My Super Post: Black Feminist Legacies

Because yesterday's entry on Claudia Jones was an incomplete response to Professor Black Woman's meme:

I am asking that each of my readers point to one or more books, articles, poems, and/or key female figures of color who have discussed feminism from 1492 to the present. Please choose: one historical figure, one from 1960-70, and one from the present from the U.S. Please also choose at least one from outside of Euro-America. Please include a trackback to this post so we can all see your answers or post a comment with your answers here

...And because there still exists today bloggers who don't have a clue of the legacy of women of color's feminism and their regular resistance to sexism in their communities, I will now seriously take on the meme, which is a mere continuation of my Black Herstory series, because, as a professor who takes on multiple roles - teacher, scholar, writer - I can no longer abide by ill-informed and miseducated comments in the blogosphere. In a nutshell:

THE IGNORANCE MUST STOP!

So, here I will do my part to combat such ignorance, to shed some light so that the ignorant masses might gain some sound knowledge.

Are you ready for some schooling?

Historical Figures:

Anna Julia Cooper (1858-1964): black feminist intellectual who was the first African American woman to earn her PhD at the Sorbonne in Paris. Her dissertation explored the political impetus for the Haitian Revolution, which precedes the important intellectual work of CLR James' The Black Jacobins (see a recent biography that came out last year: Vivian May's Anna Julia Cooper: Visionary Black Feminist) . She was also equal to (and definitely influenced) more famous intellectuals such as W.E.B. DuBois. Her 1892 manifesto, A Voice from the South, should be included in every feminist canon offered in Women's Studies (lo and behold, it is not included, hence leading ill-informed and miseducated bloggers of today to make ignorant statements that women of color don't criticize sexism in their own communities!). An important quote from A Voice from the South: "When and where I enter, the Negro race enters with me."

Lorraine Hansberry (1930-1965): Hansberry is on my mind because ABC aired Monday night the latest version of her most popular play from 1959, A Raisin in the Sun (starring a terribly miscast Sean Combs, who can't hold a candle to either Sidney Poitier or Danny Glover, Phyllisia Rashad, Audra McDonald, and Sanaa Lathan). While ABC and others who often resurrect this play or televised versions of it often do so because they wish to celebrate "Black History" month or African American heritage, they always, always miss the important feminist theorizing that underpins this play: her treatment of gendered labor and how this impacts the black family, especially in light of Mama Lena Younger's widowhood; the domestic work that she and her daughter-in-law Ruth Younger are resigned to do; the way that patriarchy and masculinity hoodwinks Walter Lee Younger into aspiring for white supremacist capitalistic pursuits and the greed and betrayal that crushes his dreams; the way that Beneatha Younger, college-educated Black Nationalist, assesses her opportunities (her questioning whether or not marriage should be her destiny, her choosing to wear her hair natural well before the Afro came into fashion - and interestingly, ABC does not include this scene, Go figure!, and her exploration of African colonial independence and how this is also tied to Civil Rights in the U.S.); the subject of abortion (ABORTION! In 1959!!) and the race, class, gender issues that shape this issue (when will mainstream feminists get a clue?). Hansberry, born to a middle-class family, was a black lesbian feminist who wrote essays in response to Simone DeBeauvoir's The Second Sex and plays dealing with issues of social justice (not all focusing on black people). She married a Jewish songwriter, Robert Nemiroff, whom she met while picketing New York University's discrimination practices. Hansberry died of cancer in her thirties, and her ex-husband, Nemiroff published a collection of her writings titled To Be Young, Gifted, and Black in 1969.

1960-1970 era

Florynce (Flo) Kennedy (1916-2000): The existence of Flo Kennedy should be enough to shut down all conversations that question whether or not black feminism is only a response to white women's racism. Where would the women's liberation movement be had it not included women like Florynce Kennedy (AKA "Flo Kennedy")? Kennedy was a civil rights lawyer, activist, and ardent feminist. In 1971, she founded the Feminist Party and nominated Shirley Chisholm for President. She also helped in the founding of NOW (National Organization for Women) and the Women's Political Caucus. She fought in the legalization of abortion and wrote Abortion Rap. She defended H. Rap Brown and several Black Panthers when they got in trouble with the law. She also toured with Gloria Steinem in promoting the feminist movement and, when asked by men in audiences if the two of them were lesbians, she famously responded, "Are you my alternative?"

Flo is notorious for some great one-liners. Yes, she's a proud black lesbian, but that did not stop her from entering a heterosexual marriage, which was short lived but prompted her to make such statements about the institution like "Why would you lock yourself in the bathroom just because you have to go three times a day?" or more famously, "A woman without a man is like a fish without a bicycle" (often attributed to Steinem). Some other great quotes: On Abortion - "If men could get pregnant, abortion would be a sacrament." On Freedom struggles - "It's like taking a bath - you've got to do it every day." Her 1976 autobiography is called Color Me Flo: My Hard Life and Good Times.

In the Present U.S.

