Queer Black Feminism: the Pleasure Principle Author(S): Laura Alexandra Harris Source: Feminist Review, No

Queer Black Feminism: The Pleasure Principle Author(s): Laura Alexandra Harris Source: Feminist Review, No. 54, Contesting Feminine Orthodoxies (Autumn, 1996), pp. 3-30 Published by: Palgrave Macmillan Journals Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/1395608 Accessed: 09-01-2016 19:46 UTC

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This content downloaded from 130.58.64.71 on Sat, 09 Jan 2016 19:46:13 UTC All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions Queer Black Feminism: The Pleasure Principle

Laura Alexandra Harris

Abstract = In thiscritical personal narrative Harris explores some of the gapsbetween con- < ceptionsof feministthought and feministpractice. Harris focuses on an analysis c of race,class, and desiredivisions within feminist sexual politics. She suggests a S queerblack feminist theory and practice that calls into question naturalized identi- ° ties and communities,and thereforewhat feminism and feministpractices might >

. H ental . t

Keywords X queer;black; feminism; fem; pop-feminism -

The title of my essay reflectsmy expectations:articulating a useful queer black feministcriticism located at the intersectionsof pop culture, intel- lectualculture, and culturesof race, class, and sexuality.In one bold line, I level the entangled terrain of pleasure and politics in feminist, black feminist,and queer theory by equatingtheir triple significationwith the direct value of Janet Jackson'spop-feminist pop song, 'You might think I'm crazy but I'm serious', if for only a brief maniacalmoment (Control, 1986). Even I know that the grammaticalpower of the colon does not extend that far, or provide an antidote to the too often silenced but fierceclash of class and race and sexualitythe emergenceof these critical theories represents.Instead, as I explore my own identifications,I will propose that queer black feminismcan rupturethe silences contained in the words and practicesof these theories. It can create and re-createits own alliancesof theories/practicesthat can begin to name, to loudly pro- claim, what queer black female sexualitiesmight entail. I suggest that it does so by explicitly foregroundingthe sexual politics of racializedand classed sexuality as a feminist practice, and by interrogatingthe many interstices between feminism as an academic discourse and feminist bodies. 33

This content downloaded from 130.58.64.71 on Sat, 09 Jan 2016 19:46:13 UTC All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions For instance,I want to acknowledgethe ways in whichmy desiresas a lesbianbut fem, as beingblack but 'light,bright, and damnnear white' (an old Louisianasaying) and as beinga feministbut froma particular class and culture reconfigurethe politics of reclaimingbodies and pleasure.I wantto speakout loudabout these complications and contradictions.But which categoryaddresses which complication?Should I speakto the historyof my blacknessas a blackfeminist or as a queer, or do I identifywith both becauseI am a lesbianof African-American descent?Often, black lesbian,and the way that descriptionof myself troublesidentity, are termsthat informeach other best aboutmy differences.Reducing queer to its bottomline - a positionopposed to norma- tive heterosexualregimes - seemsto indicatethat I am queerbecause I am a lesbian,black, and feminist.But am I only queerin relationto heteronormativityor perhapsalso in the very categorieswith which I cast my oppositionto it? Further,I want to considerhow claimingthis subjectivitydoes not simplyinform my positionwith power relations and systemsof oppressionbut enablesme and providesme with agency. Alreadymy equationdissembles as the termsare in dissonance,contra- diction, complex difficultieswith each other, with differingcultural spheres,and with Ms Jackson'snasty do-me desires. Will what I write be queer,or black,or feministat all?

I toyed with the possibilityof orderingthem differently- black queer feminist,black feminist queer, feminist black queer- of placingquestion marksbetween them, but concludedthat I havechosen for this essaythe best possibleorder. To me, the verygrouping of theseadjectives further heightensthe tensionfound in the definitionHazel Carby advocates for black feministcriticism, 'as a problem,not a solution,as a sign that should be interrogated,a locus of contradictions'(Carby, 1987: 15). Queerand blackallow me to underscorethat my relationshipto feminism, the theoriesand practicesthat emergedas the 'secondwave' in the 1970s and 1980s, is not in simplecorrelation with my genderbut neces- sarily,sometimes desperately, formed from an anglethat allows me to definemy feministidentifications rather than havethem defined for me. Queerand black allow me to bringthe personaland the politicaltogether withouthaving one circumscribethe other,to invokea criticalposition towardsprescriptive theories of oppressionand activism,and to open up the possibilityof productiveinsight into the emergingfeminisms of this decadeand theirinherent power relations. In this criticalpersonal narrative,the queermodifies and is modifiedby the blackwhich then doublymodifies the feminism.I contendthat as thesemultiple modifiers illuminatecontradictions and problemsthey producean axis where pleasureand politicsand feministbodies can compiletheir histories.

