During the most recent presidential election, voices from Gloria Steinem to journalists on news blogs discussed how young women relate to feminism, alleging that we take it for granted.

Reigniting the conversation was the revelation that, at the Iowa caucus, young women largely supported Barack over Hillary; what most young women don’t realize is that the conversation has been going on since the 1990s. In 1994, Ms. published an essay by Lisa Hogeland titled “Fear of Feminism: Why young women get the willies.”. Hogeland says that because feminism asks women to challenge the institution and to politicize their own lives, it can be a difficult mantle to take up. Giving us slightly less credit, Steinem has said that young women’s “biggest problem is that they don’t know yet that there’s a problem.”

Someone who might know a lot better than Gloria Steinem or Washington bloggers is Nona Willis Aronowitz, 24-year-old writer and feminist. Nona has spent the last two years working on a project called GIRLdrive, a way to get to know her generation and the ways we “grapple with the concepts of freedom, equality, joy, ambition, sex, and love.”

She and her partner-in-activism, Emma Bernstein, road-tripped all over the country, interviewing young women about their thoughts on feminism and how they feel it affects their lives. Both Nona and Emma grew up in New York City, with mothers who were very involved in second-wave feminism.

“It was both the most inspiring and anxious time of my life. It’s a rush to not have a real home base, to explore your own country, to pursue something that’s important to you,” said Aronowitz. “But at the same time, you start to envy those nine-to-fivers with health insurance.”

They talked to women from Seattle to New Orleans to New York City, all the while publishing snippets from their travels on the project’s blog.

Deliza, a 16 year-old musician in Chicago, said, “You know when your parents tell you, ‘You can do anything you want’? I believe I can do whatever I want, and no one’s going to stop me…I am my own person…I would see myself as a feminist.”

Liza from Austin expressed a similar sentiment: “The idea of feminism is almost part of my invisible knapsack;” she said, referencing a famous essay on race and privilege by Peggy McIntosh, “I have always taken it for granted that all genders should be equal.”

When asked, Aronowitz concluded that many young women do take feminism for granted. She said, “In a way that’s a relief. At least feminism normalized certain social and political standards! But many women can easily identify women’s issues that are important to them.”

She then noted that women often want to avoid the feminism label because it carries some negative associations. “The problem isn’t that women don’t see the obstacles in their own lives; it’s more that they don’t want to label this ‘feminism.’ It’s really powerful to connect your personal situation to a movement, but women often take issue with the off-putting stereotypes feminism drags around.”

The book comes out next fall. It will contain quotes from young women around the country, interviews with influential feminist figures, photos from the trip, essays and diary entries. Nona is currently editing the manuscript. Emma Bernstein, co-author and the GIRLdrive photographer, tragically died this past December. She was by all accounts an inspiring, passionate, and intelligent woman, and activist, and she is sorely missed.