It has become a truism – if not a truth universally acknowledged – that Jane Austen was a feminist. But what does that label signify in relation to Austen, whether now or in the past? Arizona State University Professor of English (and JASNA Greater Phoenix member) Devoney Looser looked at the previously unexamined ways that proponents of the late 19th-century “New Woman” movement and women’s suffrage activists of the early 20th century used Austen to support progressive political arguments.
JASNA Greater Phoenix Regional Coordinator Diane Gorham and Professor Devoney Looser