Women of Color and the Women's Movement

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Daphne,
thanks for pointing out these two models, which I agree are very complex,
much moreso than the blame game:

<<<Two models seem available: 1) women did all sorts of important things
and have been written out of the record by men, and 2) women were
marginalized and oppressed and couldn't do much of anything.  The
problem is that if one opts for # 1 women also have to take on responsibility
 for
the creation of this imperfect world and can't blame all its ills on men
and the patriarchy.  Whereas if one opts for # 2, then one can't blame the
patriarchy for writing women "out" of history. Either way, a more
complex picture emerges than the usual one of blame, redemption, or
retribution.>>>>

Let me complicate those models still more.  When we discuss the power
dynamics between white women and white men (sorry for this racializing,
but the terminology is inadequate), we use words like discrimination,
oppression, equal rights, equal pay, voting rights, reproductive rights,
and so on.

When we discuss the power dynamics between white women and women of color,
all those words still come into play, BUT, along with another word which
we cannot ignore:  genocide.  White women were not (generally) faced with
extinction via violent murder by white men.  American Indians, Africans
brought here as slaves, were.  These women of color have a profoundly
different kind of "oppression" to face and overcome than the oppression of
white women at the hands of white men.

To use your argument about the sharing of responsibility in blame, then,
American Indians must share some of the blame for the European, Spanish,
Mexican and American governmental policies which urged not just oppression
or assimilation, but genocide. [Yet the BIA (Bureau of Indian Affairs)
apologized this past weekend to American Indians, saying that, "This
agency participated in the ethnic cleansing that befell the
Western tribes.  It must be acknowledged that the deliberate
spread of disease, the decimation of the mighty bison herds, the use of
the poison alcohol to destroy mind and body, and the cowardly killing of
women and children made for tragedy on a scale so ghastly that it cannot
be dismissed as merely the inevitable consequence of the clash of
competing ways of life...Poverty, ignorance and disease have been the
product of this agency's work," Gover (head of the BIA) said.]

Likewise, European Jewry must share responsibility for the genocidal
tactics of the Nazi party.  Yes?

No.  There is oppression, and then there is genocide.  The two are
intimately related, but they are not the same, and we cannot treat power
dynamics between "races" the same way that we judge power dynamics between
white men and white women.  The work of oppression can, ultimately, be
done by both sides of a struggle.  However, the work of genocide is murder
of the less powerful by the more powerful; also, genocide takes the form
of not just bodily destruction (bad enough), but the rape of women for
the purpose of "diluting" the race, repression and erasure of religion and
language, and imposition of an educational system designed to "kill the
Indian, save the man" (sic).

As we are seeing on this list, the issue of race is by far the most
complex and confusing of all human relations, with perhaps the exception
of sexuality.  I don't understand why, when a woman of color tells white
women that she is oppressed by feminism's white privilege, and feels
the bite of racism from her white colleagues in the women's movement, this
testimony of an eye witness can simply be countered by white women saying
that just isn't what they see happening.  I'm telling you that it is.
AnaLouise has told you that she hears it testified to by many women of
color, including herself.  What are you going to do with that information?

I agree that responsible and careful historical work can help us answer
some of your questions, Daphne.  Please remember that the testimony of the
people you are studying is also crucial.

<<< The same thing is, apparently, still going on in relation to race and
> the women's movement. (This is surprising, given the many dozens of
books
> available on the subject, and the way race is written into all the
women's
> studies programs I know about.)>>>

The fact that books have been written about race and the women's movement,
and the "way race is written into all the women's studies programs I know
about," does not get the job done.  It is not that simple.  Including some
voices of some women of color does not necessarily cause the profound
consciousness of privilege and racism that is truly necessary.  So the
question is, what will?

Admitting that there are differences in oppression is one place to start.

Deborah Miranda
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Deborah A. Miranda
English Department
Director, EOP Writing Program
University of Washington
Box 354330   Seattle, WA  98195
vm: 206-685-2461
email: <dmiranda  @  u.washington.edu>

I think the example below shows the problems that eg. Ann Louise Keating
pointed out. Even if there are great books and anthologies from Chicanas,
African Americans we white women have not been responding. As a white woman
I realize that there is not much dialogue between white women and women of 
color.
I think this should be changed. But how?

To the list below I would like to add

Gloria Anzaldua & Cherrie Moraga: This Bridge Called My Back: Writings
 by Radical Women of Color.

bell hooks: Ain't I a Woman: Black Women and Feminism.

