Constructing difference: Feminist witch discourses in the 1970s

Abstract

It is a well-known fact, that in the 1970s, feminist activists reappro- priated the figure of the witch in various ways as a symbol of alterity, political radicalism, feminist revolt or victimhood, or the presentation of subversive (healing or body) knowledge. The article investigates the construction of this «artificial myth» in the early 1970s within different milieus of the emergent women's movements based on the examination of three feminist magazines and health guidebooks. «Die Hexenpresse. Zeitschrift für feministische Agitation» (1972-1976) in Basel, the West Berlin health guide Hexengeflüster. Frauen greifen zur Selbsthilfe (1975), and the artistic-literary journal «Sorcières. Les femmes vivent» (1975- 1982) in Paris are read as sites and tools of alternative knowledge produc- tion. The article aims at demonstrating the new witch myth as a matrix of «knowledge empowerment».