Women's equality is one of the great achievements of Western civilization. Yet most American women today do not consider themselves "feminists." Why is the term that describes one of the great chapters in the history of freedom in such disrepute?

In Freedom Feminism: Its Surprising History and Why It Matters Today, Christina Hoff Sommers seeks to recover the lost history of American feminism by introducing readers to social feminism's forgotten heroines. More importantly, she demonstrates that a modern version of social feminism-in which women are free to employ their equal status to pursue happiness in their own distinctive ways-holds the key to a feminist renaissance.