The Women’s Review of Books Vol. XX, No. 5 February 2003 74035 $4.00 I In This Issue Barboza © Anthony I Inside this issue is our fifteenth annual supplement featuring books rec- ommended by our advertisers for aca- demic course adoption. It goes without saying that these pages include only a few of the large and small presses whose lists abound in books for Women’s Studies—and that many of the books they offer will appeal as strongly to general readers as to an academic audience. Happy reading! I Unable to find any memoirs by tran- sracially adopted children, Catherine McKinley wrote her own: E.J. Graff reviews The Book of Sarahs: A Family in Parts,p.5. I Two extraordinary women leaders encourage us to believe that another world is possible: Deborah Valenze reads Madam Prime Minister, the autobi- Catherine McKinley, author of The Book of Sarahs. ography of Norway’s Gro Harlem Brundtland, p. 4, and Amy Edelstein interviews Ireland’s Mary Robinson, p. 8. I Long before Oprah, African Free and fair Americans were forming their own by Nan Levinson book clubs and reading groups: Gabrielle Foreman reviews Elizabeth Free for All: Liberty in America Today by Wendy Kaminer. McHenry’s fascinating Forgotten Readers: Boston: Beacon Press, 2002, 235 pp., $16.00 paper. Recovering the Lost History of African I American Literary Societies,p.19. endy Kaminer’s philosophy could less random than it seems; liberties interlock, I “Through the life of one woman, be summed up as “fair is fair.” As so that, for instance, the speech rights of a social critic and lawyer focusing school kids have something to do with the Naked in the Promised Land captures the W on civil liberties and criminal justice, she has religious rights of evangelicals and Wiccans, history of an era,” writes Judith a lot to say about fairness and the difficulty even though they may not seem to at first Barrington in a review of lesbian histo- of distributing it, well, fairly. blush. It’s the second blush that interests rian Lillian Faderman’s surprising new In Free for All, a collection of about 45 Kaminer and gives the book consequence. memoir, p. 16. essays written over the past five years, she The pieces here originally appeared in The I and more... covers a raft of controversies, including American Prospect (where Kaminer is a senior media violence, anti-abortion protest, sur- correspondent), Dissent, Free Inquiry and a few veillance, child pornography, flag burning, other periodicals. If that seems like preaching identity politics, affirmative action, assisted to the choir, one of Kaminer’s strengths is suicide, gay marriage, immigration laws, cam- documenting the dissent in the choir about paign finance reform, witchcraft, prosecutor- just how free inquiry (and much else) should ial abuse, victims’ rights, fathers’ rights, reli- be. Through current events, controversies gious rights and a slew of free speech dust- and legal decisions, she examines what the PRINTED IN THE USA ups. I’ve probably missed a few, but the list is continued on page three The Women’s Review Contents of Books Wellesley College Center for Research on Women 1 Nan Levinson I Free for All: Liberty in America Today by Wendy Kaminer Wellesley, MA 02481 (781) 283-2087/ (888) 283-8044 4 Deborah Valenze I Madam Prime Minister: A Life in Power and Politics by Gro Harlem Brundtland www.wellesley.edu/WomensReview Volume XX, No. 5 5 E. J. Graff I The Book of Sarahs: A Family in Parts by Catherine E. McKinley February 2003 6 Gail Bederman I Talk About Sex: The Battles Over Sex Education in the United States EDITOR IN CHIEF: Linda Gardiner by Janice M. Irvine; Love the Sin: Sexual Regulation and the Limits of Religious Tolerance PRODUCTION EDITOR: Amanda Nash by Janet R. Jakobsen and Ann Pellegrini CONTRIBUTING EDITORS: Martha Nichols, Jan Zita Grover 7 Rochelle G. Ruthchild I Girl with Two Landscapes: The Wartime Diary of Lena Jedwab, 1941-1945 POETRY EDITOR: Robin Becker by Lena Jedwab Rozenberg ADVERTISING MANAGER: Anita D. McClellan OFFICE MANAGER: Nancy Wechsler 8 Amy Edelstein I THINK GLOBALLY, ACT GLOBALLY: Mary Robinson puts human rights on EDITORIAL BOARD: Margaret Andersen I everyone’s agenda Robin Becker I Claudia M. Christie I Marsha Darling I Anne Fausto-Sterling I 12 Sherri Broder I Strangers and Kin: The American Way of Adoption by Barbara Melosh Carol Gilligan I Sandra Harding I Nancy Hartsock I Carolyn Heilbrun I Evelyn Fox 13 Jan Zita Grover I Fatal Harvest: The Tragedy of Industrial Agriculture edited by Andrew Kimbrell; Keller I Jean Baker Miller I Ruth Perry I Peggy Phelan I Helene Vivienne Wenzel Chez Panisse Fruit by Alice Waters EDITORIAL POLICY: 14 Kimberly Shearer Palmer I Womansword: What Japanese Words Say About Women by Kittredge Cherry The Women’s Review of Books is feminist but not restricted to any one conception of feminism; 15 Lisa Marcus I Conquering Infertility: Dr. Alice