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A vital history of organizing within and beyond the walls of women's prisons in the 1970s, illuminating a crucial chapter in today's abolition feminist struggles.
This new edition of an award-winning book features a foreword from acclaimed scholar-activist Sarah Haley and an afterword by Thuma.
During the 1970s, grassroots activists within and beyond the walls of women's prisons forged a radical politics against gender violence and incarceration. Scholar-activist Emily L. Thuma traces the making of this anticarceral feminism at the intersections of struggles for racial and economic justice, imprisoned and institutionalized people's rights, and gender and sexual liberation.
All Our Trials chronicles the organizing, ideas, and influence of those who placed criminalized and marginalized women at the heart of their antiviolence mobilizations. This activism confronted a "tough on crime" political agenda and clashed with the mainstream women's movement's strategy of resorting to the criminal legal system as a solution to sexual and domestic violence. Drawing on extensive research, Thuma weaves together the stories of mass defense campaigns, prisoner uprisings, coalition organizing, and activist publications that cut through prison walls. In the process,
All Our Trials reveals a vibrant culture of opposition to interpersonal and state violence that both transforms our understanding of 1970s social movements and illuminates the history of present struggles for transformative justice.
Winner of the 2020 Lambda Literary Award for LGBTQ StudiesShortlisted for the Organization of American Historians' Nickliss Prize and the American Studies Association's Romero Prize
List of contents
Foreword by Sarah Haley
Introduction
1. Lessons in Self-Defense: From "Free Joan Little" to "Free Them All"
2. Diagnosing Institutional Violence: Forging Alliances against the "Prison/Psychiatric State"
3. Printing Abolition: The Transformative Power of Women's Prison Newsletters
4. Intersecting Indictments: Coalitions for Women's Safety, Racial Justice, and the Right to the
City
Epilogue
Afterword
About the author
Emily L. Thuma is an associate professor of politics and law and the Haley Professor of Humanities at the University of Washington Tacoma. She is an interdisciplinary scholar of social movements and the carceral state and a longtime feminist antiviolence advocate and organizer.
Summary
A vital history of organizing within and beyond the walls of women’s prisons in the 1970s, illuminating a crucial chapter in today’s abolition feminist struggles.
This new edition of an award-winning book features a foreword from acclaimed scholar-activist Sarah Haley and an afterword by Thuma.
During the 1970s, grassroots women activists in and outside of prisons forged a radical politics against gender violence and incarceration. Scholar-activist Emily L. Thuma traces the making of this anticarceral feminism at the intersections of struggles for racial and economic justice, imprisoned and institutionalized people’s rights, and gender and sexual liberation.
All Our Trials chronicles the organizing, ideas, and influence of those who placed criminalized and marginalized women at the heart of their antiviolence mobilizations. This activism confronted a "tough on crime" political agenda and clashed with the mainstream women’s movement’s strategy of resorting to the criminal legal system as a solution to sexual and domestic violence.
Drawing on extensive archival research and first-person narratives, Thuma weaves together the stories of mass defense campaigns, prisoner uprisings, coalition organizing, and radical print cultures that cut through prison walls. In the process, All Our Trials reveals a vibrant culture of opposition to interpersonal and state violence that both transforms our understanding of 1970s social movements and illuminates the history of present struggles for transformative justice.
Foreword
Print and e-ARC distribution to trade and consumer media, both traditional and online, via Edelweiss, and other distribution platforms.
Targeted outreach to left and abolitionist organizations and book clubs.
Interviews in lefty magazines like The Nation, Jacobin, Dissent, Truthout, The New Republic
Interviews, reviews and excerpts in popular outlets like Teen Vogue, Vox, Vice
Radio and podcast interviews
Academic, library, and digital marketing campaigns
Outreach to indie booksellers
