Feminism, Socialism, and What’s “Left”

I think there were some fantastic moments when feminists wrote about how to reconstruct the welfare state. But I think much about class and gender has been falsely separated. For myself, I do not think that I could do feminism without socialism; it is in my blood almost. How could you analyze anything without analyzing capital when it structures everything, even us being here now? I could not imagine class, gender and race being separate in that way. I sometimes think it is sad that feminists went off and created their own spaces in academia – fantastic spaces that were needed, politically, for a time but they became very separate. I went into those spaces and fought quite a lonely battle to put class on the agenda. If I had taken a non-feminist route and stayed in sociology it would have been much easier. I think it was historically necessary but those spaces easily get cramped and have now started to close down. That does not mean that feminism is not there, but rather we see feminists going back to the more traditional disciplines that are also being reshaped. So for me, when going back to sociology, I thought that finally I would not have to fight about class any longer. But I found myself starting to fight about gender and sexuality! It is all because of this weird academic organization premised on interest.  Eurozine

On the economy of moralism and working class properness by Beverley Skeggs

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