Intersectionality is a methodology and political position that looks at the relationships between multiple social relations, oppressions, and subjectivities. The question arises as to how gender, race, class, ability, sexuality, age, and disability interact together to achieve social inequality and privileges. It is also important to know that racism, sexism, homophobia, and religious intolerance never act independently and are always meshed with one another. Intersectionality is about these kinds of multiple systems of oppression that are always interacting. While all these forms of oppression can intersect with one another, they are not one in the same or easily separable. With Kimberle Crenshaw’s "Mapping the Margins: Intersectionality, Identity Politics, and Violence against Women of Color,” we see how the first naming of intersectionality came to be so important for us to identify the different types of oppression that women of Color face daily.
For my portion of this project on our website, I focus on the oppression of Black women in the US and also the Caribbean culture with the forms of race, gender, class, and sexuality. As Crenshaw reminds us, not only do Black women have to deal with the notions of race and gender, but identity politics play a key factor as well: “The embrace of identity politics, however, has been in tension with dominant conceptions of social justice. Race, gender, and other identity categories are most often treated in mainstream liberal discourse as vestiges of bias or domination-that is, as intrinsically negative frameworks in which social power works to exclude or marginalize those who are different.” (Crenshaw, 1991) Seeing this, we get a distinct understanding that we should eliminate these structures as well as certain features of feminism and racial liberation. That way, we are able to be a form of equality for all.
In identity politics, instead of transcending the differences between both male and females, differences are inflated. If there are differences within groups that are clearly getting ignored, like sexual violence against Black women in Black communities, then tension will spread among groups (Crenshaw, 1991). Thus, intersectionality shines a light on the politics of violence against women, specifically women of color. We can all share the space of intersectionality. However, we have to remember that a woman, better yet a woman of color, does not have the advantages of men of color. So when violence is placed on them, it gets ignored. Crenshaw said it best: “Although racism and sexism readily intersect in the lives of real people, they seldom do in feminist and antiracist practices. And so, when the practices expound identity as woman or person of color as an either/or proposition, they relegate the identity of women of color to a location that resists telling” (Crenshaw, 1991). As such, with the violence against Black women in the urban and Caribbean community, it gets to the point that when Black women need to be protected or be met with the same reverence that is offered to White women, Black women just get ignored. That is a problem that my research will address, especially when race, gender, class, income, and even the effect of anti-intersectional policies have on Black women's mental health.
Crenshaw, K. (1991). Mapping the margins: Intersectionality, identity politics, and violence against women of color. Stanford Law Review 43(6), 1241-1300.