UNIVERSITY OF ALBERTA WGS 498/GSJ 598

Module 3 – Reflection

We began this Module by revisiting the ways we engage with existing literatures (scholarly and activist) and by understanding these as discursive spaces and communities on which we draw in our own work (through citing, quoting, paraphrasing, and summarizing existing work) and to which we contribute. One way to to think of scholarly, activist, and creative work is as participating actively in an ongoing conversation within specific discursive communities. Ideally, participating in these conversations should be respectful though not uncritical. Respectful participation at times might mean just listening and learning. Respectful participation also involves recognizing the intellectual, activist, and creative labour involved in creating knowledge and action.

In the context of this module, respectful and ethical engagement and participation involves acknowledging through citations the longer intellectual and activist history that created the context in with Crenshaw in 1989 first coined the term intersectionality. Crenshaw coined the term intersectionality in a scholarly legal studies article building on critical race theory within legal studies. However, efforts to theorize the ways multiple forms of oppression and inequality work together, and to understand race and gender as mutually constitutive, can be traced back at least a century to political struggles for the abolition of slavery. In the mid-20th century, terms like the “interlocking system of oppression” (C.R.C. 1977), “multiple jeopardy” (King 1988), double discrimination as well as deeper engagements with the social differences between women, constitute the context for the coining of intersectionality. 

We touched briefly and critically on the challenges of “origin stories” of intersectionality and how they might be problematically tied to questions of “ownership”. Who “owns” intersectionality and which intersections matter most, certainly has been hotly debated over the last few decades. Linked to the discussion about ownership are questions concerning who can utilize intersectionality, concerns over the “whitewashing” of intersectionality, and in the context of mainstreaming intersectionality, the fear of erasing the intellectual labor and political struggles of Black women and women of color. The contemporary struggles over intersectionality by way of laying claims a very specific past, shows that origin stories and “histories” are never innocent or just about the past. Indeed origin stories often serve to claim and justify specific presents and to ensure particular futures.

Instead of asking “who owns intersectionality” Hancock encourages us to think about ethical practices of stewardship. One aspect of stewardship for intersectionality concerns ethical citation practices and reflections on how and who we cite or don’t cite, and with what kind of consequences. Certainly, crediting Crenshaw alone for the ‘invention’ of intersectionality reproduces the myth of the single autonomous genius theorist and thereby seriously misrepresents how scholarly, creative, and activist work works – in community and in dialogue with others.

We highlighted a select number from a large canon of texts credited with contributing foundationally to the coining of intersectionality. Among them, the Combahee River Collective Statement (1977) is regarded pivotal. The C.R.C. coined the term “identity politics”:

We believe that the most profound and potentially most radical politics come directly out of our own identity, as opposed to working to end somebody else’s oppression. In the case of Black women this is a particularly repugnant, dangerous, threatening, and therefore revolutionary concept because it is obvious from looking at all the political movements that have preceded us that anyone is more worthy of liberation than ourselves. We reject pedestals, queenhood, and walking ten paces behind. To be recognized as human, levelly human, is enough. (Combahee River Collective 1977)

Based on their own experiences within feminism and black power movement, the collective realized “that multiple identities can be constantly and simultaneously present within one person’s body. The experiences of Black lesbians could not be reduced to gender, race, class, or sexuality [alone]” (Jones 2021, n.p.).

However, the C.R.C. where not just concerned solely with their own liberation but believed strongly in coalition politics with other political struggles. Identity politics would subsequently become one of the central tenets of progressive politics — as well as becoming one of the most misunderstood idea. Often misrepresented as reverse discrimination, exclusionary, myopic or an “oppression olympics.” Or, as Barbara Smith, one one of the C.R.C. members, recently put it:

Identity politics is a two-word phrase that has been completely misunderstood and weaponized against progressive, radical, and revolutionary projects. The right wing snatched up identity politics in the same way that they snatched up critical race theory. The right wing uses identity politics to say we don’t need any change and that these people want special rights and privileges that they don’t deserve. One of the myths about identity politics is that people with a certain set of identities only want to associate with people who have the same set of identities. But we write about our commitment to coalition-building in the statement. (Smith in Jones 2021, n.p.)

The C.R.C. understood identity politics as their right to define their own political agenda, because neither (white) feminists nor Black men would fight for them. However, identity politics for them, was always grounded solidarity with other subordinated groups and a joint struggle against not only their own oppression but larger struggles against  sexism, heterosexism, racism, class oppression, exploitation, and imperialism together (Jones 2021).  

Problematic is also that intersectionality is frequently reduced to identity politics in a narrow sense, namely that intersectionality is about representing diverse and complex identities in need of inclusion and representation. The work we have read so far challenges such simplified view of intersectionality, especially through attention to not only representational but also structural and political intersectionality. 

References:

Ahmed, Sara. 2013. “Making Feminist Points.” feministkilljoys, September 11, 2013. https://feministkilljoys.com/2013/09/11/making-feminist-points/.

“Ain’t I A Woman Collective.” n.d. Facebook. https://www.facebook.com/aintiawomancollective/. 

American Antiquarian Society. 2023. ““Sojourner Truth Was A New Yorker, and She Didn’t Say That” with Nell Irvin Painter.” YouTube. Video, 01:12:08. AmericanAntiquarian. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_O4neDiYQ38. 

Beal, Frances. 1969. “Double Jeopardy: To Be Black and Female — CWLU HERSTORY.” Chicago Women’s Liberation Union. https://www.cwluherstory.org/classic-feminist-writings-articles/double-jeopardy-to-be-black-and-female.

Bilge, Sirma. 2014. “Intersectionality Undone.” Du Bois Review: Social Science Research on Race 10, no. 2 (January): 405-424. 10.1017/S1742058X13000283.

