Gloria Steinem, Feminist Icon and Pop Culture Fixture, Dies at 92
By Alexus Mosley
Photo Credit: Bettmann Archive
Gloria Steinem, the journalist, activist and longtime face of the modern women’s movement, has died at 92.
Steinem died September 2 at her home in New York City. Over the course of more than six decades in public life, she became one of the most recognizable feminist figures in American culture, known as much for her journalism and activism as for the unmistakable aviator glasses and center-parted hair that became part of her public image.
Long before she became a household name, Steinem worked as a freelance journalist. In 1963, she famously went undercover as a Playboy Bunny at New York’s Playboy Club and documented the working conditions she experienced there. The resulting story helped establish her as a writer willing to examine the ways women were treated behind seemingly glamorous surfaces.
By the early 1970s, Steinem had become one of the most visible figures associated with second-wave feminism. She co-founded Ms. magazine, which launched as a standalone publication in 1972 and helped bring conversations about reproductive rights, workplace inequality, domestic life, and women’s political power into mainstream media.
Her influence quickly extended beyond journalism.
Steinem became a fixture on television, at political events and in popular culture, eventually becoming one of those rare activists whose name alone could evoke an entire movement. Her public image was reproduced endlessly in photographs, books, documentaries and later dramatizations of the women’s movement.
Over the decades, she remained active in feminist organizing and political advocacy while continuing to write and speak publicly about women’s rights, equality and social change. In 2013, President Barack Obama awarded Steinem the Presidential Medal of Freedom, one of the nation’s highest civilian honors.
Her cultural legacy is complicated, debated and undeniably significant. Feminism changed dramatically during Steinem’s lifetime, expanding to include generations of women who challenged some of the blind spots of the movement she helped popularize. Still, few figures became as closely associated with American feminism in the public imagination.
For millions of people, Gloria Steinem was not simply an activist, but was the face of an era.