THE VFA PIONEER HISTORIES PROJECT

Dorothy Sue Cobble

“When I became more involved in the labor movement, I saw myself as a feminist. But I also saw myself as somebody who was concerned with the particular issues of working-class and poor women and the ways their emancipation required a different set of priorities and policies than the emancipation of their more privileged sisters.”

Historian. Author. Activist.  A leading writer on feminism, working women’s movements, and politics. Distinguished Professor Emerita of History and Labor Studies, Rutgers University. Founder of the Center for Women and Work, Rutgers University. BA, University of California at Berkeley; PhD, Stanford University.

Interviewed by Judy Waxman, January 2022

Photo 1. Writing a skit for the feminist guerilla theatre group at Smith College in 1969.

Photo 2. One of the longshore union jobs in 1975 that paid Dorothy Sue’s way through graduate school.

Photo 3. Thrilled to be the first woman director of the Labor Studies Program at San Francisco City College in 1980.