The Captive Maternal: Anti-Fascists in Search of the Beloved

Philosopher and organizer Joy James examines the lives of the 'Captive Maternals'—those racialized and 'feminized' into roles of caretaking and consumption, yet compelled to transform through care, protest and movement-making, towards building safe communities to resist war and fascism. Shaped by enslavement, colonialism, rape and resistance (whether female, male, trans or nonbinary), they are integral to the weaving of rebel tapestries.

From domestic upheavals, through cultural revolution and police/military violence, James excavates hidden layers beneath seemingly ordinary narratives, including her biography as a 'military brat' radicalized by socialists, communists, feminists and Black Panther veterans. She deftly draws upon the writers on whose shoulders she stands—Octavia Butler and Toni Morrison, and the politics of Ella Baker, George Jackson and Assata Shakur, Mamie Till Mobley and Ida B. Wells.

The Captive Maternal navigates a powerful terrain where Black, feminist, socialist and anti-carceral studies and organizing converge. Reshaping understandings of power, resilience, and enduring struggles for liberation and justice, James’s groundbreaking analysis meditates on revolutionary love, mutations of rebellion, and the fulcra that leverage opposition to violence.