Max Dashu

{{Infobox person

| name = Max Dashu

| birth_name =Maxine Hammond

| birth_date = {{birth year and age|1950}}

| birth_place = West Chicago, Illinois, U.S.

| nationality =

| occupation = Feminist historian, author, artist

| education = Harvard University

| yearsactive = 1970–present

| spouse =

| partner = Nava Mizrahhi

| children =

| notable_works = Witches and Pagans: Women in European Folk Religion, 700–1100

| website = [http://suppressedhistories.net Suppressed Histories Archive]

}}

Maxine Hammond Dashu (born 1950), known professionally as Max Dashu, is an American feminist historian, author, and artist. Her areas of expertise include female iconography, mother-right cultures and the origins of patriarchy.

In 1970, Dashu, who is lesbian,{{cn|date=September 2024}} founded the Suppressed Histories Archives to research and document women's history and to make the full spectrum of women's history and culture visible and accessible.{{cite encyclopedia |editor-last= Love|editor-first= Barbara J.|encyclopedia= Feminists Who Changed America, 1963-1975|title= Max Dashu|url= https://books.google.com/books?id=HRouCAAAQBAJ&pg=PA108|year= 2006|publisher= University of Illinois Press|pages= 108|isbn= 9780252097478}}Women Library Workers (1983), volume 8. The collection includes 15,000 slides and 30,000 digital images.{{cite web |url= http://www.suppressedhistories.net/aboutmax.html|title= About Max Dashu|last= Dashu|first= Max|website= Suppressed Histories Archive|access-date= January 16, 2017}}{{cite web |url= http://www.matrifocus.com/Bios/bio-mdashu.htm|title= Max Dashu|website= MatriFocus|access-date= January 16, 2017}} Since the early 1970s, Dashu has delivered visual presentations on women's history throughout North America, Europe and Australia.

Dashu is the author of Witches and Pagans: Women in European Folk Religion, 700–1100 (2016), the first volume of a planned 16-volume series called Secret History of the Witches.{{cite book |last= Dashu|first= Max|date= 2016|title= Witches and Pagans: Women in European Folk Religion, 700-1100|location= Richmond, CA|publisher= Veleda Press|isbn=978-0-692-74028-6}}

Early life

Dashu grew up in West Chicago, Illinois. In 1968, she earned a full scholarship to Harvard University, where she began her research in women's history.{{cite news |last= Szymanski|first= Zak|date= July 21, 2005|title= Suppressed Histories Archive benefit Sat.|volume= 35|issue= 29|url= https://cdnc.ucr.edu/?a=d&d=BAR20050721.1.12&srpos=1&e=-------en--20--1--txt-txIN-%22max+dashu%22-------1|work= Bay Area Reporter|access-date= January 27, 2019}} Facing "entrenched resistance" to feminist scholarship, she chose to leave the university to become an independent scholar.{{cite magazine |last= Dashu|first= Max|date= 1 September 2003|volume = 33|issue= 9|title= Women's studies beyond academia|url= http://go.galegroup.com/ps/retrieve.do?tabID=T003&resultListType=RESULT_LIST&searchResultsType=SingleTab&searchType=BasicSearchForm¤tPosition=1&docId=GALE%7CA109668699&docType=Article&sort=Relevance&contentSegment=&prodId=GPS&contentSet=GALE%7CA109668699&searchId=R3|magazine= off our backs|access-date= January 27, 2019}}{{cite news |last= Orrock|first= Ray|date= January 10, 2003|title= History project unleashes women's achievements|url= https://infoweb.newsbank.com/resources/doc/nb/news/0F9938535626C52A?p=NewsBank|work= Oakland Tribune|access-date= January 27, 2019}} After founding the Suppressed Histories Archives in 1970, she began presenting on women's history in 1973, sharing slides of her research at feminist bookstores, cafe and women's centers.{{cite book |last= Morris|first= Bonnie J.|date= July 29, 2016|title= The Disappearing L: Erasure of Lesbian Spaces and Culture|publisher= SUNY Press |page= 146}} Dashu's slide presentations offered visual history at a time when lesbian history and art was not easily accessible.{{cite book |last=Harper |first= Jorjet|editor-last= Baim|editor-first= Tracy|title= Out and Proud in Chicago: An Overview of the City's Gay Movement|publisher=Surrey Books |date=2008 |pages= 123|chapter= Lesbian Writers' Conferences: Sharing Words|isbn=9781572841000}}

