Transgender History: The Roots of Today's Revolution

by Susan Stryker

In 1973, black feminists in New York, some of whom had been involved in the civil rights movement, the Black Panthers, and the Black Lesbian Caucus of the GLF, recognized the necessity of forming a separate group, the National Black Feminist Organization. Inspired by this activism, Boston-area black feminists formed the Combahee River Collective the next year. The Combahee River Collective Statement, crafted over the next few years, remains a touchstone of black and intersectional feminism and provides an important foundation for trans-inclusive feminist politics. Collective members noted that they felt “a great deal of criticism” of male sexism and “loathed” that many men were socialized to be macho and oppressive toward women, but they also stated: “We do not have the misguided notion that it is their maleness per se—i.e., their biological maleness—that makes them what they are. As black women, we find any kind of biological determinism a particularly dangerous and reactionary basis on which to build a politic.”