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Intersectionality, Lost in Translation? (Re)Thinking Inter-Sections Between Anglophone and Francophone Intersectionality

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Intersectionality, Lost in Translation? (Re)Thinking Inter-Sections Between Anglophone and Francophone Intersectionality Intersectionality, Lost in Translation? (Re)thinking Inter-sections between Anglophone and Francophone Intersectionality Intersectionality, Lost in Translation? Alexandre Baril’s interdisciplinary training combines The title of this article could have been, “All ten years in philosophy and ethics and a PhD in Wom- feminist intersectional analyses are Anglophone, all en’s Studies. After working as a visiting professor in Francophone feminists are cisgender, but some of us Feminist, Gender, and Sexuality Studies at Wesleyan are brave,” in homage to Gloria T. Hull, Patricia Bell University and as an assistant professor with a limit- Scott, and Barbara Smith’s (1982) celebrated collection, ed-term appointment in Feminist and Gender Studies All the Women are White, All the Men are Black, But at the University of Ottawa, Dr. Baril received an Iza- Some of Us Are Brave: Black Women’s Studies—the ti- ak Walton Killam Postdoctoral Fellowship to pursue tle of which has become one of the most popular for- his work on trans* and disability/crip politics in the mulations of intersectionality in the decades since its Department of Political Science at Dalhousie Universi- publication. Although intersectionality has since be- ty. His work has been published in Hypatia: Journal of come a veritable “buzzword” (Davis 2008) across dis- Feminist Philosophy, Feminist Review, Annual Review of ciplines, its history, significance, and use vary from Critical Psychology, Journal of Literary & Cultural Dis- language to language. Questions of language power ability Studies, and Disability & Society. relations, however, remain almost entirely absent from Anglophone feminist intersectional analyses. Kimberlé Abstract Crenshaw’s (1991) initial theorization of intersectional- Inspired by the intersectional formulation “All the ity denounced monolingualism as a significant barrier Women are White, All the Men are Black,” this paper for many non-Anglophone American women and, yet, suggests that “all feminist intersectional analyses are her invitation to theorize language has not been tak- Anglophone and all Francophone feminists are cisgen- en up in the development and institutionalization of der” to highlight the exclusion of language issues in An- intersectionality in the last twenty-five years. With the glophone intersectional analyses and of trans issues in rare and notable exceptions of non-American authors their Francophone counterparts. like Ann Denis (2008), Marie-Hélène Bourcier (2011), Helma Lutz, Maria Teresa Herrera Vivar, and Linda Su- Résumé pik (2011), and Chantal Maillé (2012, 2014), linguistic Inspirés par la formulation intersectionnelle « Toutes les power relations have attracted little attention in En- femmes sont blanches, tous les hommes sont noirs », cet glish-language conferences and publications in feminist article suggère que « toutes les analyses féministes inter- and gender studies where intersectional approaches are sectionnelles sont anglophones et toutes les féministes the norm. I call the combined institutionalization and francophones sont cisgenres » pour souligner l’exclu- Anglicization of intersectionality the “institutio-an- sion des problèmes de langue dans les analyses intersec- glicization of intersectionality.” This phenomenon has tionnelles anglophones et des problèmes « transgenre » both allowed intersectionality to take hold in the acade- dans leurs homologues francophones. my and normalized it through a distinctly Anglophone understanding. In non-Anglophone milieus, particularly in the Francophone communities that are the focus of this ar- ticle, intersectionality initially received a chilly recep- tion. I will show that Francophone feminists’ resistance to intersectionality is due, in part, to institutio-angli- 125 Atlantis 38.1, 2017 www.msvu.ca/atlantis cization. Despite its initial failure to gain ground in question: What are the limits and potentialities of the Francophone circles, intersectionality has become a translation and inter-sections (understood as both in- “hit concept” (Dorlin 2012) over the last five years. Ma- terconnections and sections/divides) of Francophone jor French-language journals in feminist and gender and Anglophone feminist intersectional analyses? I studies, political science, social work, and the social propose an analysis of these limits and potentialities sciences and humanities have recently published their guided by an intersectional formulation in which “all first special issues on intersectional analyses (original feminist intersectional analyses are Anglophone and translations of special issue titles provided): L’Homme