Jonna Roos
jonna.roos  @  helsinki.fi

I would especially like to suggest AnaLouise Keating's, "Heterosexual
Teacher, Lesbian/Gay/Bisexual Text:  Teaching the Sexual Other(s)", in
Tilting the Tower, edited by Linda Garber--because I think that she provides
a powerful pedagogical model that really uses "difference" as resource.  In
terms of pedagogical approach, I would also suggest Radical in<ter>ventions:
Identity, Politics, and Difference/s in Educational Praxis, edited by
Suzanne de Castell and Mary Bryson, with a foreword by Maxine Greene.
Teaching What You're Not:  Identity Politics in Higher Education, edited by
Katherine J. Mayberry might also be useful in terms of pedagogical approach
Catherine green
(815)229-6140
604 Shaw St
Rockford, IL  61104

I, too, was troubled by the question.  It seemed to imply that we could
reduce the VOLUMES of contributions made by many, many, many women of color
from as many intellectual, philosophical, and experiential backgrounds to
the same level of importance as "Anyone know where I can find the text of a
quote by so-and-so?"

I have appreciated the varied responses this post has generated - they have
reminded me of how little many "women's studies" scholars often have in
common, other than a generally-accepted term used to describe their courses
in a catalog, or as shorthand for their activism, or the ISBN category under
which their books are published.  I do not mean to suggest this is a bad
thing.  I DO mean to say how grateful I am for the chorus of voices -
conservative, radical, feminist, womanist, refuse-to-identify, etc. - that
help me continue to shape my own approaches to the field.

That said, I think that what has already been mentioned about linguistic
consciousness, the continuing problem of white centrality in academic
discourse about women's studies, reactionism, reductionism, etc. have been
very useful.  I would like to weigh in further by saying that white women
ARE to blame, both historically (which we can't change) and currently (which
we can).  We can still teach that the early suffragettes did some very
useful things for both the women's and abolition movements, while
simultaneously maintaining a critique of how they manipulated individuals
and circumstances in ways that were racist.  We can still teach that 1960's
feminists took many risks and actions that have benefitted the entire field
today, while acknowledging and critiquing that their practices were often
racist, homophobic, elitist, and ultimately divisive.


The comment (and I am paraphrasing) about how women's studies must be
overwhelmingly focused on "minority" groups or run the risk of being called
racist, homophobic, etc. struck a chord with me.  I attended the Berks a
year ago and went to a plenary session about second-wave feminism.  If
anyone on this list was a part of that discussion, please do not take
offense to what I am about to say.  The session seemed for the most part to
be comprised of white, second wave feminists complaining that third wave
feminists weren't studying them enough, and that when we were, it was only
critical.  I have to say, every time I commit something to paper, as a
historian, it is decidely NOT my hope that thirty years from now some
women's studies class will read it and say "oh, how incredible.  She had
such a vision," and leave it at that.  It is my sincere hope that thirty
years from now, some student will read what I have written and say, "She has
some good ideas, but this is what she left out," because that will mean that
people are thinking critically and moving forward.  I think the same can be
applied to the question of the "women's studies canon."  We cannot change
what texts are available to us, the fact that is was illegal for many women
of color to read or write for hundreds of years, the fact that many of the
texts we DO have by women of color may have been tampered with by white
editors (or white people who took dictation), etc. We can still use what we
have in a critical way. We CAN change the fact that most women's studies
students still believe that there has only ever been one women's movement,
or that the white women's movement was the leader, or that many white female
abolitionists/ white feminist activists did not have ulterior motives.

-Jessica Matthews
jmdiva  @  juno.com

I agree with Benay Blend's statement, that "there is still lack of dialogue
between say, chicana feminists and those of a more Western orientation, not 
to mention lack of
acceptance of other ways of looking at what it means to be a woman."

So much do I agree with this point that I have taken it up in the afterword
to my book of lit. crit.--(Out)Classed Women: Contemporary Chicana Writers
and Inequitable Gendered Power Relations, Westport, CT, 2000, due out this
month.

Dr. Phillipa Kafka
Professor Emerita
English Department
Kean University
pkafka  @  lvcm.com

I'd add nearly anything by Audre Lorde.

Marilyn Grotzky


At 08:33 PM 9/10/00 EDT, you wrote:
[much deleted]
>Meanwhile  . . . I want to reassure my student that even though (in my honest
>opinion), the woman's movement was racist and classist in origin and
>marginalized women of color, that is no longer the case.  Hence my letter to
>the Feminist Majority.  And hence my request for references on the
>contributions of women of color so that I can pass them on to my student.

