Seven Social Movements That Changed A..., Linda Gordon
Seven Social Movements That Changed A..., Linda Gordon
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Seven Social Movements That Changed America

Author: Linda Gordon

Narrator: Hillary Huber

Unabridged: 17 hr 35 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Publisher: Kalorama

Published: 03/04/2025


Synopsis

A brilliantly conceived and provocative work from an award-winning historian that examines how seven twentieth-century social movements transformed America.

How do social movements arise, wield power, and decline? Renowned scholar Linda Gordon investigates these questions in a groundbreaking work, narrating the stories of many of America's most influential twentieth-century social movements. Beginning with the turn-of-the-century settlement house movement, Gordon then scrutinizes the 1920s Ku Klux Klan and its successors, the violent American fascist groups of the 1930s. Profiles of two Depression-era movements follow—the Townsend campaign that brought us Social Security and the creation of unemployment aid. Proceeding then to the 1955 Montgomery bus boycott, which inspired the civil rights movement and launched Martin Luther King Jr.'s career, the narrative barrels into the 1960s–70s with Cesar Chavez's farmworkers' union. The concluding chapter illumines the 1970s women's liberation movement through the dramatic story of the Boston-area organizations Bread and Roses and the Combahee River Collective. Separately and together, these seven chapters animate American history, reminding us of the power of collective activism.

About Linda Gordon

Linda Gordon, winner of two Bancroft Prizes and the Los Angeles Times Book Prize, is the author of Dorothea Lange and Impounded and coauthor, with Dorothy Sue Cobble and Astrid Henry, of Feminism Unfinished. She is the Florence Kelley Professor of History at New York University and lives in New York and Madison, Wisconsin.


Reviews

Goodreads review by Zane on June 03, 2025

Very well done with a very interesting structure. Gordon has written a typology of social movements, allowing for easy comparison between them. The book is not prescriptive, rightly so, and acknowledges that what makes a social movement take off remains a mystery. Still, there’s a lot here for anyone......more

Goodreads review by Northumberland on April 23, 2025

A brilliantly conceived and provocative work from an award-winning historian that examines how seven twentieth-century social movements transformed America. How do social movements arise, wield power, and decline? Renowned scholar Linda Gordon investigates these questions in a groundbreaking work, na......more

Goodreads review by Sarah on May 24, 2025

I love learning about the history that isn’t taught to us in schools. This book is that! It can absolutely be dry at times (it’s by a historian) but the content is very interesting. Learning more about the social movements that shaped our current reality is a valuable endeavor.......more