This content downloaded from 130.58.64.71 on Sat, 09 Jan 2016 19:46:13 UTC All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions Clearly,in this last decadeof the twentiethcentury, history has become 14 particularlyimportant for feminism. lX

Feminism,Lesbian Feminism, Women's Studies, Gay and LesbianStudies, z andQueer Theory seem to havereached a pointin universitydiscourse in l z the US in whichthey are the heated,exciting, and often conflicting topics of classroom,essay, and conferencedebate. At stakeare issuesof recog- nizingand theorizing difference, acquiring resources, visibility, representation, and ultimatelyinstitutional power: a powernot to be takenlightly. A lot of the swirlrevolves around the parametersof sexuality.Not sur- prising,considering the politicalnecessity for eachto put fortha theory of sexualpractice. Black feminist theory is likewisein turmoilover its parameters,its institutionalposition, and grappleswith the theorizingof sexuality.Revealingly, it only occasionallyfinds itself articulatedin l relationto the overdeterminingqueer and feministparadigms. Most often,this articulation is foundin specificallyblack organized conferences suchas 'BlackNations/Queer Nations?' in April1995 in New York.One of the manyprojects of thisconference was to explorethe waysin which queerand blackmodify each other'sconcept of nation.In this arena, black feministsplayed an importantrole in determiningsome of the issuesat stake.But, the dominantacademic exclusion of blackfeminism as 'other'discourse, not queer not feminist,has a history both far- reachingand contemporary. For instance,I thinkthis erasureof blackfeminist theory is evidencedin BarbaraSmith's 1977 positingof a black feministlesbian criticism in 'Towarda blackfeminist criticism' three years prior to AdrienneRich's 1980 articulationof a lesbiancontinuum critical approach in 'Compul- sory heterosexualityand lesbianexistence'. Rich's model oddly makes no referenceto Smith'sessay though it readsas lesbianone of the same ToniMorrison novels, Sula. Instead, Rich refers briefly to earlier,perhaps in her view less sexuallyradical, black feminist writers to supporther claims for a lesbiancontinuum. Is it becauseSmith's black feminist lesbianemphasis on the link betweensexual and racialpolitics under- scoresthe whiteprivilege implicit in Rich'stheoretical move to not read lesbianin relationto sexuality(Rich, 1980: 178)? In Smith'sessay, lesbianis the site for an expressionof blackfemale sexuality and desire historicallydenied and oppressed.Further, Smith focuses on an erotic romanticismin readingSula as a lesbiantext that is directlylinked to her theorizingof racializedconstructions of sexualitythat preventblack women from exploringtheir subjectivity(Smith, 1977: 166). In doing this, Smith'slesbian reading speaks loudly to Rich'stheoretical silence l about racializedsexuality: a silence imposedwhen Rich claims that blacklesbian continuums are parallelto white lesbiancontinuums as if n5

This content downloaded from 130.58.64.71 on Sat, 09 Jan 2016 19:46:13 UTC All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions > they exist unaffectedby the power relationsbetween white and black s femaleracial and sexualprivilege (Rich, 1980: 198). This privileging,of ', course,being the verysystem of oppressionSmith's black feminist lesbian *- approachis in largepart intent upon unravelling.Similar to this histori- ° callyfeminist precedent much of the dominantcritical theorizing of gay, lesbian,queer and feministpositions gestures towards difference but dis- F | regardsmany of the complexitiesthat blackfeminist theory has already zs raisedabout differences.

In EvelynnHammonds' 'Black (w)holes and the geometryof blackfemale sexuality'(1994), she framesthe continueddilemma by questioning whetherthe feministshifts between lesbian and queercan dismantlethe invisibilityand silencethat haveenshrouded conceptions of blackfemale sexuality.Rather than spendthe inordinateamount of spacerequired to take whitefeminist/queer theorists to task for their'failure to articulate a conceptionof racializedsexuality', she analysesthe ways in whichthe structureof this academicdiscourse, framed by historicalinstitutions of racism, homophobia,and inequality,has compelledblack feminist theoryto enactits own silenceand erasureabout black female sexuality (Hammonds,1994: 127). Hammondsargues that sexualinvisibility as a necessaryhistorical and politicalstrategy for blackwomen has contri- butedto blackfeminisms' hesitance to do muchmore than analysethe restrictionsand oppressionsof black femalesexuality, as opposedto being empoweredto explorethe possibilitiesof agencyand pleasure (Hammonds,1994: 134). TestingHammonds' claims about institution- ally enforcedblack feminist reticence on the issueof sexuality,I imagine giving a paper on intraracialcolour spectrumsand butch-femerotic dynamics.I would have a nervousbreakdown worrying who would be in the audienceand whetherthey would be intriguedor wonderingwhat this has to do with scholarlycriticism. Yet, with my girlfriendsat the barthis is a topicwe haveoften taken up. In this groupof black/mixed racewomen, who haveother jobs, interests, and activities than academia, we haveexpressed serious conflicts, joked loudly, always gossiped about, and evenmade righteous political claims about intraracial colour politics and desire.In doingso, we have discussedissues of dark-skinnedblack lesbianfems' continued exclusion from conceptionsof womanhoodby an alwayspresent misreading of the blacklesbian body as automatically butch.These black fems express the contradictionsof desireand frustra- tion that comewith claimingsuch an identityprecisely due to the nega- tive sexualdefinitions accorded black women's bodies as not feminine, - as not woman, and as oversexedand aggressive.Further, we have exploredwhere the pleasureexists for someof us in eroticizinga system 6 of colour and genderdomination that divideswomen of colour as it

