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Women’s Studies Quarterly (WSQ) is a biannual peer-reviewed academic journal of women’s studies published each June and December and currently publishes creative nonfiction, poetry, visual art, and scholarly articles. The journal is published by The Feminist Press, which was founded by Florence Howe in 1970. Before changing its name to Women’s Studies Quarterly in 1981, the publication was titled Women’s Studies Newsletter. The name change indicated a shift in the publication’s purpose and content.

The first newsletter was published in 1972 and was published for each season. Sometimes there were less than four publications per year because editions condensed two seasons into one publication. As a newsletter, the topics were focused on women’s studies curriculum in all grade levels, children’s books, and receiving funding for women’s studies programs and faculty. The newsletter created the core network that transformed into the National Women’s Studies Association (NWSA) in 1977.

After attending a meeting of Baltimore Women’s Liberation to inquire about creating a feminist press, Howe returned to her home to find her mailbox full of letters addressed to the Feminist Press. The Baltimore Women’s Liberation Newsletter actually announced the start of the Feminist Press, contributing the idea to Florence Howe, without informing her of this decision first. From here, the organizing of the press began. In 1971, the press moved from Groucher College to Old Westbury. Two years later, the Women’s Studies Newsletter began.

The first issue of Women’s Studies Newsletter released in Fall 1972 begins the Front Matter with a section describing The Clearinghouse on Women’s Studies. The Clearinghouse on Women’s Studies began in 1969 in Florence Howe’s office at Goucher College. One essential intervention in this movement was the work of The Clearhinghouse. The academic field of Women’s Studies in the United States was in its early stages, and the Clearhousing on Women’s Studies was a way to connect the growing community of women’s studies scholars. In 1970, Howe asked the MLA’s executive council to enable the Clearinghouse on Women’s Studies to issue the first “Guide to Women’s Studies Courses and Programs.” Three “Guides,” or lists of women’s studies courses, were issued by the Clearinghouse between October 1971 and the summer of 1973. The Women’s Studies Newsletter was a project of Clearinghouse, which was “an education project of the Feminist Press.”

The Front Matter of the 1972 newsletter dates its origins to an east coast women’s studies conference in Pittsburgh where a group decided to organize a women’s studies newsletter. The newsletter was aimed to “be a forum throughout the country for the women’s studies movement.” Individuals reading and engaging with the newsletter were interested in how to get funding for women’s studies programs and how to create jobs for people to teach these types of classes. Topics included news updates from Clearinghouse and other ongoing initiatives, academic reviews and articles, case studies from certain schools or universities, reading lists, and other topics pertinent to the expanding discipline of women’s studies throughout the late 1970s and early 1980s.

As the third issue went to press, the newsletter has upwards of 500 subscribers. Subscription costs ranged between one and two dollars per issue. However, once the newsletter entered its fifth year of publication (1976), the subscription list had stagnated at just under 2,000, which did not equate to the compiled list of women’s studies teachers in higher education that had grown to over 5,500. This disparity caused the newsletter to increase subscription costs moving forward. In the Fall 1976 issue, there was a proposal for a founding convention of NWSA placed next to the edition’s editorial. NWSA became a co-publisher of the Women’s Studies Newsletter throughout 1982, at which point it returned to solely being produced by the Feminist Press.

Currently, WSQ’s bi-annual publications are based on themes. This differs from the newsletter structure that was concerned with establishing women’s studies as a discipline, and the current issues accept a wider range of submission types. Each article, poem, visual art, and creative nonfiction chosen for an edition are submitted with the preliminary theme already established. Other recent themes for WSQ issues have included precarious work (Fall/Winter 2017), mother (Fall Winter 2009), market (Fall/Winter 2010), and looking across the lens (Spring/Summer 2002). The Feminist Press, which is now housed at the CUNY Graduate Center in Midtown Manhattan, is still the sole publisher for each issue of WSQ issue.

-- The journal is published by The Feminist Press, which was founded by Florence Howe in 1970. Link to Florence Howe's wiki page. The newsletter created the core network that transformed into the National Women’s Studies Association (NWSA) in 1977. Link to National Women's Studies Association wiki page. Link to Baltimore Women’s Liberation wiki page. Currently, WSQ’s bi-annual publications are based on themes. Explain what themes means. The Feminist Press, which is now housed at the CUNY Graduate Center in Midtown Manhattan,.....link to CUNY Graduate Center wiki page.

Ibittaye (talk) 16:14, 4 December 2018 (UTC)