Chicana Liberation

Women and Mexican American Politics in Los Angeles, 1945-1981 explores the history of how Mexican American women actively participated in the Los Angeles political spectrum prior to and during the Chicano movement and the ways in which these women’s experiences influenced their engagement and practice of Chicana feminist ideologies. The book uncovers important and long-standing connections between women activists in Los Angeles politics and traces how these connections undergirded the multiple and competing forms of Chicana feminisms that arose in this era. By focusing on specific organizations based in ethnic Mexican communities in Los Angeles, domestic and international women’s conferences, and the personal experiences of activists, Chicana Liberation examines the trajectory of Chicana feminism through women’s personal experiences. As the Chicano movement unfolded, women engaged politics in a variety of ways and in doing so, challenged the relationship(s) between cultural nationalism, gender, and feminism. Chicana Liberation addresses how identity, gender and political activism come together, and it sheds light on the historical presence of Mexicans in the United States, as well as how gender informs activism. It investigates the experiences of ethnic Mexican women in Los Angeles politics, the ways in which their political participation spanned the era of the Cold War through the Chicano movement, and the strategic and deliberate decisions they made as they confronted and practiced their own feminist ideologies.