This content downloaded from 130.58.64.71 on Sat, 09 Jan 2016 19:46:13 UTC All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions ......

uses the same old stigmasto oppressthem. In comparisonto this bar 13 talk,not utopicby any means,Hammonds' assessment of how academic 1 structuresdo reinscribesystems of silenceis vital. >

My readingof Hammonds'essay understandsit as offeringan oppor- 3z tunityfor a specificblack feminist theory, one thatconfronts the dangers t and restrictionsof racializedand classed sexualitiesby producinga blackfemale sexuality resistant to capitulatingto the prescriptivenessof suchconstructions. Hammonds writes: Blackfeminist theorists must reclaimsexuality through the creationof a counternarrativethat can reconstitutea presentblack female subjectivity and thatincludes an analysisof powerrelations between white and blackwomen and amongdifferent groups of blackwomen. In bothcases I am arguingfor the developmentof a complex,relational, but not necessarilyanalogous, conceptionof racializedsexualities. (Hammonds,1994: 131) In this essay I explore the possibilitiesof the counternarrativethat Hammondscalls for in her idea of a culturalcriticism of sexuality,one that details alternativeforms of power queer black female sexuality creates;one in which labels are not naturalizedas identity- queer, black, lesbian,feminist- and thereforedo not reinscribesilence but engender'speech, desire, and agency'(Hammonds, 1994: 141). I would like to sort out some of the debatessurrounding these trajectories, and I would like to do so in orderto suggesta directionfor the emerging generationof feminisms.This directionI call queerblack feminism,a compilationof the experiencesof liberationmovements before it, a practice of alliancesrather than community,a practiceof reclamationand confrontation,and a practiceof theorizingthe alreadytraversed bound- ariesof culture.I relinquishall commonlyheld notionsof successin the pursuitof this venture. At the sametime that I articulateand analysethis alreadyongoing queer blackfeminist project I know I will be envelopingit in my own auto- biographicalperspective. I know it will be particular.My purposein doingso is to bringtheory and practicetogether by writingmy self into history,by writingmyself a history,and by writinga queerblack feminist su >ectlvltylnto practlce.I announcethis lntentlon because, eager as I am to treatthe personal,I am equallydisturbed by the exhibitionisttendency of autobiography,of experience,to closeoff the possibilityof intellectual exchange.How can we argue,disagree, and evaluatethe personalwith- l out attackingthe person?Although I wantto challengeacademic notions of personalversus critical, or ratherdisregard them, I am riddenwith anxietyabout placing my bodyand desiresinto the controversy.Further, u7

This content downloaded from 130.58.64.71 on Sat, 09 Jan 2016 19:46:13 UTC All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions > as a black feminist,I am afraidto air 'dirtylaundry'. I want to do X the rightthing. Believing as I do that this is a crucialdilemma for black ,, feminism,I have chosento locateit in a queercontext in the hopesof * refiguringthe personaland the political. o z Knowingthe text of my history,I know that feminismas the sole , dilemmafor this bodymakes it far less readable.Instead, when sexuality and race and the alwaysoverlapping clarity and confusionof the con- ,x,, nectionsare considered,feminist maps of genderare in need of other ub l terrains.This then, I imagine,is ultimatelymy point:for feminismto survive,and converselyto survivefeminism, a greedyand attentivecar- tographymust be practised.I hope it is not my accomplishmentto set up andattack a mythicfeminism, a paranoiafuelling much of the current theoreticaldebates, but insteadto uncovera few of the layersand com- plexitiesof identityand politicsalways already within feminist debate. In presentinga self, myself,the intentis to projecta representationof l whatmakes queer and black andfeminist useful as a strategy. Additionally,I want to write'camp' feminism as a meansof employing subjectivityand objectivity:certainly as a meansof maintainingdistance, but also to implicatemy positionas a queerblack feminist. Perhaps it is my way of payinghomage to andcoming to termswith a feminismthat l has beendifficult for me, be it secondwave, black, or queer.If by virtue of this seeminglydifficult feminism there is a gap,my intellectualpursuits have taught me to find gaps interesting,the location for exchange betweenboundaries, for resistance.Categories are intendedto draw straightlines. Feminism has foundout, perhapsthe hardway, that this may be the only way to thinkabout differences of sexualityand class. Not to mentionrace.

