scholarly journals Black Women’s Activism in Brazil: Black Genocide, Anti-Blackness and Racial Apartheid

2020 ◽  
Vol 2 (3) ◽  
pp. 172-182
Author(s):  
Kenneth Williamson,

This article focuses on changes in Black women’s activism, particularly in Salvador, Bahia, Brazil, from 1995-2015, by comparing two national marches. Black organizations throughout the country came together to organize a national march in national’s capital Brasilia in November 1995.  Twenty years later in November 2015, Black women organized a national march to address the intersection of racism and sexism. During those twenty years, Black activists worked tirelessly against Black genocide, anti-Blackness and racial apartheid in Brazil, and Black women stood on the frontlines of these struggles. The intersectionality of race, class, and gender were and remain critical to the activism of Black women and to the production of research and knowledge. The paper examines the changes activism in the Black movement over twenty years that marked the growth on Black women’s organizations and networks.

2009 ◽  
Vol 42 (02) ◽  
pp. 291-294 ◽  
Author(s):  
Frances B. Henderson

After an exhausting 22-hour trip from St. Louis, I landed in Maputo, Mozambique, alone, for the first time in July 2003 to begin my dissertation research on women and women's organizations in Mozambique since democratization. I spent an hour talking to a young man who was returning home (to Maputo) from Brazil. Seeing it as an opportunity to practice my Portuguese with someone who spoke English, I did not realize that an hour had passed and my “welcoming party” still had not arrived. The young man and I switched from Portuguese to English as he began telling me the “cool places to hang out and get a drink” in Maputo. I had no idea who was coming to pick me up as I was armed only with the information that it was my in-country advisor's brother who would be there. As this young man and I were talking someone came up to me and asked, “Are you Frances?” With a sigh of relief, I said yes, and he replied, “I was here all of the time and I did not realize that you were here until I heard you speaking English with this young man. I did not recognize you; we thought you would be white.”


Meridians ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 19 (S1) ◽  
pp. 513-521
Author(s):  
Claudia Ferreira ◽  
Adriana Medeiros

Abstract These three brief pieces formed part of a two-part special issue (vol. 4, nos. 1 and 2, 2016) on Afro-Descendant Feminisms in Latin America. The unprecedented nationwide mobilizational process that culminated in the first-ever Marcha das Mulheres Negras contra o Racismo e a Violência e pelo Bem Viver (Black Women’s March against Racism and Violence and for Living Well), which brought tens of thousands of Black women to Brasília on November 18, 2015, is described in an opening essay by Alvarez. It is followed by one of the several Manifestos produced by Marcha organizers, which captures the core political and theoretical issues discussed in hundreds of events across every sector of Afro-descendant women’s activism and women from the mixed-gender Brazilian Black movement as well. Finally, a photo essay by Brazilian photographers Claudia Ferreira and Adriana Medeiros offers a vivid glimpse into what many consider a watershed moment in the Afro-Brazilian feminist movement.


2018 ◽  
Vol 15 (03) ◽  
pp. 572-598 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ashley English

AbstractThough the concept of intersectionality has been in circulation for nearly 30 years and women's organizations have long been criticized for failing to prioritize the concerns of women of color, poor women, and LGBTQ women, more research is needed to determine precisely why women's organizations do and do not discuss those intersectional identities during policy debates. This study analyzes 1,021 comments that women's organizations submitted to rulemakers to test a series of hypotheses about how women's organizations’ references to women's intersectional identities increase or decrease depending on the organization's primary constituency and ideology, the proposed rule's target population, and other features of the policy-making context. Using automated text analysis and a series of models, it shows that women's organizations do discuss intersectionally marginalized women in their comments. However, not all subgroups of women are equally represented during the process. Women's organizations focus on women's sexual orientations and gender identities more than their races, ethnicities, nationalities, or socioeconomic statuses. Intersectionally marginalized women also tend to receive the most attention when commenters are from organizations that are explicitly focused on representing intersectionally marginalized women and when bureaucrats include references to intersectionally marginalized women in their proposed rules.


