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Partial Visions: Feminism and Utopianism in the 1970s
Utopianism - the belief that reality not only must, but can, be changed - is one of the most vital impulses of feminist politics. Angelika Bammer traces the articulation of this impulse in literary texts produced within the context of the American, French and German women's movements of the 1970s. "Partial Visions" provides a conceptual framework within which to approach the history of Western feminism during this formative period. At the same time, the book's comparative approach emphasizes the need to distinguish the particularities of different feminisms. Bammer argues that in terms of a radical utopianism, Western feminism not only continued where the Left foundered, but went a decisive step further by reconceptualizing what both "political" and "utopian" could mean. Through simultaneously close and contextualized reading of texts published in the US, France and the two Germanies between 1969 and 1979, her book examines the transformative potential as well as the ideological blindspots of this utopianism. It is this double edge that "Partial Visions" emphasizes. Feminist utopianism, it argues, is not just visionary, but is also myopic - time and culture-bound. This book should be of interest to students and teachers of women's studies, feminist theory, comparative literature, cultural studies, social and cultural history.
206 pages, Paperback
First published December 23, 1991
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August 19, 2025
A STUDY OF FEMINIST UTOPIAN PROPOSALS (MOSTLY IN LITERATURE)
Angelia Bammer (b. 1946) teaches Comparative Literature at Emory University, where she has previously taught German and Women’s Studies.
She wrote in then Introduction to this 1991 book, “The tradition of utopian thought in western culture has been a long and weighty one… By the late 1970s, however, some of its most eminent historians were proclaiming its demise… Utopia---the vision of the radically better world that ours could potentially be---was declared dead along with the movements for change that had inscribed it on their banners. It is my contention that this verdict was only partially true. In particular, I believe, it ignores the emergence of political and cultural movements at the time for which a utopian dimension was critical.
“Central among these was feminism. At the very time that the dream of utopia was being pronounced dead, it was vibrantly alive in the emergent American and western European women’s movements… Indeed to the extent that feminism was---and is---based on the principle of women’s liberation, a principle that is not reducible to a simple matter of equal rights, it was---and is---not only revolutionary but radically utopian… Revolution was defined in terms of process. And the concept of utopia became concrete.
“This is the story that I want to tell: not the demise of utopian thought, but its dynamic articulation in the context of 1970's feminisms. This book is not about feminist utopias… Rather it is a study of the relationship between feminism and utopianism---two ways of seeing the world and responding to the need for change that converged in particular ways in this decade.” (Pg. 1-2)
She continues, “The focus of this study … is on the way in which this debate was both reflected in and shaped by literary texts produced within this context. I have not aimed at a comprehensive survey. Rather, l have tried to identify what I consider to be representative positions… My organizing principle is conceptual… My purpose … is to use these texts as a way of raising questions about the potential and pitfalls of feminist utopianism… my study itself… could be described chiastically as a movement from the history of women in utopia to the utopia of women in history.” (Pg. 6)
She explains, “On the basis of this [Thomas More’s ‘Utopia’] model, utopias were declared to belong to the realm not of belles lettres, but social or political sciences. Or rather, as the 19th century political historian Robert von Mohl concluded, 'utopias … were neither literature nor political theory, but a curious hybrid of both.'” (Pg. 13)
She points out, “The absence of women from the history of utopia is thus a complex matter. For they have both stayed out (inscribing their utopian visions elsewhere and in other forms) and been kept out (prevented from constructing utopian spaces on their terms). In both cases, the reason lies in the way utopia has been defined. For if ‘utopia’ signifies not only order, but order in male-defined terms, then it represents neither a desirable place nor a useful genre for women. On the other hand, much (or most) of what would have been utopian from the perspective of women did not fit the category as it had been established.” (Pg. 20-21)
She explains, “At a time when a growing number of women in the United States and western Europe, both inspired by feminist cultural politics and impelled by ecological concerns, were hoping to do precisely that, namely claim land of their own, the vision of a Wanderground… could not fail to strike a responsive chord… ‘The Wanderground’ [by Sally Miller Gearheart] became a cult text of sorts, particularly in American cultural feminist and lesbian separatist circles… A few years earlier Joanna Russ’ ‘The Female Man’ had offered a first glimpse of an all-women’s utopia. Yet what Russ had merely suggested as a remote possibility, Gearheart developed on a full scale. ‘The Wanderground,’ therefore… was the first ‘fully formed lesbian visionary novel’… As its publishers at Persephone Press put it, ‘It was a book that the lesbian and feminist communities wanted and needed.’” (Pg. 86)
