Monday, December 2, 2:35pm – 2:50pm, via Zoom
Corinne Mikulik
Founded in 1980, Spinsters Books and Webbery was a lesbian separatist bookstore in Lawrence, Kansas. They were part of a cultural feminist movement that took over the radical feminist movement formed in the preceding decade. They had their origins in the University of Kansas where they ran a women’s resource center and established themselves as lesbian activists, learning about women’s issues through independently published periodicals from across the country. They started their own periodical called the Monthly Cycle where they advertised activist literature and developed their own political theory as separatists in an attempt to reach Lawrence women and lesbians. This thesis explores how Spinsters’ location in the unexamined lower Midwest and the collective’s strong connection to national activism impacted their ability to organize with local lesbians. Their middle class university origins and strict separatist ideology prevented them from connecting to other lesbians in Lawrence who were far more concerned with survival, motherhood, and legal rights. This contentious relationship between theory motivated activists and locals steeped in their oppressive reality illuminates the difficulties and ineffectiveness of pure cultural movements.