The 1970s were a time of great change for American women. Through the turbulence of the 1960s, women's roles in American society went largely unquestioned. Even the revolutionaries of the period dismissed questions of women's liberation and feminism. But, led by such theorists, writers, and political figures as Simone de Beauvoir, Betty Friedan, Gloria Steinem, and Bella Abzug, women in the 1970s began to demand different treatment.

There has been much talk about the "Sexual Revolution" in American society. Although it is very difficult to make generalizations about such a vast transformation of social attitudes, we can confidently say that beginning in the 1920s and lasting into the 1950s a small but increasingly vocal minority of Americans wanted their Puritanical culture to talk frankly about sex. The "carefree" 1920s were characterized by groups of young people who had much different attitudes toward sex than did any...