How Did World War II Affect the Lives and Status of Women?

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Section D: How Did World War II Affect the Lives and Status of Women?

        Women faced many problems in post war society. According to source D2, some women faced opposition from their husbands if they remained employed after the war. Source D7 says many women found it difficult after the war to find employment, skilled women often wanted to work but found their skills were no longer required in post war society. Britain needed women to work during the war, but after the war the job market shifted as the war economy was dismantled, many women found themselves unemployed, and due to the closure of wartime nurseries, women had difficulties in finding any jobs that included childcare. According to source D4, some women found it difficult to settle down to civilian life after the war because they found peacetime was boring in comparison to the excitement of the war. Women often had a great deal of independence and responsibility during the war, and some found that there were parts of their lives that could not be shared with family and friends.

        Not everyone wanted the status of women to change after the war. According to source D2, some women were eager to return to their ‘traditional’ domestic roles, and some women’s husbands were not keen on the idea of their wives working. Many women felt that the war was not reality, and so they opposed the change in the status of women. Of course, many men also did not want the status of women to change, possibly for the same reasons, but also because they felt women were not as capable as they were at doing certain jobs. Source D3 tells us that although men thought women were probably adequate at these jobs, they did not think that they could excel at them. I believe many men might have felt threatened by women who proved themselves as equal to them, and therefore they opposed their changing status. Source D7 says that the government promoted the image of “a mother at home”; this might suggest that the government also did not want the status of women to change.

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        According to source D3, the war greatly helped the status of women. The source tells us that women fought for centuries to be equal to men, and the Second World War that gave women this opportunity. The source says that the war helped women to prove they were capable of doing jobs requiring intelligence, and excel at them. The source also says that the war helped many women to see themselves as something other than a wife and mother. Source D3 claims that during the war women proved they were equal to men.

        Source D6 is ...

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