Reinventing the Culture of Womanhood in America and Brazil, an Anthropological Perspective: Models for the 21st Century 1964-2001

Reinventing the Culture of Womanhood in America and Brazil, an Anthropological Perspective: Models for the 21st Century 1964-2001. Alex Huxley Westfried, Lanham: University Press of America, 2002. 118 pp.

The main goal of Westfried's book is to convey, through an examination of women's struggle in Brazil in general and through 12 case studies of "innovative Brazilian women," the valuable lessons that American women could learn from their Brazilian counterpart. According to Westfried, since the 19605 middle-class Brazilian women have been struggling to overcome the cultural obstacles of patriarchy that subordinate them and place them under the control of men. Their struggles have not only altered the expectations and opportunities available to women. They have also created changes in the Brazilian family structure, decreasing the influence of patriarchal ideology and making the relationships between parents and children more open to dialogue.

While acknowledging the impact of their struggles on Brazil's social and cultural transformation, Westfried also points to the still existing gender-related problems. Examples of these include gender-related variation in wages and discrimination faced by black women. He also refers to more recent problems created by the new model of family relations. The 12 women that serve as examples of the transformations initiated by middle-class Brazilian women were selected following a series of criteria, including their desire for full sexual equality and their rejection of claims about women's inferiority. Some were militant feminists, while others were not. Arguing that the cultural context in Brazil has...