Commercialand popular feminisms of the 1970s- thatis whatI grewup on. For years I envisionedmyself as a feministand what exactlythis entailedI am unsure,except I know it was aboutbeing sexy. I planned earlyon to be lookinggood and actingsassy for the revolution.Film and televisiontold me all I neededto know about sex and the single girl. I recall Cher'simage of the vamp, the tramp,and the bit of a scampwith her bold clothingand divorcefrom symbiosis with her short partner.Books were a greatif confusingresource: The Fear of Flying (1973) and The Joy of Sex (1972). Curiously,my best girlfriendand I put the logic of those astrologicalpositions to the test. Coupledwith femaleanatomy, hedonistic sexual values were radical. In the background 8 Helen Reddy's'I am woman'inspires tears of triumphto wet my eyes

This content downloaded from 130.58.64.71 on Sat, 09 Jan 2016 19:46:13 UTC All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions whilesomething else is happeningbetween legs duringa behindthe o couchreading of XavieraHollander's testimonial The Happy Hooker X (1970).Finally, a definitivepersonal narrative bearing witness to the ls entrepreneurialstrength of the newAmerican woman - a ballsyimmi- B grantstory too. Yes,my comingof age in the 1970swas aboutthe ,,, sexualrevolution, about career gal goals, and aboutwatching my B motherstraddling the optionsof the decadewhile telling me mine- 'marryrich, you can do anythingafter you get the money'. (Themother has always been a corefigure in feministanalysis.) l I oftenask myself now where the real feminists were when I wasgrowing up.I knowthey existed and had a politicsand an organizedmovement, at leastthat is how it appearsin goingback and readingabout it. Grantedmy familywas what I not too affectionatelylabel 'po'miscege- natedclass' and intellectual debates were not foundin abundanceat the dinnertable. I tryto rememberif and when I everspotted one of these feminists,a funky-looking jean-clad one like Gloria Steinem. I must have but somehowthe imagedidn't take. Why didn't I becomeinfatuated svithher and emulate her as I didwith so manyother women? Instead, I baredmy navel in worshipof Cher.I boppedto DianaRoss' tunes and watchedher countlesstimes in the filmMahogany (1975), where she was the beautifulgood blackgirl gone bad but comeback to good blackwoman. I grewup withJanet's bad girl struggles to be a goodgirl on the late1970s comedy-drama TV showabout a blackworking-class familyGood Timesand, of course,now paytribute to herattempts to expressa nastyin-control diva attitude. It is my beliefthat Janet is only justbeginning to workher divaattitude coupled with an EarthaKitt sex-kittenstyle- sheis lackingonly the sharp claws and deeply satisfied ppprrrgggrrrwwwlll.When I gathertogether all the knowledgeI have todayabout the heightand impact of feminismin the 1970sand 1980s I amdismayed at theperception that such a massmovement passed me by.Is it onlybecause I was (am) an oppressedpop-culture junkie? I alwaysthought I was a feministbut the moreeducation I manage to acquirethe more inclined I am to believethat I musthave been lingering in a pre-feministpurgatory all thoseyears, particularly when I seemto havebeen stuck in a 1970ssexual liberation mode while coming to adult- hoodin the 1980santi-porn generation. What then does it meanfor a personto identifyas a feministwhen she doesnot possessan erudite knowledgeof the feminist'canon' of history,practice, and theory?I cannotbegin to recountall the academicincidents in whichprofessor l feministsand comrade feminists have exclaimed to me'You didn't know that?You don't know who she is?You're kidding!' Clearly, part of the 9

This content downloaded from 130.58.64.71 on Sat, 09 Jan 2016 19:46:13 UTC All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions I , search* forJ- the* real* feministsz . . in. my experience. .is a search* forJ- feministsJ- . . of fl z colour and feministsof dubious social status. But colour was not ', includedin the generaldiscussion as blackfeminists in the 1970s battled *- out this terrainthat feminismdid not alwaysactively call its own. It has °¢ becomeclear in writingthis essay that of paramountimportance to , queerblack feminist practice is the projectof redrawingthe parameters ... - of feminismas a history,practice, and theory.It would also rescuemy zs academicand lesbianembarrassments.