She notes, “Monique Wittig’s ‘Les Guérillères’ (1969/1973) has been hailed as ‘the first epic celebration of women ever written, ‘the text that best exemplifies the rage characteristic of the nascent women’s movement’… It was a text that invited superlatives… it still stands as one of the most passionate and probing investigations of the relationship between politics and culture in our time. At once experimental fiction, philosophical inquiry, and political treatise, ‘Les Guérillères’ remains generically unfixed… Wittig’s text … is summed up in the manifesto-like passage that precedes… the narrative action… ’ALL ACTION IS OVERTHROW.’… ‘Les Guérillères’ was one of the earliest and remains one of the most compelling articulations of two different, but related, movements that grew out and developed in the wake of these events: deconstruction and feminism.” (Pg. 124-125)
She observes, “Texts like ‘Les Guérillères’… powerfully illustrate the utopian dilemma that change is never a simple matter of changing ‘the object alone.’ The fantasy the ‘we’ will change (get rid of or escape from) ‘them’ is precisely that: a fantasy. Rather, they propose, in the process of change the changers themselves are changed. And that is why the outcome must remain unpredictable.” (Pg. 153)
She concludes, “What texts like these demonstrate is that feminist utopianism has not disappeared: It has shifted emphasis and thus, once again, been reconceptualized. What had often been excluded or left marginal in what passed as feminist utopianism to this point (for example, issues of race and class) has become a focus of critical attention. This change is unarguably positive. At its best, it recasts feminism in such a way that what had become idealized abstractions… can be replaced by what one might call an anticipatory pragmatism. It is a stance that is able to accommodate the vagaries of change because it thinks of change in concrete and practical terms, a utopianism in which the intense focus on the here and now draws the future (and the past) into the radius of its gaze.” (Pg. 161)
This book will appeal to feminists and those interested in modern utopias---particularly fictional.
Angelia Bammer (b. 1946) teaches Comparative Literature at Emory University, where she has previously taught German and Women’s Studies.
She wrote in then Introduction to this 1991 book, “The tradition of utopian thought in western culture has been a long and weighty one… By the late 1970s, however, some of its most eminent historians were proclaiming its demise… Utopia---the vision of the radically better world that ours could potentially be---was declared dead along with the movements for change that had inscribed it on their banners. It is my contention that this verdict was only partially true. In particular, I believe, it ignores the emergence of political and cultural movements at the time for which a utopian dimension was critical.
“Central among these was feminism. At the very time that the dream of utopia was being pronounced dead, it was vibrantly alive in the emergent American and western European women’s movements… Indeed to the extent that feminism was---and is---based on the principle of women’s liberation, a principle that is not reducible to a simple matter of equal rights, it was---and is---not only revolutionary but radically utopian… Revolution was defined in terms of process. And the concept of utopia became concrete.
“This is the story that I want to tell: not the demise of utopian thought, but its dynamic articulation in the context of 1970's feminisms. This book is not about feminist utopias… Rather it is a study of the relationship between feminism and utopianism---two ways of seeing the world and responding to the need for change that converged in particular ways in this decade.” (Pg. 1-2)
She continues, “The focus of this study … is on the way in which this debate was both reflected in and shaped by literary texts produced within this context. I have not aimed at a comprehensive survey. Rather, l have tried to identify what I consider to be representative positions… My organizing principle is conceptual… My purpose … is to use these texts as a way of raising questions about the potential and pitfalls of feminist utopianism… my study itself… could be described chiastically as a movement from the history of women in utopia to the utopia of women in history.” (Pg. 6)
She explains, “On the basis of this [Thomas More’s ‘Utopia’] model, utopias were declared to belong to the realm not of belles lettres, but social or political sciences. Or rather, as the 19th century political historian Robert von Mohl concluded, 'utopias … were neither literature nor political theory, but a curious hybrid of both.'” (Pg. 13)
She points out, “The absence of women from the history of utopia is thus a complex matter. For they have both stayed out (inscribing their utopian visions elsewhere and in other forms) and been kept out (prevented from constructing utopian spaces on their terms). In both cases, the reason lies in the way utopia has been defined. For if ‘utopia’ signifies not only order, but order in male-defined terms, then it represents neither a desirable place nor a useful genre for women. On the other hand, much (or most) of what would have been utopian from the perspective of women did not fit the category as it had been established.” (Pg. 20-21)
