Feminist Reads

Books dedicated to feminist history and ideals.
Updated September 30, 2022
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The feminine mystique
Friedan, Betty
Paper Book
Landmark, groundbreaking, classic--these adjectives barely describe the earthshaking and long-lasting effects of Betty Friedan's The Feminine Mystique. This is the book that defined "the problem that has no name," that launched the Second Wave of the feminist movement, and has been awakening women...
Hood feminism : notes from the women that a movement forgot
Kendall, Mikki
Paper Book
A NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER "The fights against hunger, homelessness, poverty, health disparities, poor schools, homophobia, transphobia, and domestic violence are feminist fights. Kendall offers a feminism rooted in the livelihood of everyday women." --Ibram X. Kendi,...
The second sex
Beauvoir, Simone de
Paper Book
Newly translated and unabridged in English for the first time, and brilliantly introduced by Judith Thurman, Simone de Beauvoir’s masterpiece weaves together history, philosophy, economics, biology, and a host of other disciplines to analyze the Western notion of “woman” and to...
We should all be feminists
Adichie, Chimamanda Ngozi
Paper Book
NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER * The highly acclaimed, provocative essay on feminism and sexual politics--from the award-winning author of Americanah "A call to action, for all people in the world, to undo the gender hierarchy." --Medium<...
Women, race & class
Davis, Angela Y.
Paper Book
From one of our most important scholars and civil rights activist icon, a powerful study of the women's liberation movement and the tangled knot of oppression facing Black women. "Angela Davis is herself a woman of undeniable courage. She should be heard."-The New York...
The rights of woman
Wollstonecraft, Mary
Paper Book
Writing in an age when the call for the rights of man had brought revolution to America and France, Mary Wollstonecraft produced her own declaration of female independence in 1792. Passionate and forthright, A Vindication of the Rights of Woman attacked the prevailing view of docile, decorative...
Sister outsider : essays and speeches
Lorde, Audre
Paper Book
Presenting the essential writings of black lesbian poet and feminist writer Audre Lorde, Sister Outsider celebrates an influential voice in twentieth-century literature. "[Lorde's] works will be important to those truly interested in growing up sensitive,...
Ain't I a woman : black women and feminism
hooks, bell
Paper Book
A groundbreaking work of feminist history and theory analyzing the complex relations between various forms of oppression. Ain't I a Woman examines the impact of sexism on black women during slavery, the historic devaluation of black womanhood, black male sexism, racism within the recent women's...
The sacred hoop : recovering the feminine in American Indian traditions : with a new preface
Allen, Paula Gunn
Paper Book
This pioneering work, first published in 1986, documents the continuing vitality of American Indian traditions and the crucial role of women in those traditions.
Bad feminist : essays
Gay, Roxane
Paper Book
"Roxane Gay is so great at weaving the intimate and personal with what is most bewildering and upsetting at this moment in culture. She is always looking, always thinking, always passionate, always careful, always right there."  -- Sheila Heti, author of How Should a Person Be...
A room of one's own
Woolf, Virginia
Paper Book
"I would venture to guess that Anon, who wrote so many poems without signing them, was often a woman." In A Room of One's Own, Virginia Woolf imagines that Shakespeare had a sister--a sister equal to Shakespeare in talent, and equal in genius, but...
Black feminist thought : knowledge, consciousness, and the politics of empowerment
Hill Collins, Patricia
Paper Book
In spite of the double burden of racial and gender discrimination, African-American women have developed a rich intellectual tradition that is not widely known. In Black Feminist Thought,Patricia Hill Collins explores the words and ideas of Black feminist intellectuals as well as those African...

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