In 1976, Dashu was involved in the Inez García defense committee. In the early 1980s, Dashu worked in the Household Workers' Rights organization, a Union WAGE project established in 1979 for working women.{{cite web |url= http://www.oac.cdlib.org/findaid/ark:/13030/tf3h4n99t9/entire_text/|title= Finding Aid to the Household Workers' Rights Records, 1982-1996|website= Online Archive of California|access-date= January 16, 2017}}{{cite web |url= http://socialarchive.iath.virginia.edu/ark:/99166/w6qs07bn|title= Union WAGE (Organization)|website= Social Networks and Archival Context}}

Career

=Historian=

Dashu's decades-long work has focused on women's history around the world, including Europe, Asia and Africa. Areas of focus include women shamans and priestesses, witches and the witch trials, folk religion and pagan European traditions. Her work has cited evidence in support of egalitarian matrilineages, and she authored a critique of Cynthia Eller's The Myth of Matriarchal Prehistory (2000). Her article "Knocking Down Straw Dolls: A Critique of Cynthia Eller's The Myth of Matriarchal Prehistory" was reprinted in the journal Feminist Theology in 2005.{{cite web | url =http://www.suppressedhistories.net/articles/strawdolls.html | title =Knocking Down Straw Dolls | last =Dashu | first =Max | date =2000 | website =Suppressed Histories Archives | access-date =March 12, 2018}}{{cite journal| last = Dashu| first = Max| date = January 2005| title = Knocking Down Straw Dolls: A Critique of Cynthia Eller's The Myth of Matriarchal Prehistory| journal = Feminist Theology| publisher = SAGE Publications| volume = 13| issue = 2| pages = 185–216

| doi = 10.1177/0966735005051947| s2cid = 143457817| doi-access = free}} Dashu has also published in the 2011 anthology Goddesses in World Culture, edited by Patricia Monaghan.{{cite web |url=http://www.patricia-monaghan.com/goddesses_in_world_culture_101596.htm |title=Goddesses in World Culture |last=Monaghan |first=Patricia |website=Patricia Monaghan |access-date=October 2, 2016}}

In 2016, Dashu published Witches and Pagans: Women in European Folk Religion, 700-1100. The work is the first volume of a 16-part series titled Secret History of the Witches. The series explores the cultural history and suppression of women in Europe, spanning 2,000 years. The next volume, under the working title Pythias, Melissae and Pharmakides, will focus on Greece.

Presenting materials from the Suppressed Histories Archives, Dashu has given talks at hundreds of universities, conferences and festivals around the world. In addition to the images and articles{{cite web |url= http://www.suppressedhistories.net/articles/articles.html|title= Articles by Max Dashu|last= Dashu|first= Max|website= Suppressed Histories Archive|access-date= January 16, 2017}} available on her website, Dashu also offers online courses on women's history via webcast.{{cite web |url=http://www.sourcememory.net |title=Source Memory: Reweaving the Connections |last=Dashu |first=Max |website=Source Memory |access-date=October 2, 2016}}

Dashu served as a historical consultant for Donna Deitch's 1975 documentary Woman to Woman and for the San Francisco Women's Building mural in 1994.

=Artist=

Dashu makes feminist paintings, posters{{cite web |url= http://users.lmi.net/maxdashu/riseupdance.html |title= Rise Up and Dance! poster|website= Runa: The Art of Max Dashu|access-date= January 16, 2017}} and prints. Her art has appeared in Witch Dream Comix (1975), the anthology She Is Everywhere!: An Anthology of Writing in Womanist/Feminist Spirituality (2005),{{cite book |editor-last=Williams |editor-first=Annette Lyn |title=She is Everywhere!: An Anthology of Writings in Womanist/feminist Spirituality |publisher=iUniverse |date=2005}} Sinister Wisdom,[http://sinisterwisdom.org/SW73 Sinister Wisdom 73.] Sinister Wisdom: A Multicultural Lesbian Literary & Art Journal. Daughters of the Moon Tarot, and in books by Judy Grahn, Diane Stein, and Martha Shelley, as well as other feminist, lesbian, and pagan publications.{{cite web |url= http://users.lmi.net/maxdashu/|title= Runa: the Art of Max Dashu|last= Dashu|first= Max|website= Runa: the Art of Max Dashu|access-date= January 16, 2017}} She also provided the illustrations for her book Witches and Pagans{{cite web |url= http://medusacoils.blogspot.com/2016/08/review-max-dashus-witches-and-pagans.html|title= REVIEW: Max Dashu's Witches and Pagans |last= Laura|first= Judith|date= 31 August 2016|website= Medusa Coils|access-date= October 8, 2016}} and uses her own illustrations to recreate incomplete or damaged artifacts shown in her presentations.