2012 ◽  
Vol 47 (2) ◽  
pp. 612-651
Author(s):  
RADHIKA GOVINDA

AbstractIn this paper I take the women's movement as the site for unpacking some of the strains and tensions involved in practical interpretations of secularism in present-day India. Several sources within and outside the movement point out that there has been a tendency to take the existence of secularism for granted, and that the supposedly secular idioms and symbols used for mobilizing women have been drawn from Hindu religio-cultural sources. Women from Dalit and religious minority communities have felt alienated by this. Hindu nationalists have cleverly appropriated these idioms and symbols to mobilize women as foot soldiers to further religious nationalism. Through a case-study of a grassroots women's NGO working in Uttar Pradesh, I seek to explore how women's organizations may be reshaping their agendas and activism to address this issue. Specifically, I will examine how and why the 2002 Gujarat riots affected the NGO, the ways in which it has started working on the issue of communal harmony and engaging with Muslims since the riots, and the challenges with which it has been confronted as a result of its efforts. In doing so, I will show how the complexities of NGO-based women's activism have become intertwined with the politics of secularism.


1998 ◽  
Vol 59 (1) ◽  
pp. 57-73 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rhoda Reddock

In this paper I explore the emergence of women's organizations and feminist consciousness in the twentieth century in the English-speaking (Commonwealth) Caribbean. The global ideas concerning women's equality from the 1960s onwards clearly informed the initiatives taken by both women and states of the Caribbean. None the less, the paper illustrates, by use of examples, the interlocked nature of women's struggles with the economic, social and political issues which preoccupy the region's population. I examine in greater detail two case studies of women's activism and mobilization around the impact of structural adjustment policies in the two territories of Jamaica and Trinidad and Tobago. By tracing the connections between and among the organizations and initiatives of women in the region, the paper situates the feminist movement in the English-speaking Caribbean as a continuously evolving one, fusing episodic struggles in different territories, engaging women of different classes and groups, and continuously building on past experience.


Sister Style ◽  
2021 ◽  
pp. 172-182
Author(s):  
Nadia E. Brown ◽  
Danielle Casarez Lemi

The concluding chapter of this book contextualizes the political implications of Black women’s appearances for both political elites and voters. The chapter centers on Black women’s activism around natural hair and its connection to politics and policy. The natural hair movement signals not just a styling preference but also a way for Black women political elites to descriptively represent constituents. In this chapter, the authors provide a summary of the findings of their study and offer insights into Black women’s representation. The chapter ends by asking readers to assess the values that they ascribe to a Black woman political elite based on what she looks like.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Agnes Meinhard ◽  
Stephanie Schwartz ◽  
Femida Handy

This paper is part of a larger project investigating the relative roles of ideology and gender composition in determining organizational structure and behavior. The project’s genesis arose from a study by Meinhard and Foster (2003) that found that Canadian women’s voluntary organizations (WVOs) differed from gender-neutral and men’s organizations on many different measures. Women’s organizations were less likely to adopt a business orientation or pursue new revenue strategies, but were more likely to collaborate with other organizations and more likely to downsize. They also tended to be more pessimistic in their outlook and engaged in more advocacy and political action. Meinhard and Foster (2003) also found that among women’s organizations, those that were members of the Canadian National Action Committee on the Status of Women (NAC), an umbrella organization for feminist groups, were more extreme in their differences. In other words, although both NAC and non-NAC organizations differed significantly from gender-neutral organizations, NAC organizations differed the most. Keywords: CVSS, Centre for Voluntary Sector Studies, Working Paper Series,TRSM, Ted Rogers School of Management Citation:


Author(s):  
Rebecca Tuuri

This chapter explores the first three decades of the National Council of Negro Women (NCNW). In 1935, educator, clubwoman, and politician Mary McLeod Bethune founded the NCNW as an organization of black women's organizations to create a united lobbying voice. By utilizing a strategy of broker politics, the NCNW opened up professional opportunities for black women and lobbied for civil rights legislation. NCNW women also enforced strict standards of respectability as they sought such power. While the NCNW claimed to speak on behalf of all black women, a majority of its membership came from black sororities. This college-based membership, as well as the council's focus on black professionalization, meant that many working class women viewed the organization as elitist and uninterested in their concerns. However, beginning in the mid 1950s and continuing through the 1960s, the NCNW became more significantly involved in civil rights and the needs of the poor.


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