all Francophone feminists are cisgender.” This inter- et la Société (2011, “Feminist Prisms: What is Inter- sectional “analytical tool” is useful to “amplify and sectionality?”); Politique et Sociétés (2014, “Intersec- highlight specific problems” (Crenshaw 2011, 232) that tionality: Domination, Exploitation, Resistance, and are the central concern of this article: the exclusion of Emancipation”); Nouvelles pratiques sociales (2014, language issues in Anglophone intersectional analyses “Intersectionality: Theoretical Reflections and Uses in and of trans issues in their Francophone counterparts. Feminist Research and Intervention”); Interrogations? I hope not only that pointing out the “failures” of these Revue pluridisciplinaire de sciences humaines et socia- communities’ intersectional analyses will enrich their les (2015, “Thinking About Intersectionality”); andRe - approaches, but that it will also permit us to (re)think cherches Féministes (2015, “Intersectionalities”). While solidarities between the communities themselves. Francophone academics who use intersectionality are To do this, I combine critical genealogy, de- more likely to discuss language issues than their An- construction, and auto-ethnographic methodology. glophone counterparts, Anglophone intersectional The first of this article’s three sections addresses the analyses are increasingly more likely to problematize absence of problematization of Anglonormativity and other topics and axes of oppression, such as transpho- language issues in feminist intersectional analyses in bia (or cisnormativity) as yet completely absent from English. The second, after briefly considering factors Francophone intersectional analyses. For example, as I that have hindered the popularization of intersection- will show, in a sample of 15 key Francophone texts on ality in Francophone feminist circles until recently, feminism and intersectionality, only one makes a sin- including Anglonormativity, shows that Francophone gle mention of trans issues amidst lengthy enumera- feminists disregard trans issues, currently a central tions of other oppressions. Simply stated, Anglophone topic in many intersectional analyses in English. The feminists seem to forget that they have a language (En- third section, based on an auto-ethnographic analy- glish) and Francophone feminists seem to forget that sis inspired by my experience as a transgender, Fran- they have a gender identity (cisgender, i.e. non-trans- cophone man, sketches a possible future for those gender). “brave” trans Francophones at the crossroads of these As with other ideas, theories, and political inter-sections. To conclude, I invite a (re)thinking of tools, “intersectionality travels” (Crenshaw 2011, 221- possible alliances suggested by the inter-sections be- 223). In its travels, intersectionality encounters varying tween Anglophone and Francophone intersectional degrees of enthusiasm in different national, linguistic, analyses. cultural, and political contexts; meets with resistance; adapts and is adapted; alters and is altered; and trans- “All Feminist Intersectional Analyses are Anglophone” forms and is transformed, particularly through the processes of linguistic translation, but also via social, The occasion for this article was a two-day seminar on the cultural, and political translation. As Patricia Hill Col- subject of ‘intersectionality’ that I recently gave during a lins (2012) asks: “What, if anything, has been lost in visiting stint at a university in Germany. To my surprise, the current translation [of intersectionality]? What, the seminar…drew interest from Ph.D. candidates and if anything, might be gained via a new translation?” colleagues from cities throughout the region, all prepared (n.p.). Inspired by these two theorists and using the to sacrifice their weekend and put aside their language dif- analogy of intersectionality’s travels in Anglophone ficulties (the seminar was in English) in order to partici- and Francophone communities, I ask the following pate. (Davis 2008, 67) 126 Atlantis 38.1, 2017 www.msvu.ca/atlantis Although Kathy Davis (2008) uses neither the and social organizations might be rethought in ways expression “institutio-anglicization” nor “institution- that take a variety of people’s language skills into con- alization” in her discussion of intersectionality, her sideration. article is dedicated to understanding the growing pop- A significant obstacle to recognizing that ularity of this concept within Anglo-American con- non-Anglophone people’s language “difficulties” are texts and a wide variety of other national contexts. societal is the fact that Anglophone identity, like many She states that this seminar was given in Germany in other dominant identities, is unmarked and remains English. What is interesting about this is how Davis, invisible to the Anglonormative gaze. Despite the ex- like many Anglophone theorists
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