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Women, Race & Class Paperback – Feb. 12 1983
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- Print length288 pages
- LanguageEnglish
- PublisherVintage
- Publication dateFeb. 12 1983
- Dimensions13.21 x 1.55 x 20.32 cm
- ISBN-109780394713519
- ISBN-13978-0394713519
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Product details
- ASIN : 0394713516
- Publisher : Vintage; First Edition (Feb. 12 1983)
- Language : English
- Paperback : 288 pages
- ISBN-10 : 9780394713519
- ISBN-13 : 978-0394713519
- Item weight : 210 g
- Dimensions : 13.21 x 1.55 x 20.32 cm
- Best Sellers Rank: #69,260 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #8 in Social Groups
- #45 in Feminist Criticism
- #84 in African American Studies (Books)
- Customer Reviews:
About the author

Angela Yvonne Davis is considered to be a distinguished social and political activist of the United States. She has made a huge contribution in the uplifting of the political and social conditions of black in the American society. She was born and brought up in Alabama by her upper middle class parents, who were also in political scene of their times. Davis has studied in New York, Frankfurt and Massachusetts, where she polished her already existing communist ideas in her mind. She started as an associate professor at the University of California in the subject of philosophy and side by side got involved in the Communist Party USA and the Black Panther Party. It was in the 1970s that Davis got in trouble with the law when one of her subject of study, a young black boy who was imprisoned, tried to escape from the jail and was found with a weapon that was claimed to have been given to him by Davis. She tried to flee the law but was caught and put in the jail until all of the charges on her were withdrawn. Davis has been a keynote speaker on the issues of feminism, condition of the prisoners in the jails of United States and the liberation of gays and lesbians at many renowned universities and institutions since that incident.
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One error within the book is in the first chapter. Twice Davis states that female slaves were the only victims of rape:
“But women suffered in different ways as well, for they were victims of sexual abuse and other barbarous mistreatment that could only be inflicted on women.” (4)
“Again, it is important to remember that the punishment inflicted on women exceeded in intensity the punishment suffered by their men, for women were not only whipped and mutilated, they were also raped.” (19)
I do not doubt that female slaves were raped more regularly than male slaves, but it does erase the experiences of male slaves to say that masters only raped women. Men were raped and sodomized by masters in order to emasculate them as well (“buck breaking”).
Davis does contradict these claims in chapter 11, though, when she acknowledges that both men and women were raped:
“Together with flogging, rape was a terribly efficient method of keeping Black women and men alike in check.” (165)
My one other critique is that the last chapter ended fairly abruptly. On the last page, Davis advocates for socialism as the singular solution to the domestic slavery of women, claiming that socialist countries have been the only ones wherein steps have been taken, but she does not elaborate or give any examples:
“The only significant steps toward ending domestic slavery have in fact been taken in the existing socialist countries.” (220)
It would have been nice to see the final chapter go on a little longer to substantiate that claim.
This book is a very good primer for people to learn about the flawed origins of the women’s suffrage movement, its imperfect leaders, and how classism and racism marred the debate on issues like birth control and abortion rights. Figures like Frederick Douglass, W. E. B. DuBois, and Sojourner Truth are excellent people to read about more thoroughly after finishing this book, as well as the countless events, both encouraging and horrifying, that have not found a place in modern school curricula.







