For and Against Feminism

Written between 1970 to 1986, these essays chart the thinking emerging from, and the debates within, Women’s Liberation in Australia, showing how it grew into a diverse, complex, and lively feminist movement.


First published in 1988, this edition of For and Against Feminism has a new introduction from the author putting the work in the context of today’s feminist debates.


Ann Curthoys AM has published extensively with a focus on Australian history, cultural studies, gender and feminist theory. Her books include Freedom Ride: A Freedom Rider Remembers (2002), and with John Docker Is History Fiction? (2006). Her most recent work, with Jessie Mitchell, is Taking Liberty: Indigenous Rights and Settler Self-Government in the Australian Colonies, 1830–1890 (2018).