The Word of a Woman: Feminist Dispatches

**Feminism from the front lines** A founder of the contemporary global women’s movement, Robin Morgan is widely known as one of feminism’s strongest, most persuasive activists. As a writer, she is unique in her ability to distill ideas into smart pieces of nonfiction that can transform a reader’s worldview forever.__The Word of a Woman__ follows Morgan’s journalism and shorter prose from the 1960s through the early 1990s. Originally published in 1992, this second edition adds five new essays. An annotated version of her famous, fiery “Goodbye to All That” is here, as are essays that expose the connections between violence against women and pornography, explain the effects of female genital mutilation, and show how sexism and racism are intimately connected. She tells inside stories about having organized the first Miss America Pageant protest, writes poignantly about being a feminist raising a son, and pens a letter to be read one thousand years in the future. She reports on her work with Palestinian women in the Gaza Strip, with Filipina prostitutes in South Asia, and with village women in South Africa—and celebrates finding indigenous feminism wherever she goes. Morgan unveils creative, visionary yet pragmatic ways for women to unite, regardless of barriers. Her message of defiant hope will inspire any woman—and man—who reads it. Feminism from the front lines A founder of the contemporary global women’s movement, Robin Morgan is widely known as one of feminism’s strongest, most persuasive activists. As a writer, she is unique in her ability to distill ideas into smart pieces of nonfiction that can transform a reader’s worldview forever. The Word of a Woman follows Morgan’s journalism and shorter prose from the 1960s through the early 1990s. Originally published in 1992, this second edition adds five new essays. An annotated version of her famous, fiery “Goodbye to All That” is here, as are essays that expose the connections between violence against women and pornography, explain the effects of female genital mutilation, and show how sexism and racism are intimately connected. She tells inside stories about having organized the first Miss America Pageant protest, writes poignantly about being a feminist raising a son, and pens a letter to be read one thousand years in the future. She reports on her work with Palestinian women in the Gaza Strip, with Filipina prostitutes in South Asia, and with village women in South Africa—and celebrates finding indigenous feminism wherever she goes. Morgan unveils creative, visionary yet pragmatic ways for women to unite, regardless of barriers. Her message of defiant hope will inspire any woman—and man—who reads it. These two decades (almost a quarter-century, in fact) of essays are a personal window into the birth, truths, and changes of the Women's Movement, by one who co-founded this feminist wave and who has been there - nationally and internationally - for it all. From the first Miss America Pageant protest in 1968 to the "divorce" from the New Left, from the first fights for abortion rights to the burgeoning of a global feminist consciousness and actions, Robin Morgan raised, embraced, and recorded issues from housewives' rage to racism, through women's love for women to global peace, neocolonialism, and the environment. Here is her voice in its full range: alternately journalistic, humorous, intensely personal, meditative, theoretical, and analytical, but always impassioned - with an obsession for human freedom and for the power of language.