She explains, “At a time when a growing number of women in the United States and western Europe, both inspired by feminist cultural politics and impelled by ecological concerns, were hoping to do precisely that, namely claim land of their own, the vision of a Wanderground… could not fail to strike a responsive chord… ‘The Wanderground’ [by Sally Miller Gearheart] became a cult text of sorts, particularly in American cultural feminist and lesbian separatist circles… A few years earlier Joanna Russ’ ‘The Female Man’ had offered a first glimpse of an all-women’s utopia. Yet what Russ had merely suggested as a remote possibility, Gearheart developed on a full scale. ‘The Wanderground,’ therefore… was the first ‘fully formed lesbian visionary novel’… As its publishers at Persephone Press put it, ‘It was a book that the lesbian and feminist communities wanted and needed.’” (Pg. 86)
She notes, “Monique Wittig’s ‘Les Guérillères’ (1969/1973) has been hailed as ‘the first epic celebration of women ever written, ‘the text that best exemplifies the rage characteristic of the nascent women’s movement’… It was a text that invited superlatives… it still stands as one of the most passionate and probing investigations of the relationship between politics and culture in our time. At once experimental fiction, philosophical inquiry, and political treatise, ‘Les Guérillères’ remains generically unfixed… Wittig’s text … is summed up in the manifesto-like passage that precedes… the narrative action… ’ALL ACTION IS OVERTHROW.’… ‘Les Guérillères’ was one of the earliest and remains one of the most compelling articulations of two different, but related, movements that grew out and developed in the wake of these events: deconstruction and feminism.” (Pg. 124-125)
She observes, “Texts like ‘Les Guérillères’… powerfully illustrate the utopian dilemma that change is never a simple matter of changing ‘the object alone.’ The fantasy the ‘we’ will change (get rid of or escape from) ‘them’ is precisely that: a fantasy. Rather, they propose, in the process of change the changers themselves are changed. And that is why the outcome must remain unpredictable.” (Pg. 153)
She concludes, “What texts like these demonstrate is that feminist utopianism has not disappeared: It has shifted emphasis and thus, once again, been reconceptualized. What had often been excluded or left marginal in what passed as feminist utopianism to this point (for example, issues of race and class) has become a focus of critical attention. This change is unarguably positive. At its best, it recasts feminism in such a way that what had become idealized abstractions… can be replaced by what one might call an anticipatory pragmatism. It is a stance that is able to accommodate the vagaries of change because it thinks of change in concrete and practical terms, a utopianism in which the intense focus on the here and now draws the future (and the past) into the radius of its gaze.” (Pg. 161)
This book will appeal to feminists and those interested in modern utopias---particularly fictional.
February 2, 2026
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Feelings about the book:
- What a book. What a great book. I really liked this and I'm so glad I read it.
Premise/Plot:
- Bammer explores the relationship between feminism and utopianism. Among the backdrop of multiple waves of feminism and the pronounced death of utopianism in the 20th century.
- Bammer analyses common themes from American, German and French feminist utopian fiction. She also touches on the historical importance behind these author's texts.
Themes:
- Flawed utopians, gender segregation oppression, feminism, socialism,
Pros:
- I liked Bammer’s commentary on the different portrayals of utopia in classic literature, from Orwell to Moore to Russ.
- This book reenforced the notion that I need to read way more. It’s comforting to know that certain ideas I have, are shared by many others.
- Chapter 1: “Wild wishes…”: women and the history of utopia was a great chapter. Bammer touched on key ideas and differences very well
- Highlights the good, bad and flaws in feminist utopian literature throughout the years
- Bammer makes a fantastic point when she reflects on how feminist rhetoric of female goodness has backfired.
- I appreciated the exploration of German feminism and their relation to utopianism when the cloud of Nazism was still very present
- There is pretty much no filler in this book (besides the last chapter which was the weakest), which was refreshing and speaks to the quality of Bammer’s writing
- The misandry is non-existent, a first for a feminist book I think lol
- I should start mentioning this more often as a pro: the bibliography section of this book is elite. I added a ton of books to my TBR
Cons:
- Would have liked some deep analysis on utopia’s written by men. A compare and contrast would have been good
Quotes:
‘If utopias are based on the imperative of order, we must ask: Whose order is it? At whose expense has it been constructed? At what cost is it maintained?’
‘To surrender to anything – even hope – at the cost of our ability and right to remain critical, Orwell warns, inevitably leads to destruction of the dreamers as well as the dream.’