ub (Whowas AlecDobkins anyway?) Knowingthis is by now a repetitivelitany I stillfind it imperativeto state: the brandof feminismthat seemsto havepassed me by, thatwaxes dis- appointedin my ignorance,works mainlyfrom the university,from a prescriptivewhite intellectualtheory of gender,and from an already enlightenedstate of sexual oppressionwithin patriarchy.One would haveto know aboutand agreeon the termsof oppressionto enterthat sphere.Access seems to havebeen a seriousproblem for feministtheory and practice,not just for me personally,but as evidencedby the subse- quentchallenges feminism faced in the 1970s and 1980s fromwomen of colour and diverseclasses and sexualities.I have begun to consider myselfa fortunateyoung feminist. I circumventedthe squabblethrough my culturalimpoverishment. I know I am fortunateas a blackfeminist becausethis allowedme to believethat sexualitywas the firstorder of the day.The media put out the backend of feminism,literally the feminist as a sexualizedrevolutionary. What I am suggestingis that this sexy back end providedmore than just a pleasantdiversion. This media- hypedfeminist was perhapsepitomized by the big-breastedbra-burning AdrienneBarbeau, who playedthe daughteron the TV show Maude.A feministwas sexuallyrebellious if also straightand righteous.In this TV situationcomedy, actress Bea Arthuras the mother,Maude, dominated the familylife. One mightargue that Maudeherself was the betterver- sion of genderfuckon the show.I can onlyconfess I foundher domineer- ing masculinityseductive and had a masturbatoryfantasy or two about her and Adrienne'sbuch-fem mother-daughter duo. (Theconfession is a coreparadigm of feministconsciousness.) Feminismwas the equivalentof power,in turnthe equivalentof sexual pleasure.After realizing the difficultiesthe threeterms have encountered withinfeminist and specificallyblack feminist debate, I have learnedto appreciateand come back to this youthfulif not naive connection.I resist being educatedout of my feminism.Rather than interpretmy l historyas one devoidof feminismit seemsmore productive to ask what 1lo I brandof feminismwas at workin my experience?Who were my feminist

This content downloaded from 130.58.64.71 on Sat, 09 Jan 2016 19:46:13 UTC All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions rolemodels then? What lessons did theyimpart to me aboutbeing female 4 and black?How can I understandthe impactof a media-popularized X female sexuality?Was it straight-upgender oppressionand objecti- > fication,as perhapsthe anti-pornfeminists might argue? Did equating t feminismwith sexualprowess undermine it or can the pejorativeimages - be reclaimed?Is this culturalbackground of the 1970s and 1980s mine to claim? (Ain'tI a feministtoo?) If I focuson feminismas the only categoryfor considerationan ellipsis occurs:there were other identity aspects to work out. The type of pulp- pop commercializedimages I adheredto were not just about feminist pleasure;instead, these images often scrambled boundaries by lettingthe wrong race and class identitiesmeander across them. For instance,in claiminga commercialand popularfeminism as my historyI mentioned Cheras a strongrecollection of a recognitionof genderand sexualityas empowering.What I did not stateovertly and what is encodedin Cher's imageis hermixed-race body - a bodythat resonatesfor mine.There is a crucialfacet to this coding:within the gossip-historyof Cher'sracial mix the imbricationof class with race is made obvious ratherthan belabouredas a complicatedconnection to be searchedout. I recall that in interviewsand songs Cherspoke about her mixedAnglo-Native Americanidentification and povertyclass backgroundand that provided me with informationand affirmationof how often one was inherentin the other.Moreover, this pop-imagerumour model of racial mixing offersinsight into the raceslass nexusby enactingpublicly that to be of mixedparentage could define one's class standing, while, if one was in a particularclass (stardom),it could be amelioratedby class privilege. Class,and mostcertainly race, seem to havebeen two areasof difficulty for feminismto fill in and, when it did, it often essentializedhow they weremediated by gender. I thinkit is difficultto writeabout feminism and at the sametime have the writingbe aboutrace. This is perhapsone of the mostimportant con- cernsfor a queerblack feminist practice: to makethe terrainof feminist sexual politicsa discourseon race. In understandingthis as a queer blackfeminist project it is importantthen to understandhow different culturalimages might work. ObviouslyI am relyingon a theorizingof my memoryof gossiprags. But if it is mistakenmemory, then the fantasy standsin - the narrativeI did createwith Cher'simage. Rather than questionthe veracityof memory-fantasyI would point to the Iyricsof some of Cher'ssongs for verificationof this readingof her body. Anyoneremember her singing 'Half-breed'?

