Gender and alcoholism: Pioneering alcoholic women’s contribution to alcoholics anonymous, 1937-60

This article shows that despite the fact that female alcoholics who played an active and pioneering role in Alcoholics Anonymous (AA) are seldom discussed in either research on this topic or the organization’s own literature, such women made a strong contribution to AA in its early decades (1937-60). Female members established bodies and modes of operation such as the AA Grapevine and womenonly groups, which have remained important tools for recovery in the twenty-first century. They also played an active role despite the obstacles posed by the period’s conservative gender-role division and the prejudices and stereotypes about alcoholic women that accompanied it. Indeed, their contribution to AA helped them carve a place not only for themselves but also for future generations of women, and made the organization one of the primary places in which women sought help for their alcoholism.