Description
WAVPM Records document the affairs of this prominent feminist organization of the late 1970s and early 1980s. The collection
is divided into five series: Administrative, Communications, Events/programs, Research, and Audio-visual. Dated materials
are placed chronologically within each folder. Folders without dates either contain material spanning the life of the organization
or undated materials.
Background
Women Against Violence in Pornography and the Media (WAVPM) was founded in 1977 following the 1976 Conference on Violence
Against Women, sponsored by the San Francisco Women's Centers. Initially based in the Berkeley Women's Center, WAVPM moved
to the Women's Building in San Francisco after its purchase in 1979. Perceiving a link between the debasement of women in
mass media representations and reported increases in the number and severity of violent acts against women, members aimed
to raise public awareness of these conditions. WAVPM, along with Women Against Pornography (WAP) in New York City and Women
Against Violence Against Women (WAVAW) in Los Angeles, led women's groups of the late-1970s/early-1980s in crusades against
pornography and promoted public discussion of the relationship between media depictions and sexist violence, bringing pornography
to the top of the feminist agenda and exacerbating a division among feminists (and among leftists in general) between proponents
of free speech and opponents of degrading images.
Restrictions
Copyright to unpublished manuscript materials has been transferred to the Gay and Lesbian
Historical Society of Northern California.
Availability
Collection is open for research.