This content downloaded from 130.58.64.71 on Sat, 09 Jan 2016 19:46:13 UTC All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions *-X * * * * - t

> (Badtaste in musicis a teministmust.) X Cher'spop-culture prowess along with her Anglo-Native American identi- < ficationalongside her light complexion alongside her sexual exclamations oz provideone code for my feministhistory. By bondingwith her back- ¢ groundI couldthen beginto imaginehow I mightconceive of my own. , I mightidentify with Cherbecause of my light complexion,because of Fz lookingfor insightinto interracialand class connections,and becauseI = like the worst kind of pop musicand culture,but, like feminism,the mediain the 1970s offer a veritablevoid when it comes to powerful sexy blackfemale images: particularly, I think, for my class background * of blackfemales who were not familiarwith some of the bold writing beingdone. There was TinaTurner with her throatyvocals. Some of us blackwomen managed to imagineliving as largeas blaxploitationfilm heroinesTamara Dobson in CleopatraJones (1973) or Pam Grierin FoxyBrown (1974), but evenso theywere not grantedpop-culture icon status.It is difficultto rememberhow I conceivedof myself;I try to rememberhow otherblack girls like my cousinsconceived of themselves. I try to rememberhow we conceivedof ourselvesin relationto each other.I know we all did the necessarygrappling with understanding what blacknessmeant to each of us as femalebut in differentways and throughdifferent means. Writing as a queer,as a feminist,is difficultfor me becauseeven though race can be addedon it can'tbe becauserace is its own queerfeminist category. Further, in the US systemof blackand whiterace works queer. A queerblack feminist practice requires marking race and class in rela- tion to desireand revealsthat the tellingof desiremust always be a text writtenabout race and class no matterhow encodedwithin gender oppression.It certainlyrequires a rethinkingof pop-culturalrepresenta- tions of feminism,the functionsthey servedfor theiraudiences, and the challengesthey presentedto prescriptivenotions of wherefeminist con- sciousnessis located.In one sexuallyexploitative package Cher's race and class addressedbaggage attached to certaindifferences central to determininghow bodiesare groupedin the US in a way that academic feminismstruggled to capture.For instance,what different combinations of gender,race, and class mixtures are obtrusiveto the delicateskeletons of spoils,plunder, and murderin the US'snational closet? The answeris all of thembut they are playedout differently.Without disregarding its particularexploitations, Walt Disney has the romanceof Pocahontas and that yuckywhite guy. Clearlythis Pocahontasromance suffers its own devastatinghistorical erasures, but even Disneycannot imagine an equivalentUS romancebetween black and white. Slavery:it's the too 112 nastystory of racewhispered in exposeform about dead presidents and

This content downloaded from 130.58.64.71 on Sat, 09 Jan 2016 19:46:13 UTC All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions publicfigures because it involvesa mostinsidious form of rape,bondage, loc and perversedesire. ,,

Further,I can be an academicfeminist; I can be a blackfeminist; I can be z a dykefeminist. But I can'tbe any of themreally without first 'passing' Iz the boundariesset up in each, withoutconfronting the assumptionsof z each, withoutrecombining the advantagesand disadvantagesof each, and withoutbeing a queerin each. This 'I' certainlyis not the unique case of passingthrough feminisms. It is not solelyspecific to my being lightand a fem;passing operates on a varietyof levels,gendered, social class,ethnic, economic, educational, and it is embeddedwithin a struc- z turethat seemsto articulatedifference but oftencontains and silencesit. Apartfrom my puerilebad taste,what attractionto an imagelike Cher representsto me was the basisfor thinkingabout constituting my difference in termspleasurable and empowering.I would like to think that probablyfrom the firstrevelations I had abouther I realizedthat access- ing feministpower entailedouting the closetsof race and class first- but that is hardto claimsincerely. Only in lookingback can I interpret my race and class as inextricablefrom my sexualityand feminist consciousness,and only in lookingforward can I predictwhat a schizo- phrenicnarrative it constructs.

