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Thinking Outside The Rainbow By Sabrina Alimahomed

1772 Words8 Pages

The Combahee River Collective was a black lesbian organization movement which strived to end the racial, sexual, and class oppressions that all women of color face. While trying to dismantle the interlocking system of oppression, these women faced obstacles brought upon by the systems of capitalism and imperialism. The term outsider within was introduced in Sabrina Alimahomed’s article, “ Thinking Outside The Rainbow: Women of Color Redefining Queer Politics and Identity.” Outsider within means being part of a community, organization, but being marginalized for reasons like race, gender, sexuality. For example, race creates outsiders within’s in the feminist movement, thus women of color experience multiple oppressions at once, unlike white …show more content…

Write an essay that explains and illustrates the significance of taking an intersectional approach to queer studies. Intersectionality is a theory which states that people have multiple identities and therefore belong to more than one community and thus experience multiple oppressions at the same time. Those who face multiple oppressions because of their layered identities are mostly queer women of color. Taking an intersectional approach to queer studies means exposing the inequalities and disadvantages that occur when people have multiple identities in order for transformational political work to happen. People of color, especially lesbian women of color experience this layered oppression. As stated in Sabrina Alimahomed’s article, “ Thinking Outside The Rainbow: Women of Color Redefining Queer Politics and Identity,” queer Latinas and Asian/Pacific Islander women experience marginality within the mainstream LGBT movement and their racial and ethnic communities. For queer Latinas and Asian/Pacific Islander women, race creates another layer of oppression, while white women use their race as a form of power and privilege. As stated in Audre Lorde’s article, “ Age, Race, Class, and Sex: Women Redefining Difference” women of color are regarded as others and not important when it comes to white feminism. White women ignore their privilege of being white, and instead of focusing on how women are oppressed based on differences of race, sexuality, class, and age, they just focus on being oppressed as women (Lorde 3) . They fail to understand or even want to comprehend the struggles of women of

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In “Coalitions as a Model for Intersectionality: From Practice to Theory,” Elizabeth Cole addresses how the intersectional approach should be utilized to form coalitions that seek to advance marginalized populations (1). However, unlike the feminist movement, that narrowly defined its goals and constituency, these newly formed coalitions should be broad based, incorporating diverse populations and directives. Moreover, the alliances can even be formed by seemingly unlike populations, which when analyzed through the intersectional lens, may share similar experiences and goals. In addition, by examining the numerous axis of gender, race, and other intersectional components, one can identify other similarities not previously recognized.

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Some may live through being sexually abused, live in extreme poverty, or even fall victim of being physical or verbally abused. Whatever the reason is, this book shows an outlet for these struggles. The only way we can help others fight these intersectionality issues is by knowing your privilege and using it to help the oppressed with no voice. In Brittney Cooper’s article “Feminism’s ugly internal clash: Why its future is not up to the white women” she states that “the future of feminism is not up to the white women. Not by themselves anyway”.

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Black women are one of the most oppressed groups in the world. Black women have to deal with discrimination because of their race, and then on top of that, their gender. There are many movements/ideologies involved with the oppression of women, but there is one that really speaks in the interests of women of African descent. In the article “Africana Womanism: The Flip Side of a Coin,” Clenora Hudson-Weems discusses what Africana womanism is and how it relates to feminism/black feminism/womanism, Black male/female relationships, and the Black family dynamic. Hudson-Weems argues that Africana womanism is not an addition to feminism, womanism, or Black feminism, but instead it is an ideology for women of African descent to follow.

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Osh, a character from Beyond the Bright Sea by Lauren Wolk, would be the best partner on a deserted island because he is a strong caregiver, quick thinking, and resourceful. Osh has proved to be a strong caregiver, which makes him a worthy partner to be stranded on an island with. At this point in the story, Osh is talking to Crow about the challenges of raising her. He didn’t want Crow to be taken away from him so he would go above and beyond to keep her protected and content.

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When reading both the Combahee River Collective and Work, Immigration, and Labor, I noticed how both display the struggles of women of color from two different communities and their efforts against oppression. The Combahee River Collective is a statement released by a group of black feminists, they viewed black feminism as a political movement that can combat the oppression that all women of color face. The black feminism movement gained traction as a part of the black liberation movements of the 1960s and 70s. In regard to their struggle, the statement mentions how black feminists are not subject only to sexual oppression, but a combined racial-sexual oppression. “Our situation as Black people necessitates that we have solidarity around the

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As black women always conform under patriarchal principles, women are generally silenced and deprived of rights because men are entitled to control everything. Women are silenced in a way that they lose their confidence and hesitate to speak up due to the norms present in the society they live in. Hence, even if women have the confidence to try to speak, men wouldn’t bother to listen since men ought to believe that they are superior to women. In addition to that, women often live in a life cycle of repetitions due to patriarchal principles since women are established to fulfill the roles the society had given them. It is evidenced by Celie as she struggles to survive and to define oneself apart from the controlling, manipulative, and abusive men in her life.

