It's actually quite staggering how out-of-date this book already is, 15 years after it's publication.

Everything you need to know you can learn by just reading the Conclusion section at the end of the book. In this Siegel finally shows her hand, she is of the Second Wave and has a lot to say about what she thinks Third Wave Feminists are doing wrong. The clues were there in the preceding chapters, but for a book that is structured to set out a basic history of Second Wave and Third Wave, it reads a lot more like "Second Wave Feminists made a few mistakes but changed the world. Third Wave Feminists don't have any respect and only care about sex."

Other than the briefest mention, Siegel fails to touch on the intersectionality of oppressions that Third Wave feminism rallies around (this is truly a book about white women, for white women). This was not a far-out concept in 2007. I was there. We were talking about it ad naseum.

Perhaps most shocking to me - though this is incidental - is the moment in the conclusion where Siegel snipes at BUST editor Debbie Stoller by mentioning "[she] has since published a series of books about knitting". Exactly how feminist is it to imply that another successful woman is less-than for having an interest outside of feminism?? Had this moment been earlier in the book, honestly I probably would have DNFd. Alas it came in the last 10 pages. Not long after this Siegel graciously definies feminism for us - with extremely binary and gender-essentialist language.

There are a lot of pillars of feminist writing that have inspired people, hundreds of pieces that still hold up today. Unfortunately, this is not one of them. ( )

A spry, thoughtful primer on the history of feminism and the dissensions and schisms therein. Siegel's thesis boils down to a plea for reconciliation between aging boomer radicals and the irreverent "third wave" that has supplanted them, but the main value of this book, at least to this curious non-expert, is its vivid and concise summary of the major developments, personalities, and ideas in postwar feminism. ( )

Reading for review in Feminist Collections... ( )

Not a heavy duty history, and no real new ground broken here, but if you're looking for a quick look over the last 40 or so years, you could do a lot worse. ( )

This seemed to be a good U.S. Feminist History 101 sort of book, which is at my level. It's unfortunate (and telling?) that the bibliography is full of anthologies from the mid-90s but not much of anything more current. ( )