Hip-Hop Feminists - Yes, there are academic feminists like Gwendolyn Pough, Tricia Rose, and Imani Perry who have developed a "hip-hop feminist studies" curriculum, and public intellectuals like Joan Morgan who have coined the phrase "hip-hop feminism." But, since there is much confusion on hip-hop feminism, or that it only occurred in the 90s, here's a little history because I'm going to start with the women within hip-hop music culture. Sha Rock may have been the first female rapper during this disco/funk era; she first performed as an emcee with Funky Four + One, then later joined Lisa Lee and Debbie Dee to form Us Girls in the early 1980s. During this decade, rapper Roxanne Shante, who “answered” UTFO’s hit record “Roxanne, Roxanne” in 1984, thus sparking what was then called the “Roxanne Wars,” set the stage for “hip-hop feminists,” whom hip-hop scholar Gwendolyn Pough defines as “women and men who step up and speak out against gender exploitation in hip-hop.” Shante’s response opened up a space for other women rappers to express their own desires and discontent, most notably in the work of Salt-n-Pepa, who also began their careers with a similar satirical “answer” to Doug E. Fresh and Slick Rick’s 1985 hit record, “The Show,” with “The Showstopper.”

Here's one of my favorite hip-hop feminist anthems from them, called "Tramp" - does this 1987 track bring back memories for you too? :)

Female rappers following in their wake include artists as diverse as MC Lyte, Queen Latifah (whose 1990 video with Monie Love, Ladies First, still sets the standard for hip-hop feminism), Yo-Yo, Da Brat, Sistah Souljah, and Eve (most notably her Love is Blind Foundation to raise awareness on domestic and sexual violence, which is a response to her rap "Love is Blind" on same subject), who have all evolved from simply “talking back” to sexist scripts produced by men to articulating their own perspectives on sexual, racial, and class politics in their music. Curiously enough, such rappers have resisted the label "feminism", even though more questionable rappers, like Lil’ Kim, do claim the word, so we need to have a serious conversation on what feminism really means. Beyond U.S. borders, female rap artists have adopted hip-hop to address their subaltern realities as marginalized women of color, including Monie Love in Britain, ALIF (Attaque Libératoire de l’Infanterie Féministe) in Senegal, MC Trey of indigenous Australia, and Las Krudas in Cuba. Within U.S. urban cultural and transnational spheres, hip-hop has also influenced and been shaped by its Caribbean musical cousins, Jamaican dancehall reggae and the Latin-based reggaeton, in which female emcees such as Lady Saw and La Bruja respectively have also emerged to counter male-dominated performances by infusing gender and sexual politics in their song lyrics. Additionally, women in hip-hop have shaped the culture in their other roles as breakdancers, graffiti artists, deejays, hip-hop novelists, filmmakers, and spoken-word poets. Most recently, a group of “B-Girls” assembled and showcased their contributions to hip-hop in the annual national event, B-Girl Be: A Celebration of Women in Hip-Hop. Now that mainstream hip-hop has become corporate - meaning that women rappers, deejays, breakdancers, graffiti artists, and spoken-word poets have all been silenced (most infamously when Sarah Jones was fined by the FCC for her "Your Revolution" poem - see this article) and marginalized to make way for the video dancers, models, and sex workers who are employed to fuel the hip-hop pornography economy, this history and its continued work in the margins needs to be remembered and acknowledged.

Black Feminism Beyond Hip-Hop: At the same time, if we're going to assess women of color feminism in the present-day U.S., we can surely find it beyond hip-hop culture. Sista II Sista (see their website) definitely comes to mind, with their important work in bridging communities of young Latinas and African Americans in Brooklyn, offering a "Free School" to raise young women and girls' consciousness on cultural pride and women's empowerment, and holding media workshops so that they can reclaim their own images and their neighborhoods (for example, using video surveillance against Big Brother to capture police brutality), as does Kiri Davis, a teenager and budding filmmaker who has produced an informative video on black girls' body image, A Girl Like Me, available on YouTube. Then, there's Shana Griffin, local New Orleans activist and feminist, who is part of INCITE! Women of Color Against Violence, the People's Hurricane Katrina Relief Fund, and Oversight Coalition. Shana Griffin is a critical voice today (see interview), for she is one of the few who broke the silence on sexual violence as it occurred in the aftermath of Katrina and worked hard in raising awareness of intersectionality so that rape victims could tell their stories without having these stories paint the New Orleans black community with the unifying brush of criminalization. Not an easy task, especially in light of various folk who think intersectionality means that women of color are too busy criticizing white women's racism while letting men of color's sexism go unchecked. Read and learn and LISTEN, is all I say on that subject.

Feminism Beyond Euro-American Context:

There are so many feminists of color beyond North America, that I'm just going to do a brief roll call. These feminists exist and have been doing intersectionality quite well: in denouncing the racism of white women, the imperialism of all women in developed contexts, and the sexism of men in their communities.

Wangari Mathai - Kenyan environmental activist, feminist, leader of the Green Belt Movement, and winner of the Nobel Peace Prize in 2004. Her memoir, Unbowed, was recently published.
Shirin Ebadi - Iranian lawyer, judge, human rights activist, advocate for women and children, and winner of the Nobel Peace Prize in 2003.
Hauwa Ibrahim - Nigerian Muslim feminist, lawyer, and advocate who successfully defended Amina Lawal against Sharia Law during 2002-2003, which demanded that Lawal be stoned to death for giving birth to an illegitimate child. (See Full Story.)
Rebecca Lolosoli - founder and matriarch of the Umoja Village, an all-female village and refuge for women in Samburu, Kenya fleeing domestic and sexual violence. (See Full Story.)
Criola - an NGO based in Brazil, focused on black women and girls and on popular education on racism, sexism, and homophobia. (See their website.)

And, finally, here is a shout-out to all of the WOC bloggers keeping this vibrant legacy of black feminism alive. In light of the misinformed and the miseducated, may we continue to keep blogging, keep agitating, keep mobilizing, and keep educating!