Abstract

Christine Delphy is a major architect of materialist feminism, a radical feminist perspective which she developed in the context of the French women's movement in the late 1960s and early 1970s. She has always been controversial and continues to make original and challenging contributions to current feminist debates. This informative volume profiles Delphy and discusses topics including her opposition to the idea that femininity and masculinity are natural phenomena. Her insistence that women and men are social categories, defined by the hierarchical relationship between them rather than by biology, typifies the materialist school within French feminism. In this lucid introduction to Delphy's work, Stevi Jackson recounts the events in Delphy's life as a feminist activist and the social and political context of her work. This text is essential reading for anyone with an interest in feminism or cultural history, this is a readable and accessible introduction to a key thinker in the modern women's movement.