Outside Voices: A Memoir of the Berkeley Revolution
Berkeley, 1972: a hotbed of creativity where painters, filmmakers, musicians, and writers inspire a young poet.
Second-wave feminism, inspired by Gloria Steinem, Bella Abzug, and Betty Friedan is swelling into a tsunami.
Women are joining together to change power dynamics in politics, the home, and the workplace.
On election day, Joan Gelfand casts her vote for George McGovern and boards a plane from New York to
California. With one introduction to a woman musician, Joan’s journey to become a writer is born. Embraced
by a thriving women’s community of artists, filmmakers, musicians, poets, and writers, Joan is encouraged to
find her voice.
Mentored by paradigm-changing writers, Joan finds the courage to face her darkest fears through poetry and
art, mining the trauma she experienced after losing her father and questioning her Jewish identity. Reminiscent
of Paris in the twenties, Greenwich Village in the sixties, and Berlin in the eighties, Berkeley in the seventies
was the “it” city of America.
Outside Voices reports the ups and downs of finding one’s way as an artist, living with a women’s band,
forging an independent Jewish identity, founding a women’s restaurant, and becoming a published writer and
songwriter while exploring the limits of sexuality and spirituality. The story includes road trips to music festivals
in the woods, beaches in Mexico, concerts in Southern California, and a retreat in the Pacific Northwest.
A triumphant story of determination and will, Outside Voices is a backstage look at the women’s movement that
sets the stage for decades of change. This book is a firsthand look at how the power of community emboldened
innovation, social change, and self-discovery.
Joan Gelfand (Author), Sandy Rustin, TBD (Narrator)
Audiobook
