This just in: There’s been a sharp increase in never-married twentysomethings in just six years. According to new Census figures released today, almost three-quarters of men and almost two-thirds of women in their 20s in 2006 said they had never been married! As reported in USA Today:

Among men ages 20-29, 73% said they had never been married in 2006, compared with 64% in 2000. For women, 62.2% had never married in 2006, compared with 53.4% six years earlier.

The data also show the percentage of those marrying in their 20s continues to decline. A USA TODAY analysis of the new Census figures shows that just 23.5% of men and 31.5% of women ages 20-29 were married in 2006. (The analysis excludes those who are married but separated.) Both the number and percentage of those in their 20s fell from 2000, when 31.5% of men and 39.5% of women were married.

“These clearly are quite dramatic changes by demographic standards,” says demographer Peter Morrison of the non-profit RAND Corp., which studies public policy issues. “The amount of change in six years is quite substantial. It’s impressive in terms of the degree to which the institution of marriage is evolving. There clearly is a process of social evolution occurring here, and one can speculate about where it will end.”

The trend toward delaying marriage has emerged over several decades as economic and social forces have made it more difficult for those in their 20s to reach independence. Sociologists and demographers say other factors are also at work, including increasing numbers of cohabiting couples, more highly educated women who have fewer highly educated men of comparable age to partner with, and more choices open to women than in decades past.

For those reasons and others, experts say they don’t expect this upward trend in the ages for marriage to reverse.

So what are twentysomethings doing instead? For one, as also reported in USA Today, Gen Y is involved. Check it out here.

And finally, twentysomethings Nona Willis-Aronowitz and Emma Bernstein are taking a feminist roadtrip! Read all about it in The Metro. I’m looking forward to meeting with Nona next week.

Ok, I’m headed off to my cousins’ for Rosh Hashanah dinner (Mom – I made a killer kugel!) — I’ll be back on GWP tomorrow night!

(Thanks to CCF and Susan Bernstein for the links!)

Part 1 of our new little logo goes live. (Thank you, Marco!)

Marco strikes again, with a hot little logo for our “Women, Girls, Ladies: Join the Conversation” program for Women’s History Month this year. (THANK YOU, M!)

The group blog is now open. It’ll look prettier, though, very soon 🙂

A must-read over at Brain, Child magazine: In “Soccer Mom Loses Her Kick,” Tracy Mayor asks whether, starved after decades on the sound-bite diet, mothers might get some meat from politicians in ’08.

Think moms are apolitical? Think again. Check out these posts from one of my favorite political moms, here, here, and here. And definitely, always, stop by Pundit Mom, MomsRising, and the Mothers Movement Online, too.

(Thanks to Steve Mintz, Stephanie Coontz, and Veronica Arreola for the heads up!)

Talk about synergy. On the way to my authors group last night, I picked up a copy of Leo Braudy’s From Chivalry to Terrorism: War and the Changing Nature of Masculinity. Then I learned that on October 2, feminist superstar Susan Faludi is coming out with a new book called The Terror Dream: Fear and Fantasy in Post-9/11 America. Anyone remember how, following 9/11, media headlines declared women to be suddenly less inclined to be satisfied as single and independent beings? And that another baby boom was apparently bound to occur as women’s biological clocks began to tick faster after the tragedy? With what sounds like her hallmark in-depth documentation, Faludi looks at the gendering of cultural response.

The Liberaloc and USA Today have posted excerpts, and here’s what I’ve gleaned (from the book description):

Why, Faldui asks, did our culture respond to an assault against American global dominance with a frenzied summons to restore “traditional” manhood, marriage, and maternity? Why did we react as if the hijackers had targeted not a commercial and military edifice but the family home and nursery?

Faludi shows how an attack fueled by hatred of Western emancipation led us to a regressive fixation on Doris Day womanhood and John Wayne masculinity, with trembling “security moms,” swaggering presidential gunslingers, and the “rescue” of a female soldier cast as a “helpless little girl”? The answer, Faludi finds, lies in a historical anomaly unique to the American experience: the nation that in recent memory has been least vulnerable to domestic attack was forged in traumatizing assaults by nonwhite “barbarians” on town and village. That humiliation lies concealed under a myth of cowboy bluster and feminine frailty, which is reanimated whenever threat and shame looms.

