A Space for Women in Our Construction of Woman

Charlene Carruthers, national director of BYP100 (shout out!), gave a Chapel Talk this past Thursday titled, "Building a Black Freedom Movement: How Black Queer Feminism Builds Power for Us All." From that talk, there was one thing, among others, that really stood out to me, that being: black queer feminism means that we all should be able to live in our full dignity as human beings. And having read Zami: A New Spelling of My Name by Audre Lorde, I could not but think of Audre Lorde, another black, queer, feminist.


I am reminded sort of the history of Black feminism from Harriet Tubman to Sojouner Truth's "Ain't I a Woman" speech to Lorde's "A Woman Speaks" to Angela Davis's lecture at the University of Chicago in May 2013 to Charlene Carruthers's talk at Wabash.


Black feminism has always walked the intersection between racial oppression and gender oppression (and capitalist oppression too!). Even the conventional way we approach conversations about womanhood or feminism is sort of problematic. When we look at studying works outside the cannon in English or Philosophy, we often approach "women's perspectives" and "Black perspective." The authors in the former camp are typically white. The authors in the latter are typically male. Where are the Black women? They are in an upper level English course.