Desiring Revolution – Second Wave Feminism & the Rewriting of Twentieth Century American Sexual Thought 1920 to 1982: Second-Wave Feminism and the ... of Twentieth-Century American Sexual Thought - Softcover

Gerhard, Jane

Softcover

ISBN 10: 023111205X ISBN 13: 9780231112055

Publisher: Columbia University Press, 2001

Synopsis

In the 1970s sex was what mattered most to feminists. Gerhard asks why issues of sex and female pleasure came to matter so much to these "second-wave feminists." She shows how the radical ideas put forward by this generation of American women was a response to attempts to define and contain female sexuality going back to the beginning of the century.

About this title

Review:

This fascinating book enriches history, women's/gender/sexuality studies, feminist theory, American studies curricula, and the libraries of advanced scholars. Gerhard deserves great credit for her skillful application of contemporary debates toward a creative interpretation of feminist and sexuality history.--Judith A. Allen "Journal of American History "

Gerhard does a wonderful job of analyzing and situating the texts she has selected...This is a story well worth reading, teaching, and expanding.--Deborah Cohler "Journal of the History of Sexuality "

Gerhard delves into the history of expert ideas about appropriate reproductive and sexual behavior. Late nineteenth-century women activists, suffragists, and settlement-house workers challenged the idea of separate gendered spheres and showed they could live independently of men... Gerhard does a nice job of showing how the early radical feminists wanted to reconstruct heterosexuality to make it more focused on women's pleasure.--Barbara Ryan "NWSA Journal "

About the Author:

Jane Gerhard is lecturer in history and literature at Harvard University.

About this edition

• Publisher: Columbia University Press
• Publication date: 2001
• ISBN 10: 023111205X
• ISBN 13: 9780231112055
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 244