1. Federici claims ‘Marx…analysed primitive accumulation almost exclusively from the viewpoint of the waged industrial proletariat’ (63). How does she argue gender and procreation as a necessary aspect of primitive accumulation? Do you think she is successful in doing so?

2. Federici argues that the witch-hunts were the ‘"original sin" in the process of social degradation that women suffered with the advent of capitalism’; yet that ‘Marxist historians…have consigned the witch-hunt to oblivion’ (164). Does Federici successfully argue that the witch-hunts are a pivotal moment in capitalist history?

3. Following on from this claim, Federici opens the chapter ‘The Great Witch-Hunt in Europe’ by asking the following questions: ‘What fears instigated such concerted policy of genocide? Why was so much violence unleashed? And why were its primary targets women?’ (169) Do you believe she is able to answer these questions? Considering other reasons could be given without capitalism at their roots, do you think Federici’s explanation can truly explain the full extent of the witch-hunts?

4. Considering ‘the association between contraception, abortion and witchcraft’ (180) and that a ‘recurrent charge in the witch trials was that witches engaged in degenerate sexual practices’ (190), women’s sexual autonomy was clearly used against them. Do you think controlling women’s sexuality is a practice still implemented in the gender power dynamic? Can you think of further examples of Federici’s arguments being prominent still today? (She does, for example, mention the charge of terrorism nowadays as the same of that of witchcraft in terms of keeping people in their place (170))

(As a side question, Maria Mies also discussed the witch-hunts in the text we read last week. Do you think the two texts work alongside each other?)