"How were the lives of women on Britain's Home Front affected by World War II"

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"How were the lives of women on Britain's Home Front affected by World War II"

During the second world war, women were affected a great deal as there were not many men around as they were all at war and so women living in Britain had to do their bit to keep all of the children, living in Britain safe and well. Women were affected in many ways, socially, physically, emotionally, economically and in other ways as well. This lead to many different hardships, opportunities, problems and also it had an affect on the social status of general life for women living in Britain in the second world war. Women were affected depending on where they lived, how old they were and their social class, and I am going to investigate into these factors to determine as to what extent women's lives were affected.

The work women had to do would increase a tremendous amount, they needed to be doing as much as possible in factories and warehouses, to keep the men on the war front with enough ammunition and supplies for the war. There were many jobs around and women were always encouraged to help. In source A3 it shows how a women is asking people to come into the factories and in it is also planes behind her, just to remind people who are viewing the poster that their loved ones are out at war, this has most probably come from the government as they are asking people to help with the factory work and it is to make people want to work in a factory to help the men fighting. I do not think that this poster would have been as effective as others because I do not think it gives any emotion and motivation. I think that the source is reliable as the time it was made is at the time of war but, I think that it is trying to show that working in the factories will be fun and exciting, when really it could have been dangerous and boring, and to someone who did not know about the affect that women were having on the home front, they would be mistaken and lead into thinking that life was easy for them.

There were many different jobs in which women could have had a role in such as, Land Army, Evacuation, Canteens, Auxiliary Fire Service (AFS), Hospital Services, Nursing Auxiliaries and the ARP. These many jobs had different posters and propaganda works for them, but the propaganda pictures obviously worked because in source A1, it shows just how many people were involved in the work effort and it shows that the numbers of women in the ARP is an incredible amount, this was from 1995 and it was a GCSE review and so I think that it is reliable as some secondary sources are reliable because in the long term it is easier to make more accurate figures and it was for a GCSE history review, which also shows that it is very reliable because incorrect figures would not help GCSE students in doing their research. In the source that is named 'information sheet 7', it shows how the work effort had an effect on many women of all ages class and social status in the final years of war, so whether or not women were affected in the early years of the war they would be in the future. The source gives us a timeline of the events of women's work the second world war; in 1941, the women's employment act was introduced and then the national service act which meant that women who were aged 21-30 had to work and then by 1943 women up to 50 had to work, so as it shows even old women had to be called up. I think that this source is reliable as it is facts from the Women at war book.
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Women's social life in the second world war gave them many opportunities and it also gave women more enjoyment. The reason for this is because people were trying to not think about war and there were many dances and films trips and other social things similar to those set -up, as there was some male company because the American soldiers were there, to obviously protect Britain. Many women who had loved ones at war, would either become tired of waiting and as there were USA soldiers with them all of the time, it became an common thing for ...

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