Includes bibliographical references and index.

In 1974, women in a feminist consciousness-raising group in Eugene, Oregon, formed a mock organization called the Ladies Sewing Circle and Terrorist Society. Emblazoning its logo onto t-shirts, the group wryly envisioned female collective textile making as a practice that could upend conventions, threaten state structures and wreak political havoc. Elaborating on this example as a prehistory to the more recent phenomenon of 'craftivism' - the politics and social practices associated with handmaking - Fray explores textiles and their role at the forefront of debates about process, materiality gender and race in times of economic upheaval.