Feminist mental health activism in England, c.1968-1995 provides the first in-depth examination of feminist mental health activism in England, employing original oral history interviews alongside detailed case studies of unexplored feminist initiatives. It charts how feminist activists in the late 1960s initially rejected psychological approaches, before employing a range of therapies to understand themselves and support one another. This book charts the emergence of feminist mental health groups in the early 1970s, the development of feminist therapy across the 1980s, and the influence of feminist politics on national charity Mind in the 1990s. It examines what participation in feminist activism felt like; demonstrating how these emotions have influenced the construction of its history. The book simultaneously forges a new direction in the history of mental healthcare in postwar England, establishing how feminists’ grassroots support for women redefined 'community care'.

This is the first book to explore women’s leading role in animal protection in nineteenth-century Britain, drawing on rich archival sources. Women founded bodies such as the Battersea Dogs’ Home, the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds and various groups that opposed vivisection. They energetically promoted better treatment of animals, both through practical action and through their writings, such as Anna Sewell’s Black Beauty. Yet their efforts were frequently belittled by opponents, or decried as typifying female ‘sentimentality’ and hysteria. Only the development of feminism in the later Victorian period enabled women to show that spontaneous fellow-feeling with animals was a civilising force. Women’s own experience of oppressive patriarchy bonded them with animals, who equally suffered from the dominance of masculine values in society, and from an assumption that all-powerful humans were entitled to exploit animals at will.

After an extremely successful debut in hardback, Housewives and citizens is now available in paperback for the first time. This book explores the contribution that five conservative, voluntary and popular women’s organisations made to women’s lives and to the campaign for women’s rights throughout the period 1928–64. The book challenges existing histories of the women’s movement that suggest the movement went into decline during the inter-war period, only to be revived by the emergence of the Women’s Liberation Movement in the late 1960s. It is argued that the term 'women’s movement' must be revised to allow a broader understanding of female agency encompassing feminist, political, religious and conservative women’s groups who campaigned to improve the status of women throughout the twentieth century. The book provides a radical re-assessment of this period of women’s history and in doing so makes a significant contribution to ongoing debates about the shape and impact of the women’s movement in twentieth-century Britain.

In the late eighteenth-century, elite British women had an unprecedented opportunity to travel. Taking travel home uncovers the souvenir culture these women developed around the texts and objects they brought back with them to realise their ambitions in the arenas of connoisseurship, friendship and science. Key characters include forty-three-year-old Hester Piozzi (Thrale), who honeymooned in Italy; thirty-one-year-old Anna Miller, who accompanied her husband on a Grand Tour; Dorothy Richardson, who undertook various tours of England from the ages of twelve to fifty-two; and the sisters Katherine and Martha Wilmot, who travelled to Russia in their late twenties. The supreme tourist of the book, the political salon hostess Lady Elizabeth Holland, travelled to many countries with her husband, including Paris, where she met Napoleon, and Spain during the Peninsular War. Using a methodology informed by literary and design theory, art history, material culture studies and tourism studies, the book examines a wide range of objects, from painted fans “of the ruins of Rome for a sequin apiece” and the Pope’s “bless’d beads”, to lava from Vesuvius and pieces of Stonehenge. It argues that the rise of the souvenir is representative of female agency, as women used their souvenirs to form spaces in which they could create and control their own travel narratives.

Women’s Lives: A Psychological Exploration, 3rd Edition draws on a wealth of the literature to present a rich range of experiences and issues of relevance to girls and women. This text offers the unique combination of a chronological approach to gender that is embedded within topical chapters. Cutting-edge and comprehensive, each chapter integrates current material on women differing in age, ethnicity, social class, nationality, sexual orientation and ableness. The third edition reflects substantial changes in the field while maintaining its empirical focus through engaging writing, student activities, and critical thinking exercises. With over 2,100 new references emphasizing the latest research and theories, the authors continue to pique interests in psychology of women.

Born in Leicester, England, and raised in a working-class family, Richardson emigrated to northern Manitoba in 1911. She was influential in the women's and peace movements in both countries. Devoutly religious, she challenged orthodoxy and worked outside the mainstream churches for peace and social justice. She cofounded one of the earliest suffrage groups in Manitoba and was a key activist in peace movements during the Boer War and World War I. She also served as an information centre for international antiwar news and ran an internationally focused women's peace crusade in World War I from her Manitoba farmhouse via the post and newspaper columns. Richardson was also a gifted writer and poet. She wrote on a variety of women's movement issues for British and Canadian newspapers and magazines, including Woman's Century, the magazine of the National Council of Women of Canada. Her outcries against war, her indictment of militarism, and her call for women and men to stand together for justice were powerful messages that still have resonance today. Tragically, poor health, both mental and physical, interfered with Richardson's work and prevented her from achieving the recognition attained by feminist contemporaries such as Nellie McClung.