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Call for Papers for Burning the Ballot: Feminism Meets Anarchy
A Special Issue of Coils of the Serpent: Journal for the Study of Contemporary Power
https://coilsoftheserpent.org/
Guest Editors: Tammy Kovich & Adam Lewis (Canada)
Anarchism’s engagement with the question of gender is at once ambiguous and contradictory. Historically, the anarchist response to the “woman/sex question” was mixed. During the period of ‘classical anarchism’ (1840-1939), women took on active roles in anarchist movements – they were active in anarchist organizations, publications, and projects across the globe. They took part in uprisings, rebellions, and revolutions, as well as in the work of day-to-day anarchist organizing, propaganda, and more. While many (though not all) rejected the label of feminist, they nonetheless spoke out against sexual subordination and called for the emancipation of women with the overthrow of all forms of social, political, and economic hierarchy. At the same time, many others were at best ambivalent to the idea of sexual equality and at worst outright hostile to it. Frequently credited as the founding father of anarchism, Pierre Joseph Proudhon (1809-1865) was an outright misogynist who spoke out against the idea that women could (or should) ever be anything other than wives and mothers, and claimed that the only option available to women outside of the family was prostitution