ABSTRACT
The themes explored in this chapter are very relevant to a decade in which the Me Too and Black Lives Matter campaigns have been featured in the news. The chapter begins with a brief history of the women’s movement which was organized around the issue of women’s suffrage. Once women got the vote there was a lull in women’s activism until the social change era of the 1960s and 1970s. The second wave of feminism energized college women and housewives to demand opportunities in the workplace that were denied to them. Their activism paid off legally and professionally. It took the third wave to represent women of all social classes and backgrounds who felt their interests had not been addressed before. The movement was considerably enriched with the growth of many varieties of feminism. Described in this chapter are the following feminisms: liberal; radical; Socialist; Postmodern; Black; Latina; intersectional; ecofeminist; and lesbian and transgender feminism. Unique to this chapter is the discussion of the antifeminist backlash which has been directed in various destructive ways at girls and women charged with crime and at professional women who work in the criminal justice system. The contributions of feminist criminologists are highlighted in Chapter 1 which closes with a discussion of the key concepts of intersectionality, empowerment, and gender specific approaches.
