Role Of Intersectionality In African American Women

The film is called the Urgency of Intersectionality by a speaker named Kimberle Crenshaw. The director has done a fantastic job with this film I find it very powerful and touching. I feel like this film is a part of a movement because at the beginning of this film Kimberle Crenshaw asked the audience to stand up, and she said to stand up if anyone in the audience know who these people are. Then she started to naming each individual who were African-American males who were the victims of police brutality. As she spoke on she then proceeded to name the African-American women who were also victims of police brutality for the past two years. Then the audience began to sit down.

The third stage of Black racial identity development refers to the immersion stage. This depicts the juncture in life when a black American’s viewpoints transform from the pre-encounter stage to a phase of enlightenment. These people have a broader awareness of the Black experience and embraces the Black culture, and its morals, virtues, and values. They take pride in the Black race and find beauty and perfection in Blackness. Dr. Cross asserts this phase to be similar to a religious conversion. Individuals within this stage usually focus on “all things Black”. They express rage and hostility towards the White race and reject its culture, while glorifying their

My research proposal will focus on the different issues African American women face while trying to advance within society. I will discuss how these women are paid less because they are women as well as African American. I will also be comparing their struggles to Black men, and White men and women. My next topic will include how these women are often discriminated against. And finally I will discuss how these women are often over looked for receiving promotions at work, even if they obtain more experience.

I am applying intersectionality and the sociological imagination to my intersecting identities: class, gender, and ethnicity. By employing intersectionality and the sociological imagination, I am analyzing how my positionality affected my personal experiences while connecting those events with society. I also included five peer-reviewed articles as supporting evidence.

Everyone is raised within a culture with a set of customs and morals handed down by those generations before them. Most individual’s view and experience identity in different ways. During history, different ethnic groups have struggled with finding their place within society. In the mid-nineteen hundreds, African Americans faced a great deal of political and social discrimination based on the tone of their skin. After the Civil Rights Movement, many African Americans no longer wanted to be identified by their African American lifestyle, so they began to practice African culture by taking on African hairdos, African-influenced clothing, and adopting African names. By turning away from their roots, many African Americans embraced a culture that was not inherited, thus putting behind the unique and significant characteristics

This paper discusses the experiences of African American Women under slavery during the Slave Trade, their exploitation, the secrecy, the variety of tasks and positions of slave women, slave and ex-slave narratives, and significant contributions to history. Also, this paper presents the hardships African American women faced and the challenges they overcame to become equal with men in today’s society. Slavery was a destructive experience for African Americans especially women. Black women suffered doubly during the slave era.

However, that didn’t stop racist, white patriarchs from brutally raping millions of African women for the sole purpose of increasing their slave count. Race breeding was an act of terrorism done to these women in America. They were repeatedly impregnated again and again. They suffered from aching backs, swollen knees and ankles, multiple miscarriages, unsanitary facilities while giving birth, and they still had to work extensive hours laboring on the fields. The black woman’s identity was ripped to shreds by imperialism white supremacy patriarchy during slavery, an effect that has trickled down into future generations. Globally, the black woman has been demoralized and tarnished for generations to come after the end of slavery.

On the very first day of the class, Introduction to the Black Experience, we learned that people are defined by their culture and geography. We are also defined by the gaze of others and our own gaze. This realization led me to contemplate what the “black experience” means to me. As a first generation Haitian-American woman at Wellesley College, it has become clearer to me how important the language and culture of parents has been in shaping my identity. I have also begun to think more critically about how my identity as a woman of color separates me from black brothers as well as my white peers at Wellesley.

81% of Black adults reported that they have experienced at least one incident of day-to-day discrimination. And Adolescence is a stage in which to examine the impact of racial discrimination on the psychological part of African Americans (Racial Identity Matters). Which can cause a person to be scared expectably if someone has already confined in themselves of their race. "My siblings had already instilled the notion of black pride in me. I would have preferred that Mommy were black. Now, as a grown man, I feel privileged to have come from two worlds" (McBride 103). It was easier to accept the black

(p 64). The author states, “This interior space of self-definition draws us into the complicated gender and class spaces of racial othering. Thus, conceiving of Black people, men and women, as historical and material subjects,” (p 64).

Black girls in schools are thus given labels and stereotypes based on their way of dressing, speaking and acting at school. The author clearly states that black girls in American schools are devalued by the

Some women falter to their low self-esteems and anger, and make decisions to be sexually promiscuous and binge on drugs and alcohol, while some are infuriated by the prejudice against them and work tirelessly to repeal it. Racial discrimination has been highlighted as a contributing factor to health disparities that Black women face. In regards to health, black women in the United States are more prone to experience more chronic physical and mental health conditions than those of other racial identities (Jerald et. Al, 2017). Although several factors cause these health disparities, racism and sexism plays a significant role, and these phenomena are further spread by overarching stereotypes.

The article titled, Black Women Thought; Matrix of Domination, by Patricia Hill Collins explores the oppression of African-American women. While there is also a theme of individual empowerment, Collins’ ends the article by stating, “only collective action can effectively generate lasting social transformation of political and economic institutions” (cite). I believe Collins’ motivation for this article was to bring awareness and to inspire change.

Society continues to nurture these depriving situations and demonstrate lack of concern towards black women by not celebrating them for the roles they played in the movements. Taylor (1998) asserted that, “despite the fact that the most celebrated leaders of the modern civil rights movements were men, African American women participated at every stage in the struggle for justice and equality” (239). Although black women were not in public eyes during these movements, it was their vision and organizing roles they played that helped in the progression of many liberation movements.

There are many interpretations of intersectionality, but without a doubt, the critical theory of intersectionality is based on the understanding that oppressive institutions within society take different forms for specific cultural and social positions of individuals and groups. Among the concerns in the article, Joan Simalchik and Hunter College Women’s and Gender Studies Collective discuss the ways in which intersectionality provides a better understanding of how relations of power and privilege and the intersection of gender and race influence women’s everyday lives.