Twenty-four hour party people: a gendered social history of California communism

This thesis explores the gendered social world of California Communism through an examination of the radical educational system, Party literature, and the marital and reproductive practices of its members. Working class women particularly used radical education as a means of gaining entree into the inner circle of Communist leadership in California. Idealized visual representations of muscular militancy, intellectualism, and radical maternity in Party newspapers showed members appropriate gender presentation and practices. Party-sponsored heterosexual socialization afforded male and female operatives the opportunity to form intimate relationships that went beyond middle-class notions of the companionate ideal. Communist leaders created this insular, gendered social world to teach collectivist thinking in all aspects of their lives and to shape working-class men and women into the next generation of Party operatives.