‘For as the Nazi state began to implement its own mad vision of utopia, it became evident that the price of law and order was not necessarily libidinal repression, but rather the social and physical repression of those who were Other to the declared norm.’
‘For in this “utopia” for women, women of colour are clearly not wanted. Mizora takes this attitude to its most sinister extreme.’
‘In their quest for a perfect (female) race, Mizoran women applied genetic engineering to eliminate all traits they considered undesirable. The result is a monstrous “utopia” of absolute, white racial purity.’
‘Should women enter the male world and “make it” in terms defined by men, or should they affirm and strengthen those very values traditionally cultivated by women?’
‘Which should be changed: the structures of difference or the system of valuation within which difference is perceived.’
‘The dilemma of both – utopias and separatism – is that the very radicalness of their stance doubles back to a fundamental conservatism as established structures and categories (such as gender) are perhaps replaced or set aside, but not dismantled.’
‘Elizabeth Cady Stanton, for example, consistently pointed out the dangers of the separate sphere theory and warned against its adoption by feminists as a political strategy.’
Feelings about the book:
- What a book. What a great book. I really liked this and I'm so glad I read it.
Premise/Plot:
- Bammer explores the relationship between feminism and utopianism. Among the backdrop of multiple waves of feminism and the pronounced death of utopianism in the 20th century.
- Bammer analyses common themes from American, German and French feminist utopian fiction. She also touches on the historical importance behind these author's texts.
Themes:
- Flawed utopians, gender segregation oppression, feminism, socialism,
Pros:
- I liked Bammer’s commentary on the different portrayals of utopia in classic literature, from Orwell to Moore to Russ.
- This book reenforced the notion that I need to read way more. It’s comforting to know that certain ideas I have, are shared by many others.
- Chapter 1: “Wild wishes…”: women and the history of utopia was a great chapter. Bammer touched on key ideas and differences very well
- Highlights the good, bad and flaws in feminist utopian literature throughout the years
- Bammer makes a fantastic point when she reflects on how feminist rhetoric of female goodness has backfired.
- I appreciated the exploration of German feminism and their relation to utopianism when the cloud of Nazism was still very present
- There is pretty much no filler in this book (besides the last chapter which was the weakest), which was refreshing and speaks to the quality of Bammer’s writing
- The misandry is non-existent, a first for a feminist book I think lol
- I should start mentioning this more often as a pro: the bibliography section of this book is elite. I added a ton of books to my TBR
Cons:
- Would have liked some deep analysis on utopia’s written by men. A compare and contrast would have been good
Quotes:
‘If utopias are based on the imperative of order, we must ask: Whose order is it? At whose expense has it been constructed? At what cost is it maintained?’
‘To surrender to anything – even hope – at the cost of our ability and right to remain critical, Orwell warns, inevitably leads to destruction of the dreamers as well as the dream.’
‘For as the Nazi state began to implement its own mad vision of utopia, it became evident that the price of law and order was not necessarily libidinal repression, but rather the social and physical repression of those who were Other to the declared norm.’
‘For in this “utopia” for women, women of colour are clearly not wanted. Mizora takes this attitude to its most sinister extreme.’
‘In their quest for a perfect (female) race, Mizoran women applied genetic engineering to eliminate all traits they considered undesirable. The result is a monstrous “utopia” of absolute, white racial purity.’
‘Should women enter the male world and “make it” in terms defined by men, or should they affirm and strengthen those very values traditionally cultivated by women?’
‘Which should be changed: the structures of difference or the system of valuation within which difference is perceived.’
‘The dilemma of both – utopias and separatism – is that the very radicalness of their stance doubles back to a fundamental conservatism as established structures and categories (such as gender) are perhaps replaced or set aside, but not dismantled.’
‘Elizabeth Cady Stanton, for example, consistently pointed out the dangers of the separate sphere theory and warned against its adoption by feminists as a political strategy.’
August 29, 2023
Feminizm ve ütopya çalışan herkesin mutlaka okuması gereken bir kitap.
Şöyle bir alıntı yapayım: “klasik ütopya yazarları ‘ideal devlet’ üzerine kafa yorar, feminist ütopya yazarları ise devletsizlik üzerine”.
Şöyle bir alıntı yapayım: “klasik ütopya yazarları ‘ideal devlet’ üzerine kafa yorar, feminist ütopya yazarları ise devletsizlik üzerine”.
June 24, 2015
I would recommend this book for all MA and PhD researchers of feminist utopias. It is highly informative and argumentative. It also includes analyses of some of the most prominent works of the genre.
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews