Taking inspiration from Irigaray’s call to “remember blood”, this paper will reflect on the challenges of developing theoretical concepts that can hold the messy materiality of human experience. This issue will be explored primarily via an archival analysis of two Women’s Studies courses which were developed at the Open University, UK in 1983 and 1992 respectively. These were distance learning courses, meaning all the teaching materials were written or recorded, offering an unusually crystallised picture of how feminist theory was being taught in these two decades. Comparing the two courses offers a historical snapshot of the ‘turn to language’ widely commented upon as occurring in Anglophone social science in the 1990s, where issues of representation became centralised above material concerns. The process of dematerialisation between the two courses will be tracked, exploring what was lost and gained between the two versions of feminist theory presented in these courses, and what arguments were used to justify changes. Irigaray’s concept of “blood” – bodies, life, death, maternal power – will be used to explore a pull away from messy materiality in feminist theory, arguing that this pull is seen more widely in the social sciences as well. Broader lessons about theory making will be explored in relation to our present historical moment, including the perils of defensive theory making.