Premilla Nadasen
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Premilla Nadasen is an American activist and historian, who specialises in the histories of women of colour in the welfare rights movement. She was President of the National Women's Studies Association from 2018 to 2020. She is the author of ''Welfare Warriors: The Welfare Rights Movement in the United States'' (2005) and ''Household Workers Unite: The Untold Story of African American Women Who Built a Movement'' (2016).


Career

Nadasen is associate professor of History at
Barnard College Barnard College is a Private college, private Women's colleges in the United States, women's Liberal arts colleges in the United States, liberal arts college affiliated with Columbia University in New York City. It was founded in 1889 by a grou ...
. She was appointed to a faculty position at Barnard College in 2013. She had previously held a Visiting Endowed Chair in Women’s Studies at Brooklyn College. In 2019 she was Fulbright Visiting Professor at the
University of Oxford The University of Oxford is a collegiate university, collegiate research university in Oxford, England. There is evidence of teaching as early as 1096, making it the oldest university in the English-speaking world and the List of oldest un ...
. From 2018 to 2020, Nadasen was President of the National Women's Studies Association. A specialist in the roles of women of color in the welfare rights movement, Nadasen has worked on the National Domestic Workers Union of America, the National Welfare Rights Organization (NWRO), as well as the role of domestic workers in the civil rights movement. She has been outspoken against attacks on gender studies by right-wing organisations around the world.


''Welfare Warriors: The Welfare Rights Movement in the United States''

Nadasen's first book, ''Welfare Warriors: The Welfare Rights Movement in the United States,'' was published in 2005, and in recognition of its importance, she received the John Hope Franklin Book Prize. At the time of its publication, it was the first book to be written on the NWRO for twenty-five years. Historian Annelise Orleck described the book as "rich and provocative" whose "greatest achievement ... is to treat the recipient-leaders of this movement WROseriously as both practical strategists and as the framers of a unique political ideology: a black, feminist vision forged in poverty and fueled by the experiences of motherhood." However, while praising the depth of archival research in the work, Andrew Fearnley noted that Nadasen's analysis appeared to preclude white and Puerto Rican women's contributions to the movement.


''Household Workers Unite: The Untold Story of African American Women Who Built a Movement''

Nadasen's 2016 work, ''Household Workers Unite: The Untold Story of African American Women Who Built a Movement,'' was reviewed by Polly Reed Myers, who described the book as "a welcome addition to the historiography on labor organizing in the postwar period", where "Nadasen reframes the organizational history of domestic labor groups in important ways by placing the voices and stories of African American domestic workers at the center of the narrative". Meanwhile Keona Ervin described the text as "highly readable" and praised the book for its illumination of the "little-known organizers including Josephine Hulett, Dorothy Bolden, Geraldine Roberts, Edith Barksdale Sloan, and Mary McClendon, and organizations such as the Club from Nowhere, the Household Technicians of America, the Domestic Workers Union, and the Household Workers Organization."


Awards

* Ann Snitow Prize - 2020 (inaugural recipient) * Sara Whaley Book Prize - 2016 *
John Hope Franklin John Hope Franklin (January 2, 1915 – March 25, 2009) was an American historian of the United States and former president of Phi Beta Kappa, the Organization of American Historians, the American Historical Association, the American Studies ...
Book Prize - 2005 * Berkshire Conference of Women Historians Article Prize * Distinguished Lecturer for the
Organization of American Historians The Organization of American Historians (OAH), formerly known as the Mississippi Valley Historical Association, is the largest professional society dedicated to the teaching and study of American history. OAH's members in the U.S. and abroad incl ...


Selected publications

*''Care: The Highest Stage of Capitalism'' ( Haymarket Books, 2023) *''Household Workers Unite: The Untold Story of African American Women Who Built a Movement'' (
Beacon Press Beacon Press is an American left-wing non-profit book publisher. Founded in 1854 by the American Unitarian Association, it is currently a department of the Unitarian Universalist Association. It is known for publishing authors such as Jame ...
, 2016) *''Rethinking the Welfare Rights Movement'' (
Routledge Routledge ( ) is a British multinational corporation, multinational publisher. It was founded in 1836 by George Routledge, and specialises in providing academic books, academic journals, journals and online resources in the fields of the humanit ...
, 2012) *"From widow to 'welfare queen': Welfare and the politics of race", ''Black Women, Gender & Families'' 1.2 (Fall 2007): 52–77. *''Welfare Warriors: The Welfare Rights Movement in the United States'' (Routledge, 2005)


References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Nadasen, Premilla Year of birth missing (living people) Living people 20th-century American historians American women historians American gender studies academics Presidents of the National Women's Studies Association