INTERSECTIONALITY ASSEMBLAGE

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What possibilities might emerge if memory workers place intersectionality in conversation with Black feminist frameworks that similarly elucidate the simultaneity of oppressive systems? What might we learn from this genealogy of resistance? The Intersectionality assemblage encourages such investigations as it specifies and materializes its genesis. 

 

First published in Kimberlé Crenshaw's groundbreaking essay, "Demarginalizing the Intersection of Race and Sex: A Black Feminist Critique of Antidiscrimination Doctrine, Feminist Theory and Antiracist Politics,” the concept of intersectionality has deep roots at the intersection of Black feminism and Critical Race Theory. As a key Critical Race Theory concept, intersectionality examines discrimination beyond the separate effects of, for instance, racism and sexism, and instead, engages the interconnectedness of systems of oppression.

 

From Claudia Jones’ “Triple Oppression” to the Combahee River Collective’s “interlocking systems of oppression,” this section travels temporally to illuminate cross-generational black feminist analyses and praxes that combat systems of oppression at the site of their multiplicity. 

 

Suggested Assemblages:

Intersectionality (primary docs)

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• DeGraffenreid v. GENERAL MOTORS ASSEMBLY DIV., ETC., 413 F. Supp. 142 (E.D. Mo. 1976)

  • Crenshaw's paper, "Demarginalizing the Intersection of Race and Sex: A Black Feminist Critique of Antidiscrimination Doctrine, Feminist Theory and Antiracist Politics" examines three legal cases to support her theorization of intersectionality, including the DeGraffenreid v. General Motors case.

• S.11 - Violence Against Women Act of 1993

  • The Violence Against Women Act of 1993 exemplifies how systemic failures to consider race and gender adversely affect women of color, specifically in relation to their interactions with police.

 

Triple Oppression

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• Left of Karl Marx, Carole Boyce Davies 

  • Recommended essay for key term: "An End to the Neglect of the Problems of the Negro Woman!"; "We Seek Full Equality for Women"

  • "An End to the Neglect of the Problems of the Negro Woman!", Claudia Jones

• Sojourning for Freedom by Erik S. McDuffie (ISBN: 0822350505)

• Ain't I a Woman by bell hooks

• THE SOJOURNER TRUTH PROJECT

  • Why is there more than one version of Sojourner Truth’s famous 1851, “Ain’t I a Woman” speech? Find out via the Sojourner Truth Project.

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Interlocking Systems of Oppression

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• The Combahee River Collective Statement

• How We Get Free by Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor (Editor)

  • Cited:

    • MWANAMKE MWANANCHI (The Nationalist Woman)

    • A Black Feminist’s Search for Sisterhood 

    • An analysis of the Edelin case 

    • The Joan Little Case 

    • Woman Is Acquitted Of Killing

    • Sojourner (Cambridge, Mass.)​

• Genealogy of resistance along the Combahee River: Harriet Tubman’s Combahee River Raid; the Combahee River Collective Statement; Alexis Pauline Gumbs’ Combahee River Black Feminist pilgrimage

• Toward a Black Feminist Criticism 

 

Matrix of Domination

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• Black Feminist Thought by Patricia Hill Collins

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This assemblage is by no means exhaustive; more to the point, it is only a beginning – an opening. We encourage you to imagine and to share other aesthetics, philosophies, and songs that speak to its matter.