In taking on the subject of American culture in the wake of 9/11, Faludi joins fellow superstar Naomi Wolf, who just came out with The End of America: Letter to a Young Patriot, as I mentioned in a previous post. It seems highly relevant that prominent feminist thinkers are turning their attention to the state of our union–which, according to both, is dangerously unraveling. The threat, they both argue, is not merely external; in the wake of 9/11, the threat to our nation’s integrity also comes from within.

I can’t wait to get my hands on these two books. More on this to come, for sure.

This is a card I was sent by my friend Stephanie Aaron (of Aaron Design). It’s too pretty not to share. Wishing you all the sweetness of apples and honey all the year long!

I’m thrilled to be part of this dialogue. In my head I keep calling it “Sisterhood, UNinterrupted,” and I feel so fortunate to be working with my fellow womengirlsladies to foster some much-needed cross-generational talk. These wgls inspire the heck outa me. And Patti: you’ll be pleased to know, perhaps, that we decided against calling ourselves womenladygirls; we had different feelings among us, in the end, about calling ourselves “girls” 🙂

In addition to continuing the conversation I’ve been having at readings and talks around my book these past few months, the significance this dialogue has for me goes straight to my core. I’ve worked in the women’s movement and in academia for about 15 years now, and, like Courtney, I’ve watched some pretty rough dynamics play out between women of different generations at work. And I’ve often felt caught in between — the confidant of women on both ends of the age spectrum.
Old enough to sympathize, young enough to want things to change. Now that I’m working independently, I watch the chasm reflected — or rather, writ large — in our popular culture. Stereotypes of young women as apolitical bimbos (“Britney, c’est moi”??) and Boomer women as bra-burning throwbacks (“Hillary – so out of touch”) drive me insane. With so much unfinished business, so much still to be done to ensure that women across ages and classes and races have the opportunity to live safe and full lives, I’m convinced it’s time for a different tune.

And speaking of tunes, I love that Gloria has started us with a musical thread.

I recently learned of this jukebox musical that’s currently playing in Minneapolis, called Respect: A Musical Journey of Women. It made me wonder, if feminism today had a few contemporary anthems, what would they be?

One for each of our towers.

Kathy Rich, author of the forthcoming book Unspeakable: A Story About India and Life in Other Words and a writer in my authors group, wrote a beautiful, poignant essay for the Modern Love column in Sunday’s New York Times. Thank you, Kathy, for giving us your amazing tale.

And my guy Marco has a very astute post up today over at Hokum on the branding of OBL. Ok, so granted, I love the guy (Marco), but I objectively think this post is brilliant. See for yourself – go check it out.

(Photo credit)

Fellow writers Courtney Martin, Gloria Feldt, Kristal Brent Zook and I have launched, yep, a group blog which we hope will foster some FRESH conversation among intergenerational feminists about what matters: power, work, sex, motherhood, pop culture, the future, and everything in between. Since I temporarily can’t figure out how to post over there (doh), I thought I’d make my post live here for the time being. So here it goes:

Sisterhood, UNinterrupted

I’m thrilled to be part of this dialogue. In my head, I confess, I’ve been calling it “Sisterhood, UNinterrupted,” and I feel so fortunate to be working with my fellow womengirlsladies to foster some much-needed cross-generational talk. These wgls inspire the heck outa me. In addition to continuing the conversation I’ve been having at readings and talks around my book these past few months, the significance this dialogue has for me goes straight to my core. I’ve worked in the women’s movement and in academia for about 15 years now, and, like Courtney, I’ve watched some pretty rough dynamics play out between women of different generations at work. And I’ve often felt caught in between — the confidant of women on both ends of the age spectrum. Old enough to sympathize, young enough to want things to change. Now that I’m working independently, I watch the generational chasm reflected — or rather, writ large — in our popular culture. Stereotypes of young women as apolitical bimbos (“Britney, c’est moi!”) and Boomer women as bra-burning throwbacks (“Hillary – so out of touch”) drive me insane. With so much unfinished business, so much still to be done to ensure that women across ages and classes and races have the opportunity to live safe and full lives, I’m convinced it’s time for a different tune.

Check out what Courtney, Gloria, Patti Binder, and others have to say so far over at www.womengirlsladies.blogspot.com. And join the conversation!

And may they long be remembered in our hearts.