Feminism has its origins in the earliest ages of human civilization and believes in the political, economic, and cultural equality of women. It is usually divided between three waves: feminism of the first wave, which deals with property and voting rights, feminism in the second wave, focused on equality and anti-discrimination, and feminism in the third wave which behaves in the 1990s the perceived privileges of white women in the second wave. The history of feminism is so long as it is fascinating, from Ancient Greece to fighting women’s elections to the women’s marches and the MeToo movement.
Abigail Adams, President John Adams’ first lady, has seen access to education, property, and voting as vital to the equitable opportunities of women in particular. Abigail Adams warns in letters to her husband John Adams: “We are willing to encourage rebellion if we don’t provide special focus and attention to the women, and we won’t be bound by a law that has no voice” In the 19th century began the “rebellion” that Adams had threatened, calling for more liberty for women and demanding the abolition of slavery. Indeed, many of the women leaders of the abolitionist movement have recognized an irony that they themselves cannot enjoy when defending African American rights. In the United States, numerous women have shown that they deserve equal representation during the First World War. In 1920, the 19th amendment was adopted mainly because of the labor of suffragists such as Susan B. Anthony and Carrie Chapman Catt. U.S. women eventually won the right to vote. Feminists took up what certain historians call the “second wave” of feminism with these rights guaranteed.
Critics said that the advantages of the feminist movement, especially the second wave, were mostly limited to white, high-school women and that feminism failed to address colored women, Lesbians, immigrants, and religious minorities’ issues. In its revolting statement before the Ohio Women’s Rights Convention in 1851, Sojourner Truth also complained about the racial distinctions in the status of women.