Tidal Wave: How Women Changed America at Century's End

Tidal Wave: How Women Changed America at Century's End. By Sara M. Evans. (New York: Free Press, 2003. 304 pp. $26.00, ISBN 0-02909912-9.)

Tidal Wave, by Sara M. Evans, a longtime chronicler of women's activism, is a welcome addition to the history of second-wave feminism, both for its consolidation of existing scholarship and for its original contributions to the field. Most important, Evans's extended discussion of liberal activists lays to rest the persistent idea that women of color had no use for feminism and found no place for themselves within women's groups. Fascinating accounts of multicultural women's activism, including the central role black women played in the growth of liberal feminism in the 1960s and 1970s and the growth of Latina activism in the 1980s, underscore the commitment by feminists to antiracist work and to...