Complacency and Conformity: The Female Experience at Gettysburg College, 1956-1966

Abstract

Women at Gettysburg College from 1956-66 received unequal treatment at a predominantly male school. Despite the 1960s being seen as a time of radical change, the majority of women on campus were content with the rules and social norms which held them in place. Changes and complaints were not widespread or outspoken, but they did exist in organizations such as the Women’s Student Government Association. Examinations of campus policies, dress codes, and dorm regulations illustrate the different standards men and women were held to on campus. Meanwhile Greek life, beauty contests, athletics and first hand accounts of social life reveal a complex relationship between the desires of women at that time, and the world in which they lived. Due to such social rules, Gettysburg College remained cocoon-like for many women. As the outside world and politics began to shift, Gettysburg College would continue to cling to old norms until the last few years of the 1960s

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