The Mental Load: A Feminist Comic

In her first book of comic strips, Emma reflects on social and feminist issues by means of simple line drawings, dissecting the mental load (i.e., all that invisible and unpaid organizing, list-making, and planning women do to manage their lives and the lives of their family members). Most women carry some form of mental load--about their work, household responsibilities, financial obligations, and personal life, but what makes up that burden and how it's distributed within households and understood in offices is not always equal or fair. In her strips, Emma deals with themes ranging from maternity leave (it is not a vacation!), domestic violence, the clitoris, the violence of the medical world on women during childbirth, and other feminist issues, and she does so in a straightforward way that is both hilarious and deadly serious. Her comics also address the everyday outrages and absurdities of immigrant rights, income equality, and police violence.