Abortion & liberation
5 things, including 4 new books on male control of women’s bodies and 1 reading snack
It hit me hard this week how close the election is and how tediously we’re all standing between two possible futures. I’ve been reading a lot to help me through this month, and though I’m spending much of that time with memoirs and essays relevant to my teaching and writing, I’ve also found reading into history to be politically comforting and clarifying right now.
So this week, I have four books for you on the past and present sexual, reproductive, and medical control of women’s bodies. These books are each, of course, harrowing, disturbing, upsetting, insightful, and extremely timely. I hope they remind you why we, at minimum, vote, but also how deep and long the personal and collective fights to have women recognized as people have been, and how far we still have to go.
I also find all of these books hopeful in their own way— they are honest and precise and edifying and rousing, and that feels exactly like what we need in this era of misogynist muck and intentional confusion.