Sex Radicals and the Quest for Women's Equality
Fighting for women's equality and reproductive choice in the nineteenth century
Cloth – $44
978-0-252-02804-5
Publication Date
Cloth: 04/07/2003
About the Book
Often seen as an era of passionless women and Victorian prudery, the late nineteenth century was in fact a time of radical thought about sexuality and notions of free love. A grassroots sex radical movement of women and men channeled their discomfort with the inequalities they saw as inherent to marriage into frank public discussions about the relationship between sexuality and women’s rights.Joanne E. Passet draws on rich documentary sources to chart the growth of the sex radical movement. As she shows, strong links between the rise of print culture and increasing freedom for women allowed people of both genders to build geographically dispersed communities of ideas. Passet challenges conventional ideas about the restrictive mores of society and reveals that the majority of participants in the sex radical movement resided in the Midwest and the Great Plains, where ideas of individual freedom and sovereignty resonated strongly.Eye-opening and filled with vivid detail, Sex Radicals and the Quest for Women's Equality shows how a forgotten movement laid the foundations for public discussions of sex and sexuality in America.About the Author
Joanne E. Passet is a professor emerita of history at Indiana University East. Her books include Sex Variant Woman: The Life of Jeannette Howard Foster and Indomitable: The Life of Barbara Grier.Reviews
"A valuable study for historians of women, sexuality, and social reform movements."--The Journal of American History"The book ably demonstrates how sex radical women…helped shape modern conceptions of sex and gender."--Choice
"Goes a long way toward rediscovering the history of sex radicalism through excellent use of primary sources that privilege history's unacknowledged voices."--Libraries & Culture
Blurbs
“A critically important book that expands our understanding of later waves of feminism by exploring its long-neglected roots.”--Nancy A. Hewitt, author of Southern Discomfort: Women’s Activism in Tampa, Florida, 1880s-1920s
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