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Gender Talk: The Struggle for Women's Equality in African American Communities
Why has the African American community remained silent about gender even as race has moved to the forefront of our nation’s consciousness? In this important new book, two of the nation’s leading African American intellectuals offer a resounding and far-reaching answer to a question that has been ignored for far too long. Hard-hitting and brilliant in its analysis of culture and sexual politics, Gender Talk asserts boldly that gender matters are critical to the Black community in the twenty-first century.
In the Black community, rape, violence against women, and sexual harassment are as much the legacy of slavery as is racism. Johnnetta Betsch Cole and Beverly Guy-Sheftall argue powerfully that the only way to defeat this legacy is to focus on the intersection of race and gender.
Gender Talk examines why the “race problem” has become so male-centered and how this has opened a deep divide between Black women and men. The authors turn to their own lives, offering intimate accounts of their experiences as daughters, wives, and leaders. They examine pivotal moments in African American history when race and gender issues collided with explosive results—from the struggle for women’s suffrage in the nineteenth century to women’s attempts to gain a voice in the Black Baptist movement and on into the 1960s, when the Civil Rights movement and the upsurge of Black Power transformed the Black community while sidelining women.
Along the way, they present the testimonies of a large and influential group of Black women and men, including bell hooks, Faye Wattleton, Byllye Avery, Cornell West, Robin DG Kelley, Michael Eric Dyson, Marcia Gillispie, and Dorothy Height.
Provding searching analysis into the present, Cole and Guy-Sheftall uncover the cultural assumptions and attitudes in hip-hop and rap, in the O.J. Simpson and Mike Tyson trials, in the Million Men and Million Women Marches, and in the battle over Clarence Thomas’s appointment to the Supreme Court. Fearless and eye-opening, Gender Talk is required reading for anyone concerned with the future of African American women—and men.
In the Black community, rape, violence against women, and sexual harassment are as much the legacy of slavery as is racism. Johnnetta Betsch Cole and Beverly Guy-Sheftall argue powerfully that the only way to defeat this legacy is to focus on the intersection of race and gender.
Gender Talk examines why the “race problem” has become so male-centered and how this has opened a deep divide between Black women and men. The authors turn to their own lives, offering intimate accounts of their experiences as daughters, wives, and leaders. They examine pivotal moments in African American history when race and gender issues collided with explosive results—from the struggle for women’s suffrage in the nineteenth century to women’s attempts to gain a voice in the Black Baptist movement and on into the 1960s, when the Civil Rights movement and the upsurge of Black Power transformed the Black community while sidelining women.
Along the way, they present the testimonies of a large and influential group of Black women and men, including bell hooks, Faye Wattleton, Byllye Avery, Cornell West, Robin DG Kelley, Michael Eric Dyson, Marcia Gillispie, and Dorothy Height.
Provding searching analysis into the present, Cole and Guy-Sheftall uncover the cultural assumptions and attitudes in hip-hop and rap, in the O.J. Simpson and Mike Tyson trials, in the Million Men and Million Women Marches, and in the battle over Clarence Thomas’s appointment to the Supreme Court. Fearless and eye-opening, Gender Talk is required reading for anyone concerned with the future of African American women—and men.
336 pages, Hardcover
First published February 4, 2003
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April 27, 2024not taking intro to women's studies with dr. guy-sheftall is going to haunt me until my dying day
July 18, 2016
Johnnetta Betsch Cole is a former college president and academic scholar with a research focus in African American studies and women’s issues. Beverly Guy-Sheftall is a professor of Women’s Studies at Spelman College.
This scholarly work is a compilation of review of literature, analysis of other studies, and dialogue with countless women and men about the issues surrounding race and gender for African American women. The underlying theoretical framework is Black Feminist Thought while qualitative methods were used in gathering, conducting, and analyzing the data. The researchers included as many personal narratives as possible to allow African American women to use their own voices to explain the trauma often associated with gender and/or racial discrimination. The foundation of this work rest with the idea that the personal is political. The Combahee River Collective (1983) defines the undercurrent of the sister circle idea. The formation of NOW, the single most powerful feminist organization is detailed with the truth of lack of involvement of women of color. They devote an entire chapter to presenting the case of why African American women must have the voices heard. Research must be conducted to share information about women of color while using narratives of their voices. The authors also include the silence of the Black church, the marginalization of hip hop culture, and the exclusion of the Black lesbian community. The books ends with a call to action for systemic change. Various ideas are offered to effectively change the systems that continue to enslave our words, thoughts and deeds. Most of all they encourage us to tell our stories in whatever way possible.
This scholarly work is a compilation of review of literature, analysis of other studies, and dialogue with countless women and men about the issues surrounding race and gender for African American women. The underlying theoretical framework is Black Feminist Thought while qualitative methods were used in gathering, conducting, and analyzing the data. The researchers included as many personal narratives as possible to allow African American women to use their own voices to explain the trauma often associated with gender and/or racial discrimination. The foundation of this work rest with the idea that the personal is political. The Combahee River Collective (1983) defines the undercurrent of the sister circle idea. The formation of NOW, the single most powerful feminist organization is detailed with the truth of lack of involvement of women of color. They devote an entire chapter to presenting the case of why African American women must have the voices heard. Research must be conducted to share information about women of color while using narratives of their voices. The authors also include the silence of the Black church, the marginalization of hip hop culture, and the exclusion of the Black lesbian community. The books ends with a call to action for systemic change. Various ideas are offered to effectively change the systems that continue to enslave our words, thoughts and deeds. Most of all they encourage us to tell our stories in whatever way possible.
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews