“Feminism is the political theory and practice to free all women: women of color, working-class women, poor women, physically challenged women, lesbians, old women—as well as white economically privileged heterosexual women.  Anything less than this is not feminism, but merely female self-aggrandizement.”
        --Barbara Smith in This Bridge Called My Back (1981)

“Feminism is a commitment to eradicating the ideology of domination that permeates Western culture on various levels—sex, race, and class, to name a few—and a commitment to reorganizing US society, so that the self-development of people can take precedence over imperialism, economic expansion, and material desires.”
        --bell hooks, Ain’t I a Woman (1981)

“Third World feminism is about feeding people in all their hungers.”
        --Cherrie Moraga, Loving in the War Years (1983)

“I myself have never been able to find out precisely what feminism is:  I only know that people call me a feminist whenever I express sentiments that differentiate me from a doormat.”
        --Rebecca West (1913)

“Feminism asks the world to recognize at long last that women aren’t decorative ornaments, worthy vessels, members of a ‘special-interest group.’  They are half (in fact, now more than half) of the national population, and just as deserving of rights and opportunities, just as capable of participating in the world’s events, as the other half.  Feminism’s agenda is basic:  It asks that women not be forced to ‘choose’ between public justice and private happiness.  It asks that women be free to define themselves—instead of having their identity defined for them, time and again, by their culture and their men.”
        --Susan Faludi, Backlash (1991)

“Feminism is an ongoing project, a process, undertaken on a daily basis by millions of women of all ages, classes, ethnic and racial backgrounds, and sexual preferences.  Feminism is constantly being reinvented, and reinvented through determination and compromise, so that women try, as best they can, to have love and support as well as power and autonomy.”
        --Susan Douglas, Where the Girls Are (1994)

“Feminism is the radical notion that women are people.”
         --bumper sticker

                          Because woman's work is never done
                         and is underpaid or unpaid or boring or
                        repetitious and we're the first to get fired
                         and what we look like is more important
                         than what we do and if we get raped it's
                       our fault and if we get beaten we must have
                       provoked it and if we raise our voices we're
                        nagging bitches and if we enjoy sex we're
                       nymphos and if we don't we're frigid and if
                       we love women it's because we can't get a
                      "real" man and if we ask our doctor too many
                       questions we're neurotic and/or pushy and
                      if we expect childcare we're selfish and if we
                      stand up for our rights we're aggressive and
                        "unfeminine" and if we don't we're typical
                       weak females and if we want to get married
                      we're out to trap a man and if we don't we're
                       unnatural and because we still can't get an
                     adequate safe contraceptive but men can walk
                        on the moon and if we can't cope or don't
                          want a pregnancy we're made to feel
                       guilty about abortion and...for lots and lots
                           of other reasons we are part of the
                             women's liberation movement.

         --Women’s Rights Manifesto, National Organization for Women