British feminism's forgotten decade? the 1930s in the UK

British feminism's forgotten decade? the 1930s in the UK

This paper considers the forgotten feminisms of the 1930s to suggest that we need to look beyond 'waves' of high drama to the quiet and persistent work that kept the flame of feminism burning when many considered it outdated or irrelevant. This paper focuses on several remarkable neglected works of feminist thought responding both to the recent achievement of full political citizenship for women in 1928 and to the wider context of this troubled time: the Depression, the rise of Fascism, the Spanish Civil War and the looming menace of international conflict. While Virginia Woolf's Three Guineas (1938) is still remembered, a number of other significant works by feminist writers and intellectuals, never reprinted since the outbreak of the Second World War, addressed similar issues of women's place and responsibilities in this uncertain and threatening world.

The women whose writings are considered were involved in a range of issues of national and international significance, but they also took time to reflect on, as the title of Winifred Holtby's best-selling and several times reprinted contribution put it, Women and a Changing Civilisation (1934). They addressed the problems faced by feminism when several major goals appeared to have been won and there were claims that it was no longer relevant or at least of limited importance.  Their observations and analysis cogently argued that there were still battles left to fight and issues to which feminist analysis could contribute understanding.