women around the globe.

Betty Friedan -- The Women's Movement

"It isn’t accidental that the modern women’s movement exploded in America because the ideology of the mainstream of the movement is first of all that women are people; and being people, they can and must demand equality of opportunity and their own voice in the decisions of society, human freedom, human dignity, all the rest that is considered our American birthright. And that’s all it was. Everybody had such a hard time thinking this was a movement without an ideology, but the ideology of this movement was no more or no less than the ideology of all human evolution and of American democracy, but applied to women. That’s what was unique, and it was applied to us. We did it for ourselves and not abstractly—grocery baskets to the poor for some other race." Betty Friedan  

The oral biography of Betty Friedan, who fueled the women’s liberation movement that continues to work toward equal rights for women around the globe.

Betty Friedan -- HERSTORY

Betty-Friedan

"Well, they say the women's movement is the largest movement of social change of the last decades and in some ways it’s probably the largest revolution of all time, though it isn’t what anyone else has ever meant by revolution. You have to see it in its own terms. I think we’re only beginning to see the far-flung implications of the change. Also I think the women’s movement is only a step in a larger process of evolution, that it’s a stage. It’s been happening for a long time." Betty Friedan 

The oral biography of Betty Friedan, who fueled the women’s liberation movement that continues to work toward equal rights for women around the globe.

Diana Vreeland - On Ballet

 "For years I was in ballet schools. I never went with the idea of becoming a professional. At a certain point I couldn’t really go to a regular school because I didn’t know anything, and ballet school was the only school my parents could keep me in. I was perfectly happy in a ballet class on a barre. I think that it’s the only way to bring up a girl, you see, because it gives her a feeling, a rhythm. Through dancing you interpret the music, and you feel the wonderful, natural things of the earth. It’s the discipline, doing everything absolutely perfectly, meeting the standards because, by God, with a ballet master like Fokine, if you didn’t you were in trouble."  Diana Vreeland

The oral biography of Diana Vreeland, whose pioneering exhibitions at the Metropolitan Museum of Art elevated fashion to a fine art.  One of 42 profiles from Particular Passions: Talks With Women Who Shaped Our Times.

Diana Vreeland - On working

 "Before I went to work, my life was a life of leisure. I’d no responsibilities except my house, my family, and my friends. I could never have lived that kind of life in New York. I think it’s something in the climate that makes one want to get out and about. To me, people live in New York to work, not to dream or to have a leisurely, imaginative life. There’s too much interference, and there are too few people who can join you in leisure. There’s great imagination here, but it’s of another kind."  Diana Vreeland

The oral biography of Diana Vreeland, whose pioneering exhibitions at the Metropolitan Museum of Art elevated fashion to a fine art.  One of 42 profiles from Particular Passions: Talks With Women Who Shaped Our Times.

Diana Vreeland - On Fashion

"Fashion is not the same thing as style. Fashion is everywhere, on the daily air, and it’s always moving."  Diana Vreeland 

The oral biography of Diana Vreeland, whose pioneering exhibitions at the Metropolitan Museum of Art elevated fashion to a fine art.  One of 42 profiles from Particular Passions: Talks With Women Who Shaped Our Times.