Department of Education

The Unlikely Feminist Journey of Miss America 1971

In Jezebel, Visiting Assistant Professor Hilary Levey Friedman writes about Miss America 1971, an unexpected feminist trailblazer.

Hilary Levey Friedman, Visiting Assistant Professor, discusses Phyllis George, Miss America 1971, and how the women that the pageant represents has evolved over the years. "In many ways, it was to be a metaphor for George’s trailblazing career, which mixed sports, politics, business, and, of course, pageantry. What she could not have predicted then, as a small-town girl from Texas growing up in the 1950s, is that she would become an unexpected feminist trailblazer, her experiences illustrative of the ways that 50 years of feminism transformed the lives of American women."

The Unlikely Feminist Journey of Miss America 1971 (written by Hilary Levey Friedman) — Jezebel