The Political Thought of America’s Founding Feminists - Hardcover

Lisa Pace Vetter is Associate Professor of Political Science and Affiliate Faculty member of the Gender and Women’s Studies Department at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County. She is the author of “Women’s Work” as Political Art: Weaving and Dialectical Politics in Homer, Aristophanes, and Plato.

"The Political Thought of America’s Founding Feminists is both wide-ranging and deep. It tells us about early women's rights advocates, but it does far more than that. Lisa Pace Vetter's book bears not merely on our understanding of particular moments or issues in American political history but on our understanding of American political history itself."-Susan McWilliams, author of Traveling Back: Toward a Global Political Theory

“Vetter looks beyond formal conventional modes of theorizing to consider women’s activism, as well as their speeches, letters, and the writings of their contemporaries. She includes nontraditional perspectives, such as the religious underpinnings of their activism and philosophies. The influence of these nontraditional perspectives illustrates her point that American political theory emerged from unexpected venues and diverse voices.”-Hypatia Reviews Online

"The result is a well-researched and beautifully written book that weaves together discussion of the contributions of several early feminists with several long-standing theoretical debates, in a compelling and fruitful way. The book should be of serious interest to scholars of feminist theory and history,"-The Review of Politics

"Vetter's chapters are gems. Any of them could be assigned in a course on American political thought, and perhaps that is part of Vetter's objective of transforming the canon."-American Historical Review

“In this innovative book, Vetter expands the contours of U.S. political theory. The Political Thought of America’s Founding Feminists compellingly demonstrates how feminist and critical race theory enrich the conceptualization of liberty, equality, citizenship, self-ownership, and democracy.”-Mary Hawkesworth, author of Embodied Power: Demystifying Disembodied Politics