I hope I have this right.  In Deborah, Golda, and Me, Letty Cottin
Progrebin says that for some time there was a dialog between black and
Jewish women.  The Jewish women seemed satisfied -- their goal was to
create a dialog where everyone could be heard and enhance understanding.
The African-American women were less satisfied, wondering when everyone was
going to stand up and take action.  The goals were different -- for one the
dialog was the action, for the other, dialog was a preliminary to action.
When we manage to create dialog, we need a fairly clear picture of where
each of us and each groups wants to go.

Marilyn Grotzky

Hi,
I want to thank everyone for this useful and timely
discussion. I hope it continues. I have a few sources
to add:

Lee Maracle, I am Woman: A Native Perspective on
Sociology and Feminism

Mohanty, Russo, Torres, eds. Third World Women and the
Politics of Feminism

Janice Gould, "The Problem of Being Indian: One
Mixed-Blood's Dilemma" (sorry I don't have the full
cite but it's in Sidonie Smith's edited collection on
autobiography)

Kate Shanley, "Thoughts on Indian Feminism" in Brant,
Gathering the Spirit

Clara Sue Kidwell, "What Would Pocahontas Think Now?:
Native Women and Cultural Persisitance" Callaloo Vol.
17, no. 1

Patricia Penn Hilden, When Nickels Were Indians: An
Urban Mixed-Blood Story (Smithsonian, 1995--I think).
See esp. "Decolonizing the Women's Minds"

I'd also like to say that I agree with Deborah's
response to Daphne Patai:

"To be white, and to conclude that
white women are always to
be blamed, is to sidestep the issue yet again."

And that, furthermore, I think Patai's response is a
disingenuous way to put white women right back in the
center.

Janet

^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^
Janet McAdams
http://faculty-staff.ou.edu/M/Janet.E.Mc-Adams-1/

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

        I agree, I'd add everything by Audre Lorde. I'm finding Female
Subjects in Black and White:  Race, Psychoanalysis, Feminism, edited by
Elizabeth Abel, Barbara Christian, and Helene Moglen to be useful.  But are
you just looking for work **on **contributions of women of color?  It seems
like you should have Black Feminist Criticism:  Perspectives on Black Women
Writers by Barbara Christian.  Also work by Barbara Smith.  Has someone
mentioned AnaLouise Keating's Women Reading Women Writing?  There is also
Changing Our Own Words:  Essays on Criticism, Theory, and Writing by Black
Women, edited by Cheryl Wall.
        I mean, maybe it would be useful at this point--not only for your
project, here--but in terms of this conversation to begin to really compile
some reasonable bibliographies--that we might share and work with in our
teaching.  Of course, some exist, but it might be interesting to see what we
would come up with on our own.  I suggest that such a project would be
telling.
        I am concerned with the discussion we've been having.  There are so
many ways it reminds me of so many other conversations that (mostly white)
feminists try to have about racism.  The conversations often end up
nowhere--maybe agreeing how complex "it all" is, how "useless" guilt is, how
we all are really different, and so on and on.
        I feel that feminism is really split racially and that the work of
women of color has been made almost invisible.  And as a white, lesbian,
feminist, visual artist and so on--that makes me angry and ashamed.  There
has been much talk throughout this thread--as there often seems to be in
these conversations about "blame".  I've tended to think that "guilt",
"blame" and "shame" are generally not really very useful feelings for moving
an individual or a group forward.  But I have come to believe that we need
to feel guilt and shame and let it move us toward acting differently.
        And there are real things that we can do.  We can start by thinking
about how little most educated people in this country know of and about
writers of color in this country (not to mention the world).  And as
teachers, we can teach women of color writers--and not always in classes
that are about women of color.  We can work on meaningful and visible
collaborations.  It does not really have to be as complicated as so many of
us, so often make it.  I'm not saying that means it is easy.  But we must
change the way things are now.
Catherine green
(815)229-6140
604 Shaw St.
Rockford, IL  61104

I'm glad that the query generated a broader discussion of the histories of
feminism and the women's movement in terms of issues of marginality and
centrality.  And I'm glad for the clarification of the original query,
which had baffled/troubled me a bit.
  Since I haven't seen it mentioned yet (although I haven't finished
getting through the flurry of messages this morning), let me mention a
"central" and invaluable text re: these issues:  bell hooks, _Feminist
Theory:  From Margin to Center_ (South End Press, 1984) and also her
earlier _Aint' I a Woman:  Black Women and Feminism_ (also South End
Press, 1981).
 Also, I'd like to mention, more re: the relation of women of color to
feminist theory than to the women's movement per se, a book in which I
admit having an essay (on hooks) (and AnaLouise Keating, who's posted on
this thread, also has an essay: _Other Sisterhoods:  Literary Theory and
U.S. Women of Color_, ed. Sandra Kumamoto Stanley (Illinois, 1998). Let me
note that Sandra and at least some of the contributors found this title
chosen by the press) troubling, precisely because it suggests that women
of color are "other" to (some versions of) feminist theory.  As I often
ask my students, "who is whose 'other'"?  Although more narrowly focused
than _This Bridge Called My Back_ and other pivotal texts on women of
color in/and feminism, this book has a number of essays on the "contributions"
 of women of color to feminism and feminist theory (and/or their
[re]shaping of feminism and fem. theory). Marilyn Edelstein, English,
Santa Clara U
medelstein  @  scu.edu

