Keeping the records safe: Reflections on preserving sources for feminist history

Susan Magarey in her paper 'Memory and Desire: Feminists Re-membering Feminism' in this journal, has made a strong plea for remembering the history of feminism through sharing her fascinating insights into feminist activism in the 1970s and 1980s. She has in this piece interwoven the oral testimonies of former activists with her own experiences to highlight the excitement and dedication that the movement generated. She notes divisions that inspired activists to follow different paths: sometimes all were united on an issue, but at other times seemed scarcely aware of each other's campaigns. And in the wake of accusations of feminists' ethnocentrism made by women of colour, she reviews with candour the place Indigenous and migrant women played in the movement, and how their particular concerns figured in activism that was led, for the most part, by white women of middle-class backgrounds. This past, she urges, must be recorded in all its complexity as a significant segment of the history of Australian women. In this paper I trace a collaborative contribution to feminist scholarship, in which I participated as an advocate for the preservation of women's records for historical use.