{"id":299,"date":"2018-12-10T10:00:48","date_gmt":"2018-12-10T15:00:48","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/sites.williams.edu\/engl113-f18\/?p=299"},"modified":"2018-12-14T13:44:36","modified_gmt":"2018-12-14T18:44:36","slug":"i-am-your-sister-black-women-organizing-across-sexualities","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sites.williams.edu\/engl113-f18\/marr\/i-am-your-sister-black-women-organizing-across-sexualities\/","title":{"rendered":"I Am Your Sister: Black Women Organizing across Sexualities"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/a>Published in 1985, \u201cI am Your Sister\u201d is the third pamphlet included in Kitchen Table: Women of Color Press\u2019s <\/em>Freedom Organizing Series. The piece is based on a speech Lorde gave at the Women\u2019s Center of Medgar Evers College in New York City. It addresses divisiveness in the feminist movement, specifically in relation to heterosexism and homophobia which Lorde names as \u201ctwo grave barriers to organizing among Black women\u201d (3).<\/p>\n

From the very beginning, Lorde speaks of a need to redefine the framework through which we examine and determine identity. She illustrates a need \u201cto deal constructively with the genuine differences between us and to recognize that unity does not require that we be identical to one another\u201d (3). Lorde clarifies that effective feminism will not be built around ignoring intricate intersections of identity but rather around embracing and wrestling with them. She exemplifies this approach in the context of her own lived experience, writing, \u201cWhen I say I am a Black feminist; I mean I recognize that my power as well as my primary oppressions come as a result of my Blackness as well as my womanness, and therefore my struggles on both of these fronts are inseparable” (4). This definitive statement is a near direct precursor to the notion of “intersectionality,” which Kimberly Crenshaw coined four years after \u201cI am Your Sister\u201d in a 1989 article called, \u201cDemarginalizing the Intersection of Race and Sex: A Black Feminist Critique of Anti-discrimination Doctrine, Feminist Theory and Antiracist Politics.\u201d<\/p>\n

The message Lorde desires to convey in \u201cI am Your Sister\u201d is apparent: \u00a0\u201cWe cannot afford to waste each other\u2019s energies in our common battles\u201d (7). She asks her audience, \u201cHow do we organize around our differences, neither denying them nor blowing them up out of proportion?\u201d (7) and upholds that the solution is ultimately \u201can effort of will\u201d (7). Lorde concludes the piece with characteristic eloquence and clarity, writing in reference to stereotypes about lesbians,<\/p>\n

Those stereotypes are yours to solve, not mine, and they are a terrible and wasteful barrier to working together.\u00a0 I am not your enemy. We do not have to become each other\u2019s unique experiences and insights in order to share what we have learned through our particular battles for survival as Black women\u2026\u2026I do not want to be tolerated, nor misnamed. I want to be recognized. I am a Black Lesbian, and I am <\/em>your sister. (8)<\/p>\n

The use of “and” and the italicization of the \u201cam\u201d here are crucial. These linguistic choices clarify what Lorde believes to be inherent to identity on the level of form: that it is both aspects that are inalienable, and their existence is active and undeniable.<\/p>\n

Source:<\/strong> Lorde, Audre.\u00a0I Am Your Sister: Black Women Organizing across Sexualities.<\/em>\u00a01st ed., Kitchen Table, Women of Color Press, 1985.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Published in 1985, \u201cI am Your Sister\u201d is the third pamphlet included in Kitchen Table: Women of Color Press\u2019s Freedom Organizing Series. The piece is based on a speech Lorde gave at the Women\u2019s Center of Medgar Evers College in … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2052,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-299","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-marr"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.williams.edu\/engl113-f18\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/299","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.williams.edu\/engl113-f18\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.williams.edu\/engl113-f18\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.williams.edu\/engl113-f18\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2052"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.williams.edu\/engl113-f18\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=299"}],"version-history":[{"count":9,"href":"https:\/\/sites.williams.edu\/engl113-f18\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/299\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":807,"href":"https:\/\/sites.williams.edu\/engl113-f18\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/299\/revisions\/807"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.williams.edu\/engl113-f18\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=299"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.williams.edu\/engl113-f18\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=299"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.williams.edu\/engl113-f18\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=299"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}