I have a query.  My understanding is that many of the people on this list
are teachers of women's studies.  So, are the white women teachers of
women's studies on this list saying that indeed they ignore women of color
in their WoSt courses?  And if they do not, then where is all this ignoring
and rendering invisible taking place?  At our women's studies program here
at UMass, courses on women of color are required and have been for years.
Not much else is required, at least in terms of "identity."  And even before
this requirement, I don't remember a single faculty member who was teaching
"white women."
    I think the world is and has been far too complex to be sorted out along
race lines. But such sorting--indeed usually engaged in to score points--
leads to a very inaccurate and oversimplified view of the world, such as
that voiced by a colleague  some years ago, who said, "Let's face it. There
are two kinds of people in the world, oppressors and oppressed. And these
correspond to white and non-white."  Lots of people in the room knew this
was nonsense, but no one dared contradict her.  Now *that* is a form of
differential treatment based on race that I find extremely objectionable.

---------------------------------
daphne.patai  @  spanport.umass.edu

On Mon, 11 Sep 2000, deborah a. miranda wrote:

When we discuss the power
> dynamics between white women and white men (sorry for this racializing,
> but the terminology is inadequate), we use words like discrimination,
> oppression, equal rights, equal pay, voting rights, reproductive rights,
> and so on.
>
> When we discuss the power dynamics between white women and women of color,
> all those words still come into play, BUT, along with another word which
> we cannot ignore:  genocide.  White women were not (generally) faced with
> extinction via violent murder by white men.  American Indians, Africans
> brought here as slaves, were.  These women of color have a profoundly
> different kind of "oppression" to face and overcome than the oppression of
> white women at the hands of white men.

Okay, to throw a whole new issue into this thread: Deborah, I greatly
appreciate your posts, but I sense that the above argument puts forms of
oppression in hierarchy of seriousness. Correct me if I'm wrong.

Not all people of color have the experience of genocide/attempted genocide
in recent background. (And some whites do--Jews). White racist policies
toward Africans and African Americans did not aim to wipe them out, but to
keep them for the resources they provided as slaves (as women were
used--equally powerless by law). Asian Americans, Arab Americans, other
groups of color have their own (varying) experiences with racism in this
country, but don't necessarily have genocide in their recent background,
which shapes the meaning of racism experienced today.

Yet the contrast is used only between the oppression of white women by
white men, versus people of color by whites. This seems to me to
trivialize sexual and gender-based oppression. Distinctions are important,
but are harmful, I think, if they are used to make "more oppressed"
arguments. The idea that gender oppression isn't as harmful or malicious,
etc, is very common and has had huge, devastating consequences. The
tolerenace for ubiquitous gender-based hate speech and gender-based
violence is one example. Women aren't suppose to "dare" think of the
oppression directed against them with the same seriousness as other
oppressed groups.

As for "blame," there are women collaborators, there were Jewish
collaborators before and during the holocaust, and it's likely that there
were/are collaborators in any oppression and genocide carried out. The
idea that all members of a group must all be innocent or else the group
itself must share blame and responsibility for oppression, as I
interpreted Daphne's statement to say, seems to sidestip the fact that we
must undo systems of oppression, and those who have "gained" from the
oppression (yeah, including the collaborators), must re-situate
themselves, giving up their position of power-over and all the benefits or
seeming benefits that go with that.