lll Clichedand retrogradeas the admissionis, my motherand her friends were certainlyfeminist influences surrounding me. They are the women thatwere of age in the 1970s,that werecaught up in the ideologiesand imagesand culturalrevolutions. It was theirlives that wereavailable for revision,or unableto be revised.The memoryof thesewomen and their desireshas a clarityand poignancyfor me that no amountof feminist analysiscan interpellate.All of themwere what I like affectionatelyto call 'high priestesses'after a disparagingdescription of women in Joanna Russ' story 'When it changed'( 1972). They were the high- heeled,painted, cleavaged, and perfumedimages of women feminism wantedto washoff andliberate. And when these women refused a liberation thatappeared to themas justanother brand of repression- feminism rejectedthem. Maybe what feministsdid not know is that thesewomen madefun of them.My momand these'girls' would break out laughing, theywould go out drinking,and theywould chase down possible sexual exploitsat the bowlingrink together.They were going to have a little bit of fun beforeit was over.Claiming and namingher own desires,this was my mom'sfeminist revolution. And certainlyin late 1970s feminist termsthey were not part of the community.Whose community was it anyway?These straight,working-class, racially diverse women, mostly 13

This content downloaded from 130.58.64.71 on Sat, 09 Jan 2016 19:46:13 UTC All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions I>@divorced with kids, or stuckin badmarriages, or youngand searching for s desire,were far moreconcerned with findingpleasure than findingcom- ', munity.Pleasure they understoodwas what had been deniedthem, and s whateverelse theyfailed to graspthey understood that claimingpleasure ° I was the currencyof power.

- In orderto betterunderstand my mother'sdesires, it will be usefulto describewhat a queerblack feminism might look like in relationto a briefand admittedlygeneral mapping out of someof the issuestroubling to feminism.In the US, feminism,from an early radicalstance that assessedgender as biologicallyconstructed and thereforeoppressive, seems to have become almost immediatelya pluralityof feminisms ratherthan a cohesivemovement. Throughout the 1970s and 1980s feminismwas characterizedby a dispersalof politicalstances with lesbian feministsand culturalfeminists overdetermining the debateson gender, sexuality,and practice.Although categorizing these complicatedideo- logicalgroupings does disserviceto theirown plurality,as AliceEchols (1984)points out in heressay, 'The taming of the id: feministsexual politics,1968-83', these dominant feminisms tended to cancelout othersites of feministpractice or renderthem as anti-feminist.The criticalobjection facingmainstream (cultural) feminism and lesbianfeminism is the analysis of it as white,middle-class, anti-sex, utopic, gender reactionary, and academic.Feminists from this periodare often upset by the revisionist renderingsof whatthey 'experienced'as a radicaltime. Evidence of this was abundantat the 1995 ModernLanguage Association convention in San Diego wherefeminism 'revisited' panels were the crowd-grabbers. The rhetoricranged from claims about the 'repressed'memory of feminism to angry'mother-feminists' who could not locatewhat those way- ward feminist daughterswere contributingto the cause.1 Perhaps withoutnegating feminist icons' own historyand concernswe can call into questiontheir paradigms.Without disbelieving their narrativesof liberationperhaps we can assess how that practiceof liberationwas displacedin certaincommunities, across certain identities, and becamea l prescrlptlve. . egacy. (Whathave you donefor me lately?) The overridingissue informing this feministdiscussion is whetheror not feminismwas ableto addressissues of difference,primarily race. Femin- | ists wantingto preservea memoryof feminismas one of anti-racism claimas exampleswomen of colourwriting, for instance,Audre Lorde. In fact,Judith Butler, in a lecturedelivered at the Universityof California I SanDiego on 15 February1995 entitled'Against proper objects', treated l14 l this veryaspect of feminismin relationto queer,and, I believe,made the

This content downloaded from 130.58.64.71 on Sat, 09 Jan 2016 19:46:13 UTC All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions claimthat feminism was not impairedin its focuson genderin relationto o race unless we are now to discountwriters like Lorde as feminists. X Althoughthis is a validpoint, my positionis that a slippageoccurs in > the power relationsof feminismwhen we simplyinclude all feminists tE regardlessof somevery serious divisions and power dynamics. There did ,zS emergea dominantideology of feminismagainst which women of E colouror otherdiversity had to write.I wouldgo evenfurther and suggest that it is thesewriters who are also the inventorsof queerfeminism exactlybecause, as race was elidedby gender,so were sexualpolitics and otherconceptions of differenceand oppression.In fact,I can readily namewomen of colourwhom I haveheard identify themselves as queer/ black feminists:for instance,June Jordan, Gloria Anzaldua, Chrystos, CherrieMoraga, and JewelleGomez; it is muchharder for me to think of women of colour who identifyas simplyfeminists. Feminism was inspiredby the 1950s and 1960s US CivilRights movement and, if that is acknowledged,feminism's growth out of race relationsresituates its absenceof raceanalysis as a dominantfactor in need of correction,not as a historyof a multiculturalplurality of feministpractice in whichall wereequa partlclpants.. .

