The Gender Revolution

The Gender Revolution will be examined and commemorated with a series of panels and presentations as a part of the Summer of Love 50th anniversary celebrations. The San Francisco Main Library is hosting this event in their Koret Auditorium on Thursday, September 7th, 2017, from 3:30 pm to 7:30 pm, with hourly 10 minute breaks, and is free to the public.

We begin with four women who all belonged to the same consciousness-raising group in Berkeley 50 years ago. Judy Gumbo Albert was an original Yippie leader with a prodigious FBI file, Alta enjoyed notoriety as a provocative feminist poet and publisher, Anne Weills was known for being a radical feminist, anti-imperialist, and anti-war activist, and Jane Scherr, whose relationship with Berkeley Barb publisher Max Scherr became emblematic of how our patriarchal society and resulting gender inequality would impact America’s legal system. We have KPFA’s Kris Welch tentatively scheduled to interview them.

The second hour looks at the unique challenges faced by women of color during this time, as they fought racial, economic and gender discrimination, which they continue to do today. Black Panther party member Judy Juanita is a teacher, historian and author who most recently published DeFacto Feminism: Essays Straight Out of Oakland, and is a self-described “feminist foot soldier.” Fran Beal co-founded the Black Women’s Liberation Committee of SNCC and wrote “Double Jeopardy: To Be Black and Female.” Professor Emerita and author Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz will be moderating this discussion.

The third hour will focus on how the Bay Area’s counterculture challenged prevailing attitudes regarding gender. Alexandra Hart Jacopetti, and her first husband Roland Jacopetti, participated in “happenings” through their Open Theater in Berkeley and San Francisco’s “Trips Festivals” provoking audiences with countercultural themes such as the human body as art. They also helped found the Morningstar Ranch commune. Denise Kaufman was a folk musician who jammed with Ken Kesey & the Pranksters before joining one of the first all girl rock bands called the Ace of Cups. They will be interviewed by St. Mary’s professor Gretchen Lemke-Santangelo, author of Daughters of Aquarius the first book to examine the lives of women in the counterculture, about their impact on gender norms.

The last hour will feature Trina Robbins who is a historian of women’s comix and one of the most respected feminist cartoonists of the Sixties. Mary Wings made history in 1973 when she released Come Out Comix, the first lesbian underground comic book. They will lead us in an intense visual history of the Gender Revolution through its milestones in the underground press, and specifically through comix. The program will end with a showing of Wavy Gravy and the Ace of Cups’ new music video, Basic Human Needs.