How Did Women Change After 1945

In what ways did women’s live change after 1945?

The life of women after the Second World War (1945) can be attributed to many different factors, some of these being; the work in which woman did and women and their family lives. With war ending, new political changes and roles of both men and woman changing all contributed to the changes of women’s life through the 20th century.

Before 1945, as the Second World war was taking place people at home, often only the woman and the children, mainly had to change their daily lives. This included both family life and also work life. The type of jobs in which woman participated in during the war included taking in evacuees and food/offices jobs. However, woman did take over a lot of the male roles
Woman were highly devoted to the family life and they were expected to do all the washing, cooking, cleaning etc which were very laborious and tied them to the home; meaning a lot of woman had to stay at home and not work as much due to the responsibilities they had at the home. For example as things which as washing machines, dishwashers, hoovers and modern cookers were introduced, it make it easier and quicker to do their day to day duties, which made a big difference as these type of duties could day full days consuming a lot of their time. More advanced domestic technology have made it more possible for woman to combine wife and motherhood with paid
Marriage was seen as a ‘typical’ experience for woman throughout the 20th Century, however towards the end of the century the ideas surrounding marriage began to change. John Gillis has called the period 1850-1960 ‘the long era of mandatory matrimony’. The first marriage rate per 1,000 woman over the age of 16 rose from 57.4 to 97.9 by 1971. However, it was then saw to decrease to 40.1 by the end of the century; there was a increase in marriage immediately post-war. Within the years of 1951-1961 it showed these were the years the ages in which to marry were at its youngest, having a mean age of 23.1, before increasing in the average age to marry in the end of the century.

Continuing with the concept of marriage, there was also big changes with children being born outside of marriages. In 1960 the rate of children being born outside marriages was at a low 5%, this increased to 28% in 1990. This shows how the ideas of the family life for woman, and also men, were starting to change. There was beginning to have normality in the ideas of children being born without the two parents being married, showing the traditional/archaic views of family life were