The Feminine Mystique is a book by American author Betty Friedan, widely credited with sparking second-wave feminism in the United States.

[5][6] The phrase "feminine mystique" was coined by Friedan to describe the assumptions that women would be fulfilled from their housework, marriage, sexual lives, and children.

Friedan also states that this is in contrast to the 1930s, at which time women's magazines often featured confident and independent heroines, many of whom were involved in careers.

Friedan argues at the end of the chapter that although theorists discuss how men need to find their identity, women are expected to be autonomous.

"[11] Chapter 4: Friedan discusses early American feminists and how they fought against the assumption that the proper role of a woman was to be solely a wife and mother.

Institutions were studied in terms of their function in society, and women were confined to their sexual biological roles as housewives and mothers as well as told that doing otherwise would upset the social balance.

Friedan says that this change in education arrested girls in their emotional development at a young age, because they never had to face the painful identity crisis and subsequent maturation that comes from dealing with many adult challenges.

[12] Chapter 12: Friedan discusses the fact that many children have lost interest in life or emotional growth, attributing the change to the mother's own lack of fulfillment, a side effect of the feminine mystique.

[12] Chapter 13: Friedan discusses the psychologist Abraham Maslow's hierarchy of needs and notes that women have been trapped at the basic, physiological level, expected to find their identity through their sexual role alone.

[12] Friedan originally intended to write a sequel to The Feminine Mystique, which was to be called Woman: The Fourth Dimension, but instead only wrote an article by that name, which appeared in the Ladies' Home Journal in June 1964.

"Her work indicates for us the ways that feminism was interconnected with the struggles of working-class men and women, with black and Jewish battles against racism and anti-Semitism… As a result, The Feminine Mystique had substantial impact on a wide range of political activists, thinkers, and ordinary individuals.

[24][25] An accompanying exhibit titled REACT was also on display, consisting of twenty-five pieces of artwork responding to The Feminine Mystique.

[26] Also in 2013, to celebrate its centennial the U.S. Department of Labor created a list of over 100 Books that Shaped Work in America, which included The Feminine Mystique.

[29] In 2014, the Betty Friedan Hometown Tribute committee won the Superior Achievement award in the special projects category for its 50th anniversary celebration of the publication of The Feminine Mystique.

Significant numbers of women responded angrily to the book, which they felt implied that wives and mothers could never be fulfilled.

[31] "Women who valued their roles as mothers and housewives interpreted Friedan's message as one that threatened their stability, devalued their labor, and disrespected their intelligence.

"[34] When women critical of the work were not expressing personal offense at Friedan's description of the housewife's plight, they were accusing her of planning to destroy American families.

[36] Daniel Horowitz, a Professor of American Studies at Smith College, points out that although Friedan presented herself as a typical suburban housewife, she was involved with radical politics and labor journalism in her youth, and during the time she wrote The Feminine Mystique she worked as a freelance journalist for women's magazines and as a community organizer.

In fact an employee under the alias "L M" wrote in a two-page memo that[36] Friedan's theoretical views were "too obvious and feminine", as well as critiquing her approach by suggesting it to be unscientific.

[41][42] In part, this criticism stems from her adherence to the paradigmatic belief at the time that "bad mothers" caused deviance from heteronormative and cisnormative society.