Simone de Beauvoir and ‘The Second Sex’

Episode 83: Simone de Beauvoir and ‘The Second Sex’

Host: Joan Neuberger, Department of History, University of Texas at Austin

Guest: Judith Coffin, Department of History, University of Texas at Austin

May 11, 2016

Simone de Beauvoir was one of the most important intellectuals, feminists, and writers of the 20th century. Her life and writings defied the expectations of her birth into a middle class French family, and her philosophies inspired others, including Betty Friedan. Her seminal work, The Second Sex, is a dense two volume work that can be intimidating at first glance, combining philosophy and psychology, and her own observations.

Fortunately, Judith Coffin from UT’s Department of History, is here to help contextualize and parse out the context, influences, and impact of one of the 20th century’s greatest feminist works.

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Simone de Beauvoir was an incredibly important intellectual, feminist, writer, popular subject of adoration and attack. Let’s start talking about who she was. She lived from 1908-1986 that just about covers the whole twentieth century.

She came from a middle-class family. She was one of two girls. Girls did not have great things expected of them and she blew past everybody’s expectations. She became a philosopher and a writer. She wrote memoirs. She wrote novels. She wrote essays. She edited journals. She was linked very early to Jean-Paul Sartre, the French existentialist. And her first and most important book was The Second Sex.