“Girls Get Rough”

World War II challenged traditional gender norms as women increasingly took on responsibilities on the home front and in the defense industry that had been formerly reserved for men. The war also fueled a renewed interest in women’s self-defense. Justified in nationalistic and militaristic terms, women’s self-defense training was depicted as a necessary national defense measure. Racialized and gendered constructions of the potential perpetrator, the self-defense instructor, and the practitioner of self-defense were also impacted by the war. Yet, the long-term repercussions of this wartime interest in women’s self-defense were far less permanent and much more nuanced.