From the mid-1950s to the late 1970s, there was an emerging women's movement in Canada which was known as "second-wave feminism." The women's liberation movement's main objective was to free women from oppression, both in the private and public spheres. Throughout second-wave feminism, women were becoming focused on their role outside of the private sphere, concerned about gender equality and fair pay and more feminist groups were being formed. During this era, Doris Anderson worked as an editor at Chatelaine magazine. Instead of viewing women as passive victims, Doris Anderson liberated women through her work at Chatelaine. By writing about the true stories of women, controversies in women's reproductive rights and medicine, information on the labour market, the imbalance of power between men and women both inside and outside of the home and making light of serious situations in her editorials, Doris Anderson empowered her readers to think and act beyond the scope of their private spheres and try to make a positive change in their everyday lives. Doris Anderson's experiences as a working mother are representative of the lives of women during the second-wave feminism period in Canadian history. .
Doris Anderson is an extraordinary advocate of the second-wave feminism period in Canadian history since she continued to work at Chatelaine from 1957 to 1977, despite being married with children. At the age of thirty-five, Doris met David Anderson, and was married on May 24, 1957. David and Doris Anderson had three children together: Peter, Stephen and Mitchell Anderson. In Anderson's biography, Rebel Daughter, Anderson mentioned that "having a baby while holding down a job was so unusual. Anderson worked for Chatelaine at home before her first son Peter was born since there were a limited number of staffs available to fill her position. Anderson expected to spend quality time with her newborn after giving birth to Peter; however, this was not the case as Anderson "would have liked nothing more than six months at least, not two weeks, to get accustomed to the profound changes in life.
