Caliban and the Witch: Women, the Body and Primitive Accumulation

Literary Nonfiction. CALIBAN AND THE WITCH is a history of the body in the transition to capitalism. Moving from the peasant revolts of the late Middle Ages to the witch-hunts and the rise of mechanical philosophy, Federici investigates the capitalist rationalization of social reproduction. She shows how the battle against the rebel body and the conflict between body and mind are essential conditions for the development of labor power and self-ownership, two central principles of modern social organization.

"It is both a passionate work of memory recovered and a hammer of humanity's agenda."—Peter Linebaugh, author of The London Hanged

• Witches, Witch-Hunting, and Women
• Re-enchanting the World: Feminism and the Politics of the Commons (KAIROS)
• Black Marxism: The Making of the Black Radical Tradition
• Revolution at Point Zero: Housework, Reproduction, and Feminist Struggle (Common Notions)
• Witches, Midwives, and Nurses: A History of Women Healers (Contemporary Classics)
• Capital: Volume 1: A Critique of Political Economy (Penguin Classics)
• Hanging without a Rope
• Fossil Capital: The Rise of Steam Power and the Roots of Global Warming
• Capitalist Realism: Is There No Alternative?
• Why Women Have Better Sex Under Socialism: And Other Arguments for Economic Independence