Elly Bulkin (born December 17, 1944) is an American writer. A founding editor of two nationally distributed periodicals: ''
Conditions'' and ''Bridges: A Journal for Jewish Feminists and Our Friends.'' ''Bridges'' mission statement explains that the journal sought to integrate “analysis of class and race into Jewish-feminist thought" and to be "a specifically Jewish participant in the multi-ethnic feminist movement.�
She is an important figure in the history of
lesbian writing
Lesbian literature is a subgenre of literature addressing lesbian themes. It includes poetry, plays, fiction addressing lesbian characters, and non-fiction about lesbian-interest topics.
Fiction that falls into this category may be of any genr ...
.
Personal life
Bulkin grew up in the
Bronx, New York
The Bronx () is a Boroughs of New York City, borough of New York City, coextensive with Bronx County, in the U.S. state, state of New York (state), New York. It is south of Westchester County, New York, Westchester County; north and east of the ...
, after her father and maternal grandparents emigrated from
Eastern Europe.
She worked for five years at the Women's Center at
Brooklyn College
Brooklyn College is a public university in Brooklyn, Brooklyn, New York. It is part of the City University of New York system and enrolls about 15,000 undergraduate and 2,800 graduate students on a 35-acre campus.
Being New York City's first publ ...
.
An activist since the 1970s, Elly has been part of DARE/Dykes Against Racism Everywhere (NYC), Women Free Women in Prison (NYC), Feminist Action Network (
Albany, NY),
Women in Black (
Boston), and other local political groups, in addition to being a member of the National Feminist Task Force of New Jewish Agenda. More recently, she was a steering committee member of Communities In Support of the Khalil Gibran International Academy (CISKGIA). A founding member of Jews Say No! (NYC) and Jews Against Islamophobia (JAI/NYC), she helped launch the Network Against Islamophobia (NAI), a project of
Jewish Voice for Peace.
Now retired, she provides grant writing technical assistance to grantee partners of
Astraea, the Lesbian Fund for Justice.
Career
Bulkin emerged in the literary scene during the 1970s as a proud, Jewish, lesbian. She regularly reviews women's poetry, but is most well-known for editing and co-editing many lesbian anthologies. She co-edited two anthologies with
Joan Larkin, the first of which came out in 1975, titled ''Amazon Poetry: An Anthology of Lesbian Poetry.'' The second was from 1981 with
Persephone Press
Persephone Press was a publishing company and communications network run by a lesbian-feminist collective in Watertown, Massachusetts. The company published fourteen books between 1976 and 1983, when the organization was sold to Beacon Press.
Hi ...
, titled ''Lesbian Poetry: An Anthology.''
Bulkin was a founding editor of two nationally distributed periodicals: ''Conditions, a magazine of writing by women with an emphasis on writing by lesbians'', and ''Bridges: A Journal for Jewish Feminists and Our Friends''.
She has published articles on racism and writing; heterosexism and women’s studies; lesbian poetry; and other topics. Bulkin's articles on lesbian poetry cover both historical context and analysis as well as pedagogical approaches. She is co-author, with
Minnie Bruce Pratt and
Barbara Smith, of ''Yours in Struggle: Three Feminist Perspectives on Anti-Semitism and Racism'' (1984) and, with Donna Nevel, of
Islamophobia & Israel' (2013).
Works
* (ed. with Joan Larkin) ''Amazon Poetry: An anthology of Lesbian Poetry'', 1975
* (ed.) ''Lesbian Fiction: An Anthology'', 1981
* (ed. with Joan Larkin) ''
Lesbian Poetry: An Anthology'', 1981
* (ed. with Minnie Bruce Pratt and Barbara Smith) ''Yours in Struggle: Three Feminist Perspectives on Antisemitism and Racism'', 1984
*''Enter password, recovery : re-enter password'', 1990
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Bulkin, Elly
1944 births
Living people
American writers
American lesbian writers
Jewish American writers
21st-century American Jews
21st-century American women writers