Feminists Despite Themselves

The book Feminists Despite Themselves is the first history of the women's movement in Ukraine. The book explains how Ukrainian women, constrained by national and traditional issues, began to develop self-help organizations in their rural communities. It analyzes a vast range of material, encompassing Ukrainian women in the Russian and Austrian empires; the national liberation struggle; the interwar period; international feminism; and Ukrainian women in the Soviet Union. In this study, based upon primary archival materials in the United States, Canada, Austria, Poland, and the Soviet Union, the author suggests that the Ukrainian women's movement was similar to the self-help women's movements characteristic of emergent colonial countries since 1945. It highlights an important dimension of East European and Soviet history and makes a significant contribution to women's studies.