Today is the birthday, in 1908, of Simone de Beauvoir, French existentialist philosopher, writer, social theorist, and feminist activist. Though she did not consider herself a philosopher, nor was she considered one at the time of her death, she had a significant influence on both feminist existentialism and feminist theory.
She was best known for her “trailblazing work in feminist philosophy”, The Second Sex (1949), a detailed analysis of women’s oppression and a foundational tract of contemporary feminism. She was also known for her novels, the most famous of which were She Came to Stay (1943) and The Mandarins.
Beauvoir and Jean-Paul Sartre met during her college years. Intrigued by her determination as an educator, he intended to make their relationship romantic. However, she had no interest in doing so. She later changed her mind, and in October 1929, Jean-Paul Sartre and Beauvoir became a couple for the next 51 years, until his death in 1980. She and Sartre entered into a lifelong “soul partnership”, which was sexual but not exclusive, nor did it involve living together. She chose never to marry and never had children. This gave her the time to advance her education and engage in political causes, write and teach, and take lovers.
The Second Sex, first published in 1949 in French as Le Deuxième Sexe, turns the existentialist mantra that existence precedes essence into a feminist one: “One is not born but becomes a woman” (French: “On ne naît pas femme, on le devient”). With this famous phrase, Beauvoir first articulated what has come to be known as the sex-gender distinction, that is, the distinction between biological sex and the social and historical construction of gender and its attendant stereotypes.
Jean-Paul Sartre and Simone de Beauvoir at the Balzac Memorial
Today is the birthday, in 1941, of American folk singer, songwriter, musician, and activist Joan Baez. She scored the 1971 US No.3 & UK No.6 single with a cover of the Band’s ‘The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down’ and was one of the first major artists to record the songs of Bob Dylan in the early 1960s. Baez also performed at the 1969 Woodstock Festival. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LFA5JgwdEy4
