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“Side by Side With Our Men?”1 Women's Activism, Community, and Gender in the 1984–1985 British Miners’ Strike

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  17 April 2009

Jean Spence  and
Carol Stephenson
Jean Spence
Affiliation:
Durham University
Carol Stephenson
Affiliation:
University of Northumbria
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Abstract

This paper explores the gendered concept of community with reference to the activism of women during the UK 1984–1985 miners’ strike. Drawing on texts from the period and reflective discussions twenty years later with women associated with the strike, it interrogates the ways in which the idea of community was used to accommodate the activism of women. We argue that the apparently gender-neutral ideal of mining community carried meanings that had ambiguous political implications for the women and that the strike highlighted paradoxes that question established understanding of female strike activism.

Type
Rethinking the Left in Victory and Defeat
Information
International Labor and Working-Class History , Volume 75 , Issue 1 , Spring 2009 , pp. 68 - 84
Copyright
Copyright © International Labor and Working-Class History, Inc. 2009

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References

NOTES

2. The Times, (June 24, 1983), 1; (April 27, 1984), 28.

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38. Lily Ross, interview.

39. See for example post-strike films such as Brassed Off; Billy Elliot; Faith.

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41. Samuel et al., The Enemy Within, 5.

42. Bulmer, ed., Mining and Social Change.

43. Hall, King Coal.

44. The Times, (May 16, 1984), 9; (June 18, 1984), 2.

45. Samuel et al., The Enemy Within, 5.

46. Julia Heron, interview. See also, eg., Stead, Never the Same Again; Monica Shaw, Women in Protest; Allen, Meg, “Women, ‘Community’ and the British Miners’ Strike” in Rowbotham, Sheila and Linkogle, S., eds., Women Resist Globalization: Mobilizing for Livelihood and Rights, (London, 2001)Google Scholar.

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56. Myrtle MacPherson, interview.

57. See, for example, The Times, (May 16, 1984), 9; (June 18, 1984), 2.

58. Anne Suddick, interview.

59. S. Hyatt, “By the bottle of the people.” Activists’ campaigns and the challenge of community development. AGM paper, Churches Community Work Alliance, West Yorkshire Network (October 14, 1993) uses the concept of “accidental activism.”

60. Anna Lawson, written interview.

61. Spence and Stephenson, Female Involvement in the Miners’ Strike.

62. Lily Ross, interview.

63. See e.g., Jean McCrindle, 115–116 in Sheila Rowbotham interviews McCrindle, Jean, “More than Just a Memory: Some Political Implications of Women's Involvement in the Miners’ Strike” in Feminist Review, 23, (Summer 1986), 109–124Google Scholar.

64. See, Loretta Loach, “We'll Be Here Right to the End … and After: Women in the Miners’ Strike” in Huw Beynon, ed., Digging Deeper, 177; See also discussion between Jean McCrindle and Sheila Rowbotham, “More than Just a Memory.”

65. Pat MacIntyre, interview. See also Shaw and Mundy, Complexities of Class and Gender Relations.

66. Stead, Never the Same Again, 22.

67. Women's Forum Discussion.

68. Stead, Never the Same Again.

69. Women's Forum Discussion.

70. See Samuel et al., The Enemy Within; Shaw, Women in Protest; and Suddick, Anne, “The Past We Inherit The Future We Build” in Capital and Class 87, (Autumn 2005), 3–16CrossRefGoogle Scholar for discussion of “Links.”

71. The contemporary engagement of the women activists is apparent in all our interviews and is continuous with a prehistory of activism stimulated by the strike. See Spence and Stephenson, Female Involvement in the Miners’ Strike; and also e.g., Gerard, Lesley, “Lessons from the University of Life,” Independent, (February 16, 1995) 29Google Scholar.