Representational Intersectionality and persons of mixed races

Representational Intersectionality Beyond Race:
Persons of Mixed Races and Categories of “Otherness” in Feminist Studies
Intersectionality is not simply a popular term in academia or a hot buzzword in the popular discourse. It is something that feminism must come to terms with to make a difference in people’s lives and to change the ways in which women are represented and their ability to access social justice. The term intersectionality was coined by scholar Kimberlé Crenshaw in 1989, referring to how identity is based upon an interconnected web of social categorizations such as “race, class, and gender” rather than something that could solely be reduced to a singular category, such as gender (“What Is Intersectionality,” 2017, par. 5). The category of gender, Crenshaw notes, also includes sexuality, given the extent to which non-heterosexual women were likewise excluded from many of the concerns of 20th century feminism at the time she coined the term (“What Is Intersectionality,” 2017). Without intersectionality, it was impossible on a legal as well as a theoretical level to address the complexities of economic discrimination women of color were facing, believed Crenshaw (Adewunmi, 2014).
Crenshaw was writing in response to the prevailing notion among many feminists that gender alone was the most salient category for categorizing their lived experience. For women of color, quite simply this was not always the case. And even if they were in situations where gender impacted their sense of self and being, it was not necessarily in the same manner as their white, female counterparts. A good example of this from earlier variations of Second Wave Feminism was the extent to which the ability of women to work was framed with the 20th century by works such as The Feminine Mystique. Early middle-class female advocates of feminism protested that women not being permitted to work after marriage was a serious issue in their disenfranchisement, given this rendered them dependent upon men. It also gave them little stimulation or outlet for their frustrated intellectual impulses, even if they had gone to university. In stark contrast, African-American women, by and large, had to work to support their families—sometimes extended families, rather than the nuclear family that was the focus of feminism during that era. They also had to face racism in the form of discrimination against themselves, which prohibited them from securing employment other than as domestic servants, cooks, and other menial occupations. And, of course, many African-American women had historically been barred from institutions of higher learning or lacked the economic means to attend college.
Of course, white women likewise faced discrimination which limited their advancement in school and the workplace. But intersectionality acknowledges the differences in experiences of different women, based upon their various status in regards to race and class, as well as gender. For African-American women, the issues was seldom the ability to work, but how their personhood was acknowledged in work and personal contexts. Furthermore, by acknowledging that access to working opportunities was not in and of itself enough, feminists of all backgrounds could benefit, since the ability to work for less money, promotional prospects, and lower pay than a man was hardly something to aspire to as an employee and a woman.
Of course, intersectionality can and must be framed up as something even more complex than simply white women versus African-American women. The concept of intersectionality suggests women of mixed race, for example, may face further pressures that complicate their relationship with the self and society, including feeling pressure to choose membership in one category or another. It adds complexity to the idea of racial polarization as well, since women of multiple racial identity categories may not see themselves as part of such an oppositional binary.
Intersectionality is postmodern in the sense that it accepts that there is no singular, linear narrative for all women’s experiences. It is useful given the growing acceptance of the enlargement of the category of women, such as transwomen, who again may have different biological as well as social experiences than cis-gendered women. Even if race is acknowledged as a highly fluid and constructed category, the experience of being of a different race can have a significant impact on how someone is treated, and therefore upon the individual’s life.
To hold race at arm’s distance and to suggest it is a separate category is a refusal to understand the extent to which race is a socially constructed category with a significant impact upon all people of both genders. It is also important to understand how women of color experience race and gender in a distinct manner that is not always easily understood by white women, white men, or even men of color. On the other hand, this does not excuse people of different races from striving to understand the experiences of people of other races and fetishizing their differences. This is yet another reason why, as noted by bell hooks in her essay, “Eating the Other,” it is also important not to fetishize or render what is characterized as “the other” in an exotic fashion. “When race and ethnicity become commodi?ed as resources for pleasure, the culture of speci?c groups, as well as the bodies of individuals, can be seen as constituting an alternative playground where members of dominating races, genders, sexual practices af?rm their power-over in intimate relations with the Other,” hooks notes (hooks, 1992, par.5).
Fetishizing of difference ultimately means creating a static category of race that is self-enclosed, while the varied experiences of people of color highlight how false that is; even people of African ancestry may have distinct encounters in America based upon personal history, such as someone who is an immigrant from West Africa and primarily defines his or her experience in terms of an immigrant’s experience, versus someone who is the child of slaves and does not have palpable and distinct cultural connection to another nation. Again, this is not a question of suggesting that one encounter is more valid, authentic, or better but rather to acknowledge that subtle and nuanced differences may be present.
The challenge of intersectionality, of course, is that it is entirely built upon nuances that many people would rather avoid. Simplicity, particularly in regards to issues of politics, is often preferred, even though people’s identification is anything but simple. “Oftentimes, it is easier to believe and to explain to others that ‘all women feel’ a certain way or that ‘LGBTQ+ people believe’ some common understanding, but this does not reflect reality. We must recognize that all unique experiences of identity, and particularly ones that involve multiple overlapping oppressions, are valid” (“What Is Intersectionality,” 2017, par. 14). This reminder is also in reference to the fact that although intersectionality may be defamed as a highfalutin germ with little reference to lived reality, it is actually more reflective of the complex reality that most people of all races encounter.
Essentializing race as something that cannot be understood, or which is an easy-to-bracket category, hooks notes, is to deny the extent to which it permeates society in subtle ways. Merely including more people of color in advertising or in token fashion television does not eradicate the historical injustices which have been done in the past, and the extent to which they still impact the lived realities of the present. Moreover, the question then arises as to who is fully representative and fit to stand in as a such a placeholder, given that no singular person’s identity and experience can be truly, fully representative of all.
References
Adewunmi, B. (2014). Kimberlé Crenshaw on intersectionality. The New Statesman.
Retrieved from: https://www.newstatesman.com/lifestyle/2014/04/kimberl-crenshaw- intersectionality-i-wanted-come-everyday-metaphor-anyone-could
Friedan, B. (2013). The feminine mystique: 50th anniversary edition. New York, NY: W.W.
Norton & Co.
hooks, bell. (1992). Eating the other.” In Black looks: Race and representation. Boston: South
End Press, 1992. Retrieved from: https://genius.com/Bell-hooks-eating-the-other-desire- and-resistance-annotated
What is intersectionality, and what does it have to do with me? (2017). YW Boston. Retrieved
from: https://www.ywboston.org/2017/03/what-is-intersectionality-and-what-does-it- have-to-do-with-me/