Adriene

Said It: feminist news, culture, politics
http://www.saidit.org

as has been suggested by a few of the responses in this thread, it seems
that perhaps contemporary white middle-class feminist scholars would do
well (as many have) to go back to square one re american WOMEN'S history
(as in, encompassing ALL of america's women) in much the same way they
have joined in prescribing this process in respect to (white
male-centered) "history" in general...

in much the same way as women had to be "written back into" the general
flow of the nation's historical development, the actions and viewpoints
of early native american, chinese, chicana and black women, and later
hispanic, japanese, semitic and asian women need to be WOVEN INTO our
comprehension of women's political awareness, action and impact in the
u.s.--not added as patches here and there, or as separate tapestries
occasionally joined by a stitch or two...

if we can understand what's wrong with seeing women as an "adjunct" or
"subsection" to the "real" (that is, white middle-class men's) story, we
shouldn't have that much difficulty seeing the FUNDAMENTAL flaw in
starting from a conceptualization of "feminism" and "women's political
action" as the product of white middle-class women's viewpoint and
effort...

please let it not take ANOTHER 30 years to accomplish this!...

debbie <louis  @  umbc.edu>

I have to admit that I have always had difficulties with this term "women
(or people) of colour."  Is it any different, really, from "coloured
women," a phrase that now sounds retrograde to our ears?  And doesn't it
still take as a benchmark "white" people, who are somehow viewed as being
without colour (even though, if I remember my high-school science classes,
white is the combination of all colours of the spectrum, and black is
actually the absence of colour)?

Comments welcome ...

Best wishes,
Adam Jones

Adam Jones, Profesor/Investigador
Divisi=F3n de Estudios Internacionales
Centro de Investigaci=F3n y Docencia Econ=F3micas (CIDE)
Carretera M=E9xico-Toluca 3655
Col. Lomas de Santa Fe, C.P. 01210, M=E9xico, D.F., M=C9XICO
Tel. (525) 727-9800, ext. 2447  Fax: (525) 727-9872

Executive Director, Gendercide Watch <http://www.gendercide.org>
Personal website: <http://www.interchange.ubc.ca/adamj>

I have been reading the posts in this thread with great interest and
reflecting on some very critical points that have been made, while trying to
formulate a meaningful contribution to the discussion.    I actually read
multiple questions asked and answered in this "one" thread, which is
complicating the listening at points but also highlighting the complexity.

I think what is probably most useful, in support of an earlier suggestion
someone made, is to de-construct and then re-construct some of our syllabi.
Let's ask ourselves:  what are we studying?, what do we want our students
(and ourselves) to explore?, what are we teaching? who are we teaching
(meaning our students), and who are we teaching (meaning our selected
content)?

We need to examine, and re-examine our own philosophical frameworks, and
that means acknowledging feminisms, women's movements, women's lived
realities, etc... everything in plurals, across varied axes of identity and
experience (race, class, sexual orientation, religions, ages, etc.) and
growing out of different cultures and his/herstories.

Women's Studies here in the US for much of its herstory has focused on what
has popularly been perceived and called "The Women's Movement," a movement
that was highly vocal and visible in the 60s and 70s, a movement that was
shaped, defined, governed, if you will, most notably by the common
experiences of middle class, white women.    Hear me out, please.   There
were many women of color within this particular movement that tried to make
"The Women's Movement" into a coalition for women across difference, but it
didn't happen in the way it should have or could have.   [ We like to think
we know better now, but I really wonder sometimes, if we do...]

That is not to say that any single movement can represent everyone, but it
is acknowledging the weaknesses and failures, pointing out what we have
learned in the process.    While some of the result was merely a product of
certain organizational strategies, some of the result was the outcome of
racial, ethnic, cultural insensitivities, and perhaps even racism.  We
cannot devalue the contributions of the particular movement, but we have to
be honest in admitting what didn't work well and where we went wrong.  "The
Women's Movement" of which I speak believed that "we are all sisters and
that is all that matters in our struggle," failing to address, and many
times even failing to *acknowledge* the specificities and intersections of
race, class, sexual orientation with gender in the discourse on oppression,
resistance, and social change.

A productive by-product of that organizational failure is the increased
mobilizaton of many different feminists movement led by women of color
speaking for themselves, but we cannot say that "The Women's Movement" which
has now been called "The 'White' Women's Movement" did a good thing by doing
that because in the process there was much pain and loss -- I have heard and
ready many women of color speak of the pain of exclusion and invisibility
that they experienced.  The herstoric record shows that, while successful in
many arenas, this reality was a living example of how the hierarchy of
oppression plays out in real life.

As Women's Studies and "feminism" aims to de-center the white heterosexual
male in history, so too we must hold ourselves accountable to re-positioning
white women as the center point of our teaching.  We can acknowledge the
remarkable contributions that white women have made and pay them honor while
accurately demonstrating the breadth of women's lives and herstories
throughout the world, considering the majority of the world's women are not
white, are not middle-class, etc.

I hope I have articulated my thinking clearly enough.  Please feel free to
write me if anything is unclear.

Best,
Lisa Burke
LBurke2  @  njcu.edu