Koa Beck

I like this book. It's well written, well organized; cites enough data to be persuasive and uses enough anecdotes and personal experience to be compelling. It almost goes without saying how important the topic is for feminist thought today. If I were still teaching I'd probably use it in one of my Gender, Women's & Sexuality Studies classes.

However, I have one critique that I know most readers will find extremely nit-picky but it irked me every time I saw it. The US campaigners for women's suffrage never referred to themselves as suffragettes but as suffragists.* The -ette or -ess ending in English is a diminutive form, often used to mock or belittle someone or something, as in 'bachelorette', 'poetess', or when Gloria Steinem said most men want their wives to have a jobette (rather than a job). Beck should have known this, as her cited sources for suffrage history used the term suffragist, not suffragette.


*Yes, I am aware that British suffrage activists did use suffragette for themselves. Britain and the US are two different countries, two different contexts.… (meer)