Domar’s Mind/Body Guide to Enhancing Fertility all writing that is neither sexist, racist, homo- and Coping with Infertility by Alice Domar and Alice Lesch Kelly phobic, nor otherwise discriminatory will be welcome. We seek to represent the widest 16 Judith Barrington I Naked in the Promised Land: A Memoir by Lillian Faderman possible range of feminist perspectives both in the books reviewed and in the content of 17 Christine Froula I Analyzing Freud: Letters of H.D., Bryher and Their Circle edited by the reviews. We believe that no one of us, alone or in a group, can speak for feminism, Susan Stanford Friedman or women, as such; all of our thinking and writing takes place in a specific political, 18 Julia Epstein I Publicity’s Secret: How Technoculture Capitalizes on Democracy by Jodi Dean social, ethnic and sexual context, and a responsible review periodical should reflect 19 Gabrielle Foreman I Forgotten Readers: Recovering the Lost History of African American Literary and further that diversity. The Women’s Review Societies by Elizabeth McHenry takes no editorial stance; all the views expressed in it represent the opinion of the 20 Helen Zia I The Colors of Nature: Culture, Identity, and the Natural World edited by individual authors. Alison H. Deming and Lauret E. Savoy ADVERTISING POLICY: The Women’s Review accepts both display and 21 Paisley Currah I How Sex Changed: A History of Transsexuality in the United States classified advertising. Classified rates are by Joanne Meyerowitz $1.15 per word, with a ten word minimum. The base rate for display ads is $53 per col- I umn inch; for more information on rates and 21 Marcia Falk Two Poems available discounts, call or write to the adver- tising manager. The Women’s Review will not 22 Books Received accept advertising which is clearly inappropri- ate to the goals of a feminist publication; however, as we are unable to investigate the accuracy of claims made by our advertisers, publication of an advertisement does not rep- Contributors resent endorsement by The Women’s Review. Advertising inquiries: call 781-283-2560. JUDITH BARRINGTON’s most recent book, Lifesaving: A Memoir, was the winner of the Lambda Book Award and a finalist for the PEN/Martha Albrand Award for the art of the memoir. She is also the author of Writing the Memoir: From Truth to Art and two collections of The Women’s Review of Books (ISSN #0738- poetry. Her web site is www.judithbarrington.com. 1433) is published monthly except August by GAIL BEDERMAN, the author of Manliness and Civilization: A Cultural History of Gender and Race in the US, 1877-1917, teaches US history at the The Women’s Review, Inc., 828 Washington University of Notre Dame. She is working on two projects: a biography of the nineteenth-century New York abortionist Madame Restell, and Street, Wellesley, MA 02481. Annual subscrip- another book provisionally entitled Sex Radicalism, Malthusianism, and ‘Reproductive Rights’ in England and the US, 1793-1831 (forthcoming, University tions are $27.00 for individuals and $47.00 for of Chicago Press). institutions. Overseas postage fees are an SHERRI BRODER is a US social historian. Her book Tramps, Unfit Mothers, and Neglected Children: Negotiating the Family in Late Nineteenth-Century additional $20.00 airmail or $5.00 surface mail Philadelphia was published recently by the University of Pennsylvania Press. to all countries outside the US. Back issues are PAISLEY CURRAH, associate professor of political science and coordinator of the women’s studies program at Brooklyn College of the City available for $4.00 per copy. Please allow 6-8 University of New York, is co-editing, with Richard M. Juang and Shannon Minter, Transgender Rights: History, Politics, and Law, forthcoming from weeks for all subscription transactions. the University of Minnesota Press. She serves on the board of the Transgender Law and Policy Institute. Periodicals class postage paid at Boston, MA AMY EDELSTEIN, contributing writer for What Is Enlightenment? magazine, also covers conservation, globalization, and sustainable develop- and additional mailing offices. POSTMAS- ment issues. She lives in Lenox, MA; email [email protected]. TER: send address corrections to The Women’s Review of Books, Wellesley College Center for JULIA EPSTEIN is Director of Communications for the Disability Rights Education and Defense Fund in Berkeley, California. She has been a literature professor and has worked in software development. Research on Women, Wellesley, MA 02481. MARCIA FALK’s books include The Song of Songs: A New Translation and Interpretation and The Book of Blessings, a feminist re-creation of The Women’s Review of Books is a project of the Jewish prayer. The Spectacular Difference, a volume of her translations of the Hebrew poet Zelda, is forthcoming in 2003 from Hebrew Union Wellesley College Center for Research on College Press.