Barbara Jones was an iconoclastic anthropologist and feminist who, by her early 60s, had become something of a black-leather Margaret Mead, incorporating Harley-Davidsons deeply into biker culture and writing her 2001 book “Motorcycles''. Published “Desire: Harleys, Women, and Americans.'' She died on March 6 in Santa Cruz, California. She passed away at the age of 89.
The cause of death at the nursing home was cardiopulmonary failure, said son Howard Schwartz.
Brave and outspoken, Brooklyn-born Ms. Jones began her career as a lecturer at the New School for Social Research in Greenwich Village, focusing on women's issues and teaching on topics such as the anthropological aspects of menopause. Wrote a paper.
Since the 1960s, she has also been a feminist activist, helping women arrange illegal abortions in the pre-Roe v. Wade era. In 1970, she participated in a one-day occupation of the editorial offices of Ladies' Home Journal in New York, demanding the opportunity to publish a “liberated” version of the magazine.
“She was a bit of a wild woman, a real unconventional woman,” Phyllis Chesler, author of “Women and Madness” (1972) and a longtime friend of Ms. Jones, said in a telephone interview. “Yes, she was an academic and a nice Jewish girl from Brooklyn. But she was also a bit of a street bastard.”
In his 50s, when Joans, then a professor of anthropology at Merritt College in Oakland, Calif., bought his first motorcycle and unwittingly opened up a new field of research for himself, the name became more literal. Became.
“For Harley riders, there are two kinds of bikes,” she writes in the foreword to Bike Lust. “We have some Harleys and a lot of other types of motorcycles.”
Jones rode his muscular Harley-Davidson lowrider, nicknamed the Beast, on weekend rides with the Foghogs, a San Francisco-based motorcycle club, studying a subculture with many divisions and subgroups. At bike shops, biker bars, Harley festivals, etc.
By the 1980s and '90s, Harley culture, long associated with roughnecks like the Hell's Angels, was entering the mainstream, and a new wave of middle-class professionals were turning to chrome-clad “pigs” as their ticket to adventure. ” was adopted.
In a 2003 interview with CNN, she said that at the time, women enthusiasts were a significant presence, accounting for 10 to 12 percent of the motorcycle population. “Women who were once excluded from any position other than Betty in the backseat are now riding alone on the roads or joining all-female riding clubs,” she wrote.
In her book, Joans describes a group of male and female bikers she met during her research. Women had their own subcategories, such as “female bikers” and “female bikers.”
Jones told CNN that the female biker had a “great ride, but no tingling.” “She ends up carrying her hair dryer, makeup and condoms in her saddlebag. But she stays away from her paraphernalia.”
She says the female biker is “the complete opposite of me.” “Female bikers will look down on men's help and say, 'Wait a minute.' It's my bike. I can tear it down and rebuild it.”
While male riders tended to travel in packs, female riders often embarked on adventures and solo rides, sometimes covering multiple states. “Between birth and death, wedding and ceremony, there is a long journey,” she wrote.
“This journey, this adventure is a testing ground for women bikers,” she added. “We're going off on our own because we have to.”
Barbara Joan Levinson was born in Brooklyn on February 28, 1935, the only child of Rubin Levinson, who owned a clothing store in lower Manhattan, and Eleanor (Davidson) Levinson, a middle school teacher.
After graduating from Midwood High School in 1952, he attended Brooklyn College, where he earned a bachelor's degree in philosophy in 1956, a master's degree in sociology and anthropology from New York University in 1965, and an anthropology degree from City College. I received a doctorate in science. in New York in 1974.
By 1956 she was married to her first husband Irwin Schwartz, but they divorced in 1970. She then took the surname Jones.
In 1974, she, her boyfriend Kenneth Harmon, and their two sons moved to Santa Cruz. The next year, Jones accepted a teaching position at San Jose State University, and the two married. It was Mr. Harmon, a computer programmer and longtime motorcycle enthusiast, who inspired her to ride Foghogs.
In addition to her son, Howard, she is survived by another son, David Schwartz, four grandchildren and one great-grandchild. Mr. Harmon passed away in 2021.
Although he became passionate about Harleys, Jones didn't start out interested in Harleys. Her first motorcycle was a lightweight Honda Rebel 250 that she purchased when she was 56 years old.
“Then when she turned 60, she switched to a Harley lowrider,” Chesler said of Jones' hulking beast. “I said, 'Have you lost your mind? “That's 650 pounds. How are you going to pick it up if it falls?'' And she said, “You just do that.'' ”