Yeah and so the witch hunts to get
into that particular phase which is of
course a very dramatic phase and I think
that you mentioned I don't know how you
said it exactly but it it almost loses
when it gets talked about in in you know
history textbooks or whatever
it is it's it loses that it loses almost
its historical context and the
transition into capitalism is sort of
not mentioned it is not discussed as the
reason why this witch the witch hunts
occurred in the first place
so I guess if I could ask you this
question then is what role or what was
the let me split this into two
questions the people that were trying to
to capture these women that were being
accused of being witches what was their
purpose in doing that and in trying to
subject to to label a woman as a witch
and then of course you know execute her
publicly what was the purpose of that
and also what was the long-term
implications of of the witch hunts on on
women and and also on the development of
capitalism
SILVIA FEDERICI: Alright yeah yeah you know
it's very very very important and it's
it's not an easy you know it's it's not
there's no there's no easy answer but
you know it's like it's like when you
look at this scenery when you look at any
landscape right that the further up you
go the more you get a comprehensive view
the moment you zero in and
you all you see a street but then you
know that when you see the street in the
context of everything else you have a
much better and I'm using it for the
witch hunts because it's been very easy and
some prefer that path is very easy to
get lost into you know a particular
accusation or a particular sense of
persecution but
then when you look at it as a whole then
you know when you get it and as a whole
means in both in times you know over the
period looking at say the three two
centuries and a half and in which it was
particularly massive and and looking at
all the countries that it involved and
when you see what was the period of it
returned then you put it into world
history and what other things were
taking place at the same time you know
like at the conquest of America like the
beginning of the slave trade like the
expropriation of the peasantry you know
in the beginning of the capitalist
system right then then then it then it
begins to speak to you in a different
way right and one of the things that
I've been trying to stress over and over
is that in every place across Europe the
return begins with governments passing
laws you know for example announcing
that there is a new crime witchcraft and
introducing new regulation introducing
new acts of government this is very
important because if from above that the
people are told watch out
they are these in these people and
they're doing it it's not something that
is coming from below you know right and
you know there's also more than then
it's gone into Caliban in the Witch for
example one thing that I could have put
in but is that know if you have for
example a poor person in the 16th or 17th century going to a magistrate you
know to accuse a woman of being a witch that poor person will not be
necessarily listen to you
even who is been listened to you know
who are the accusers who's accusation
are unheard and who are those who were
not heard
you know already tells us the class
nature of the witch hunt because there
is immediately one of the second things
that just striking is that the
difference in class you know generally
between this so-called witches and the
accusers so you see there's a class
difference you see that those who are
accusing them are usually the people of
power in their community people who had
property so there's a you see that
it's a persecution there is a very
clear-cut class character secondly of
course in a gender character and and
they are different groups of women you
know there are different groups of women
who are you know basically liable
vulnerable to accusation
it's not one group only but they are
common denominator generally the poor
they come from the lower classes and
there are certain types of accusations
that are very common and often they are
piled up in a witch is accused of all of
them at the same time so you know I I
tried in Caliban and the Witch to give it
a typology and the typology of the witch
in my view is also a typology
of the changes the capitalism the trying
to introduce particularly in the sphere
of reproduction and in the sphere of
relation between women and men know and
so the witch is the beggar if your old
woman the beggar was not accepting that
people refuse to support her to give us
something you know when is and so
there's a whole attack on on communal
mutual aid and there's an attack on on
on the idea that you know people have
arrived to support themselves and that
there's a whole fear on the better off
about the poor
you know poor that have been
impoverished clearly because why should
there be women who don't have anything
who have to go around the neighborhood
asking for some wine some oil some
butter you know or living alone in
poverty there's also women who are you
know exercising and you know healing
healing practices they've basically
got midwives or they're curing people
with herbes with sometimes with you know
I don't know charms but many women had
their own garden they knew the
properties of plants
they knew the properties of roots
flowers and and they were they were the
doctor so these are women who have a
certain power often they predicted the
future so there's the figure of the
healer and she represents something in
the community and you know you have an
attack on popular powers you know you
have an attack on mutual aid you have
an attack on popular powers there's also
the woman who is supposed to be
promiscuous right and this is very very
very whole campaign on the question of
sexuality and procreation so I'm trying
to show that the witch hunt it's also a way
for the state and capital to begin to
exert a new type of control over the body
of women control procreation make sure
the procreation is productive you know
yeah the women used sexuality in a
productive way you know to to give birth
and also sexuality has to be controlled
you know sexuality seen as something
that can subvert social order
it can subvert that you know people's
relation to work it can subvert the
class differences so that the body of
women begins to be portrayed as
something that is dangerous you know
it's place of dangers they have to be
neutralized so I'm saying that out of
the witch hunts comes a whole new regime you
know a whole new disciplinary regime that
you know it's clearly what becomes the
norm for women in capitalism and and
I said that they you can see that
there is an important difference between
the image of the woman that is described
before the returned in the popular
literature and the image of the woman
that as it appears in the literature of
the seventeen eighteenth century you
know after the witch hunt they say defeating
between the witch hunt is a is a defeat
on the power the women is an attack on
the social power of women and it's also
a preparation of the woman to be to take
on particular tasks
you know she becomes the unpaid workers
she becomes you know they weren't
confined to the work of reproduction and
she's the one who is portrayed as not
having much reason being you know weaker
in a reasoning power and needing to be
controlled by men so it's really
I mean the witch hunt is really a
the condition the step towards the
creation of the new sexual division of
labor