Brah, Avtar, and Ann Phoenix. 2004. “Ain’t I A Woman? Revisiting Intersectionality.” Journal of International Women’s Studies 5 (3): 75-86.

Bulkin, Elly, Minnie B. Pratt, and Barbara Smith. 1988. Yours in Struggle: Three Feminist Perspectives on Anti-semitism and Racism. N.p.: Firebrand Books.

CBC News. 2013. “Busted: 5 infamous plagiarism cases.” CBC, January 10, 2013. https://www.cbc.ca/news/world/busted-5-infamous-plagiarism-cases-1.1398768. 

Cox, Laverne. 2015. “Laverne Cox: “Ain’t I a Woman”.” YouTube. Video, 02:17. Xtra Magazine. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PQkXnDkLW5Q. 

Crenshaw, Kimberle. 1989. “Demarginalizing the Intersection of Race and Sex: A Black Feminist Critique of Antidiscrimination Doctrine, Feminist Theory and Antiracist Politics.” University of Chicago Legal Forum 1989 (1): 139-167.

Crenshaw, Kimberle. 1991. “Mapping the Margins: Intersectionality, Identity Politics, and Violence against Women of Color.” Stanford Law Review 43 (6): 1241-1299. https://doi.org/10.2307/1229039.

Datta, Bishakha. 2009. Ain’t I a Woman | A Global Dialogue between the Sex Workers’ Rights movement and the Stop Violence Against Women movement. Bangkok: CREA.

Drisker, Tiarra. 2022. “Frances Beal: A Revolutionary Woman – The College of Arts & Sciences at Texas A&M University.” College of Liberal Arts, March 1, 2022. https://liberalarts.tamu.edu/blog/2022/03/01/frances-beal-a-revolutionary-woman/. 

Hancock, Ange-Marie. 2016. Intersectionality: An Intellectual History. New York: Oxford University Press. https://doi.org/10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199370368.001.0001.

hooks, bell. 2015. Ain’t I a Woman: Black Women and Feminism. 2nd ed. New York: Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9781315743264.

Hull, Gloria T., Patricia Bell-Scott, and Barbara Smith, eds. 1982. All the Women are White, All the Blacks are Men, But Some of Us are Brave: Black Women’s Studies. N.p.: The Feminist Press at CUNY.

Jones, Marian. 2021. ““If Black Women Were Free”: An Oral History of the Combahee River Collective.” The Nation, October 29, 2021. https://www.thenation.com/article/society/combahee-river-collective-oral-history/.

King, Deborah. 1988. “Multiple Jeopardy, Multiple Consciousness: The Context of a Black Feminist Ideology.” Signs 14 (1): 42-72. 10.1086/494491.

Liu, Jessica. 2019. “How to Paraphrase in 5 Easy Steps | Scribbr.” YouTube. Video, 03:55. Scribbr. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oiM0x0ApVL8. 

Liu, Jessica. 2019. “How to Quote in Under 5 Minutes | Scribbr.” YouTube. Video, 4:52. Scribbr. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DhMl3eIcGbI. 

Lorde, Audre. 1984. “Age, Race, Class, and Sex: Women Redefining Difference.” In Sister Outsider: Essays and Speeches, 114-123. Freedom, CA: Crossing Press.

Mauer, Barry, and John Venecek. 2022. “Positing a Thesis Statement and Composing a Title / Defining Key Terms.” In Strategies for Conducting Literary Research. N.p.: Pressbooks.

May 2012

May, Vivian M. 2015. Pursuing Intersectionality, Unsettling Dominant Imaginaries. N.p.: Routledge.

Miller, Cate. 2017. “Rhetorical Precis Directions.” YouTube. Video, 04:44. Cate Miller. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q7AiGt03eXk. 

Moraga, Cherríe, and Gloria Anzaldúa, eds. 2015. This Bridge Called My Back: Writings by Radical Women of Color. N.p.: SUNY Press.

Painter, Nell I. 1996. Sojourner Truth: A Life A Symbol. N.Y.: WW Norton.

Podell, Leslie. n.d. “Compare the Speeches — The Sojourner Truth Project.” The Sojourner Truth Project. https://www.thesojournertruthproject.com/compare-the-speeches/.

Stanford University. n.d. “Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) | The Martin Luther King, Jr. Research and Education Institute.” The Martin Luther King, Jr. Research and Education Institute. Accessed May 28, 2024. https://kinginstitute.stanford.edu/student-nonviolent-coordinating-committee-sncc. 

“Stories – The Combahee Ferry Raid.” n.d. National Museum of African American History and Culture. Accessed May 28, 2024. https://nmaahc.si.edu/explore/stories/combahee-ferry-raid.

Crenshaw, Kimberle. 1991. “Mapping the Margins: Intersectionality, Identity Politics, and Violence against Women of Color.” Stanford Law Review 43 (6): 1241-1299. https://doi.org/10.2307/1229039.

The Combahee River Collective. 1977. “The Combahee River Collective Statement.” Blackpast. https://www.blackpast.org/african-american-history/combahee-river-collective-statement-1977/.

Tracey, Liz. 2022. “The Combahee River Collective Statement: Annotated.” JSTORDaily, March 24, 2022. https://daily.jstor.org/annotations-the-combahee-river-collective-statement/. 

Washington, Kerry. 2018. “Sojourner Truth’s “Ain’t I a Woman” Performed by Kerry Washington.” YouTube. Video, 03:00. ZinnEdProject. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ry_i8w2rdQY&t=4s. 

Women’s Rights National Historical Park. 2017. “Sojourner Truth: Ain’t I A Woman?” National Park Service. https://www.nps.gov/articles/sojourner-truth.htm.