To Black Feminists of Today (Christine Decker)
Dear Black Feminists of today,
While I am proud of the progress black women have made in fighting for equal treatment and respect, we still have far to go. I am dismayed to see that the term women remains exclusive and is still a product of social construction. Unfortunately, in our society all women are not perceived and treated as equals. In fact, the word women itself is associated with/strictly linked to white women. This issue traces back to our nation’s history of slavery, which established black women as being inferior to their white counterparts. This not only laid foundation for the many sexual assaults in the decades to follow, but also created the core problem of white women becoming the societal ideal/standard. I experienced and fought against this inherent link of woman-ness to white women when I demanded it was my right as a woman to sit in the ladies car on the train. Despite the fact that we are both women biologically, my race separated me from being viewed as a lady. While we may now be legally equal to white women, this is far from what persists in reality. We often still find ourselves conforming to white women’s standards of beauty and socially accepted norms in effort to gain respectability. Racial uplift has persisted for decades but it is time we stop. We cannot accept conformity as the answer. Why should we have to conform ourselves to fit the mold of white women in order to be respected? By conforming to the social norms of white women, we are only reinforcing the perception of a woman as being a white woman.
Unfortunately, I do not believe that it will ever be possible to have a definition/perception of women completely isolated from race. The idea of intersectionality captures how unique backgrounds resultant from one’s social class, ethnicity, gender, sexuality and more results in individualized experienced that cannot be grouped under the single umbrella of “women” or “black”. Homogenizing women into one category, as it the current practice of the US feminist movement, does not account for the different burdens and privileges tied to the many aspects of one’s identity. Aspects of our identity do not exist merely in isolation, they are “mutually constitutive” (Brubaker). The picture from the 2017 Women’s March depicts this powerfully, with the poster that reads “Don’t Forget: White Women Voted for Trump”. White women have far less to lose than we do and grouping ourselves into the single category of women hides this important truth. As Elsa Barkley Brown urged in “What has Happened Here”, we need to allow for the understanding of the experiences of a variety of women. The unfortunate reality is we have a bigger battle to fight than white women, and this battle will further vary within the black community as a result of one’s personal situation (as captured by idea of intersectionality). This is important to note. Homogenizing all blacks into one entity obscures the true heterogeneity that exists within the black community and we must remember to bear this in mind.
I urge you to break up the homogenous movement and fight against the societal norms of what a woman should be. In order to gain true equality and respect for all women, we cannot do so as “women” as a whole. Ms. Barkley Brown says it best: “we have still to recognize that being a woman is, in fact, not extractable from the context in which one is a woman”. We must consider the reality of intersectionality and create a new platform and movement that will allow women of all backgrounds to adequately petition for and achieve the respect we deserve.
Sincerely,
Catherine Brown
While I am proud of the progress black women have made in fighting for equal treatment and respect, we still have far to go. I am dismayed to see that the term women remains exclusive and is still a product of social construction. Unfortunately, in our society all women are not perceived and treated as equals. In fact, the word women itself is associated with/strictly linked to white women. This issue traces back to our nation’s history of slavery, which established black women as being inferior to their white counterparts. This not only laid foundation for the many sexual assaults in the decades to follow, but also created the core problem of white women becoming the societal ideal/standard. I experienced and fought against this inherent link of woman-ness to white women when I demanded it was my right as a woman to sit in the ladies car on the train. Despite the fact that we are both women biologically, my race separated me from being viewed as a lady. While we may now be legally equal to white women, this is far from what persists in reality. We often still find ourselves conforming to white women’s standards of beauty and socially accepted norms in effort to gain respectability. Racial uplift has persisted for decades but it is time we stop. We cannot accept conformity as the answer. Why should we have to conform ourselves to fit the mold of white women in order to be respected? By conforming to the social norms of white women, we are only reinforcing the perception of a woman as being a white woman.
Unfortunately, I do not believe that it will ever be possible to have a definition/perception of women completely isolated from race. The idea of intersectionality captures how unique backgrounds resultant from one’s social class, ethnicity, gender, sexuality and more results in individualized experienced that cannot be grouped under the single umbrella of “women” or “black”. Homogenizing women into one category, as it the current practice of the US feminist movement, does not account for the different burdens and privileges tied to the many aspects of one’s identity. Aspects of our identity do not exist merely in isolation, they are “mutually constitutive” (Brubaker). The picture from the 2017 Women’s March depicts this powerfully, with the poster that reads “Don’t Forget: White Women Voted for Trump”. White women have far less to lose than we do and grouping ourselves into the single category of women hides this important truth. As Elsa Barkley Brown urged in “What has Happened Here”, we need to allow for the understanding of the experiences of a variety of women. The unfortunate reality is we have a bigger battle to fight than white women, and this battle will further vary within the black community as a result of one’s personal situation (as captured by idea of intersectionality). This is important to note. Homogenizing all blacks into one entity obscures the true heterogeneity that exists within the black community and we must remember to bear this in mind.
I urge you to break up the homogenous movement and fight against the societal norms of what a woman should be. In order to gain true equality and respect for all women, we cannot do so as “women” as a whole. Ms. Barkley Brown says it best: “we have still to recognize that being a woman is, in fact, not extractable from the context in which one is a woman”. We must consider the reality of intersectionality and create a new platform and movement that will allow women of all backgrounds to adequately petition for and achieve the respect we deserve.
Sincerely,
Catherine Brown
Excellent! Such a thoughtful, thorough, and detailed post. Looking forward to discussing this in class!
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