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Family is what might have the greatest impact on someone's life and identity. In the memoir Brown Girl Dreaming by Jacqueline Woodson, she is an African American who grew up right after the Civil Rights Movement in the south. She went through a lot because of her race and her family was able to help her get through it. She also moved around a lot as a kid, which affected her a lot because she was with different family members every time she moved.

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Audrey Lorde once said “I am not free while any woman is unfree, even when her shackles are very different from my own.” I use this quote to introduce my concept of intersectional feminism, Audrey Lorde captured the idea very well. My interpretation of this quote is Lorde focusing on how even women vary in race, religion, sexual orientation and this difference is a woman’s “shackles” which holds her back from being seen as equal. It focuses on how women should not ignore what makes them different, but acknowledge this difference to work together as a feminist community. This brings light to the idea of intersectionality, described as “a framework in which to understand that systems of power and oppression and social identity categories are overlapping, interconnected, and simultaneous”(Lecture Week 3).

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Intersectionality is defined by social categories, such as race and gender that have interconnected to apply to individuals and groups, causing an overlap, which has consequently created a system of discrimination and disadvantages Kimberle Crenshaw coined the term in her article ‘Demarginalizing the Intersection of Race and Sex: A Black Feminist Critique of Antidiscrimination Doctrine, Feminist Theory and Anti-racist Politics’ (1889). Intersectionality can be recognised in many iconic Disney films such as, Cinderella, snow white. Aladdin and little mermaid. All these well-known movies provide societal intersections. This can be addressed through the protagonists and princesses ethnicity of being white, with Disney only recently introducing a black princess, in 2009.

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According to the English Oxford Dictionary, intersectionality is the, “Interconnected nature of social categorizations such as race, class, and gender as they apply to a given individual or group, regarded as creating overlapping and interdependent systems of discrimination or disadvantage” (Oxford Dictionaries, n.d). Intersectionality is a way of acknowledging and comprehending that everyone’s identity has more than one attribute or social category; it’s how everyone experiences their own identity in their own unique way. For instance, in the article, Why intersectionality can’t wait, the writer Kimberlé Crenshaw, talked about a group of black women who prosecuted General Motors for discrimination (Crenshaw, 2015). Crenshaw spoke about how

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Combahee River Collective organization emphasized the theme oppression or injustice, especially in the Black feminism. According to the Combahee Collective organization, “The fact that racial politics and indeed racism are pervasive factors in our lives did not allow us, and still does not allow most black women, to look more deeply into our own experiences and define those things that make our lives what they are and our oppression specific to us”, it can be inferred that, oppression wasn’t just a new issue, but it was effecting the lives of the black women even from the beginning. Talking about oppression, Combahee River Collective specifically

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I define intersectionality as having different life experiences and multiple identities that intersect. For example, the EOP program here on campus helps students who are first generation college students. They often have specific needs and obstacles. These students are sometimes below the poverty line. These two identities intersect because having family members who have never been to college often results in making less money which limits the chances of their children going to school.

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Kareen Harboyan English 1C Professor Supekar March 15, 2018 Word Count: Crenshaw’s Mapping the Margins: The Marginalization of Women of Color Analyzed Through Generalization and A Feminist Lens Crenshaw's Mapping the Margins: Intersectionality, Identity Politics, and Violence Against Women of Color expands on the multifaceted struggles of women of color and the generalizations ingrained in society that limit women of color and keep them in a box. In this text, Crenshaw builds on the concept of intersectionality which proposes that social categorizations such as gender and race are intertwined and have great influence on one another.

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Intersectionality thus highlights the ways in which one’s social context is affected by one’s social identity- which this, your social identity has the ability to either privilege or oppress. For example, an English-speaking individual will experience privilege in an English dominated society, and a homosexual individual will most-likely experience oppression in a heteronormative society. Intersectionality is thus a concept which can be used to expose the ways in which privilege functions in a

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Afro-american women are discriminated from their own community men and the White men and White women. These women have been considered to the least beings in the world. Even the basic rights are regretted for them. They have been marginalized in the society and are treated as slaves and low paid labourers. Black women have been undergoing class, race, social oppression and found voiceless against the odds of the society.

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