=Radio=

From 1980 to 1983, Dashu co-produced the weekly radio program A World Wind with Chana Wilson on KPFA in Berkeley, California.{{cite news |author= |title= On campus|url=https://www.newspapers.com/newspage/126847165/ |newspaper=The Daily Chronicle |location=De Kalb, Illinois |date= 22 March 1988|access-date= October 2, 2016}} The program featured international women's music, news and culture.{{cite magazine |author= |title= Monday, Oct. 12th|url= https://www.myheritage.com/research/record-90100-476911020/kpfa-folio-fall-marathon-1981-vol-33-no-9?trp=&trn=organic_google&trl=|magazine= KPFA Folio|location= Berkeley, California|publisher= KPFA|date= October 1981|volume= 33|issue= 9|page= 18|access-date= October 8, 2016}}{{cite magazine |author= |date= March 1982|title= Alternative Airwaves|url= http://digitalassets.lib.berkeley.edu/sfbagals/Coming_Up/1982_CU_Mar.pdf|magazine= Coming Up!|location= San Francisco|page = 8|access-date= October 8, 2016}} In 1981, Dashu produced the women's history program Flashes from Our Past.

Selected works

=Books=

Witch Dream Comix (1975)
Witches and Pagans: Women in European Folk Religion, 700-1100 (2016)

=Articles=

"Resurgence" in Foremothers of the Women's Spirituality Movement: Elders and Visionaries, edited by Miriam Robbins Dexter and Vicki Noble (2015)
"[https://www.academia.edu/9974324/Icons_of_the_Matrix_female_symbolism_in_ancient_culture_2014_update_ Icons of the Matrix: female symbolism in ancient culture]" (originally published 2005, updated in 2014)
"[https://www.academia.edu/11646356/Raising_the_Dead_Medicine_Women_Who_Revive_and_Retrieve_Souls Raising the Dead: Medicine Women Who Revive and Retrieve Souls I]" (2013)
"[https://books.google.com/books?id=DdjcvMbKuO0C&dq=%22The%20Meanings%20of%20Goddess%22%20%22she%20is%20everywhere%22&pg=PA17 The Meanings of Goddess]" in She Is Everywhere, edited by Mary Saracino and Mary Beth Moser (2011)
"[https://books.google.com/books?id=qotjet-Hb0MC&dq=%22Xi%20Wangmu%22%20dashu&pg=PA141 Xi Wangmu: The Great Goddess of China]" in Goddesses in World Culture, edited by Patricia Monaghan (2010)
"[http://www.suppressedhistories.net/goddess/fdivsa.html Female Divinities of South America]" in Goddesses in World Culture, edited by Patricia Monaghan (2010)
"[http://fth.sagepub.com/content/13/2/185.extract Knocking Down Straw Dolls: A Critique of Eller's The Myth of Matriarchal Prehistory]" (originally published 2000, republished in Feminist Theology in 2005)
"Women's Studies Beyond Academia" in off our backs (2003)
"[https://journals.equinoxpub.com/index.php/POM/article/view/14509 Another View of the Witch Hunts]" in The Pomegranate (1999)
[http://www.suppressedhistories.net/secrethistory/briggs.html Review of Witches and Neighbors: The Social and Cultural Context of European Witchcraft by Robin Briggs] (1998)
"[http://www.suppressedhistories.net/articles/respect.html Respect and Responsibility: On Cultural Appropriation]" in La Gazette (1993)

=Multimedia=

Woman Shaman: The Ancients (2-disc DVD)
Women's Power (DVD){{cite web |url= http://www.suppressedhistories.net/womenspowerdvd.html|title= Women's Power|last= Dashu|first= Max|website= Suppressed Histories Archive|access-date= January 16, 2017}}
Video courses https://suppressed-histories.teachable.com/

References

External links

[http://www.suppressedhistories.net/ Suppressed History Archives]
{{facebook|Suppressed-Histories-Archives-333661528320|Suppressed Histories Archive}}
{{YouTube|user=maxdashu|title=Max Dashu}}
[http://www.suppressedhistories.net/sha/makingofsha.html The Making of the Suppressed Histories Archives]
[https://suppressedhistories.academia.edu/MaxDashu Max Dashu on Academia.edu]

Category:1950 births

Category:American art historians

Category:American feminist writers

Category:American feminist artists

Category:Feminist historians

Category:Lesbian feminists

Category:American lesbian artists

Category:American lesbian writers

Category:American LGBTQ historians

Category:Living people

Category:People from West Chicago, Illinois

Category:People from Richmond, California