Of importanceto this particularessay, one of the commonalitiesbetween thesemodels of feminismwas an emphasison desireas a politicalchoice ratherthan a personalone. Thisseems to haveoccurred primarily due to lesbianrecognition within mainstream feminism as a politicalchoice over a sexualone. The praxiswas emphasizedby focusingon an alternative femaleculture, one with innategender values, in whichequality would be achievedby eliminatingpower, a 'masculine'construction. By the 1980s this praxisseems to havebeen exacerbated by its focuson sexual practicein relationto genderoppression, a focus which quite clearly erasedclass and race. For instance,straight working-class women like my motherunderstood getting fucked as one of the few momentsof powerand pleasurethey could engagein. For them feminismwas not about rejectingsupposedly masculine values - they liked masculinity- instead,negotiating a relationshipwith it was essentialto theirempower- ment. For blackwomen, race mandatedvery complicatednegotiations with masculinity.In an attemptto purgemale identification, this brand of feminismfailed to considerhow pleasuremight intersect and subvert the powerdynamics of sociallyconstructed gender or how racismfunc- tions. This becomesmarkedly apparent within lesbian feminismas butch-femdesire, a desireof genderpolarity betnveen lesbians came to be labelledan unacceptableand heterosexuallyimitative power dynamic. Not only did this once againrecast gender as innateto anatomybut it l lackedany regardfor the divisionsof raceand class wherethis culture l 15

This content downloaded from 130.58.64.71 on Sat, 09 Jan 2016 19:46:13 UTC All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions I'>°often occurred. Women - a categoryalready seriously divided by gender X definitionsand classand raceand sexualpreference. < The personalis politicalhas beenparamount to feministanalyses, as if it O hasn'tbeen for othertypes of politicalor intellectualanalyses. Feminism ¢ did not inventCthe personal' but admittedit, workedit, and went on to ', canonizeit as a litmustest. Personalchoices of pleasureare politicalin F as we are at libertyto makethem. The parametersof what that z so far s personalpleasure entails are not an indicationof intellectualsavvy or politicalcommitment. This remainsfor me the pivotalmisconception of feministthought. A queerblack feminist agenda should make this distinc- tion and in makingit expandfeminist practice until it is unrecognizable as such,not to eraseit, but to enableits dispersalthroughout an array of political,cultural, and intellectualalliances. To givecredit its due,it is exactlythe abilityand futureof feminism,and the premiseof this essay | in makingclaims for queer black feminism,that feministhistory is strong enough to shore up emergingradical movements. bell hooks often seemsto be makinga relatedpoint in her writing.In her essay 'Feminism:a transformational politic' hooks states: CStrategically, feminist movement[sic] should be a centralcomponent of all other liberation strugglesbecause it challengeseach of us to alterour personor personal engagement(either as victimsor perpetratorsor both) in a systemof domination'(hooks, 1989: 43). Althoughher later utopic desire to l replacepower and domination with 'love'differs greatly from my percep- tion of poweras everywhere-especially in 'love'- hooksis makingan insightfuland radicalclaim about how and wherefeminism should be locatedin the future.Furthermore, hooks emphasizes a feministpractice * thatdoes not requireliteracy as a contingencyof participation.This con- ceptioninforms this entire essay. By disruptingthe literalinterpretation of classicfeminisms' 'the personal is political',queer black feminism inverts that aspectof identitypolitics that attemptsto institutean assimilationist agendafor all womenunder gender oppression. I am genuinelyconcerned that the liberation1970s feminists made for me shouldnot be denied.Let me stateclearly that this essay could obviously not be writtenwithout their struggles,triumphs, and failures.But just maybewhile they were liberatingthey were simultaneouslyoppressing. Missionariesdid it; at leastwe knowfeminists had the bestof intentions. I'm too old to be the rebelliousteenager in my mother'shouse. I do not wantto argueover who rememberswhat right any more.Instead I want to recordwhat feminismmeant for me, to me, with the understanding thatI do so becauseI am grateful it was there.I needto claimmy feminist past for the future,not be told I neverhad one, and thereforefemin- 16 ism needsto be reconfiguredto includethat past and definethat future.

This content downloaded from 130.58.64.71 on Sat, 09 Jan 2016 19:46:13 UTC All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions Often,this entailsrecognizing women whose voices were not articulated 1 throughfeminism or whosepolitics were not formedcorrectly according X to feminism.Many of thesewomen will not be so identifiableas feminists. > Someof thesewomen are people I havefound through feminist education 1= and counter-educationlike Joan Nestle,Dorothy Allison, Amber Holli- - baugh, Audre Lorde, CherrieMoraga, Jewelle Gomez, and Barbara Smith:women who have been both discomfitedand embracedwithin feminism.A combinationof thesewomen and others make up my closest feministrelatives; they are my historicalprecursors for queer black

, . . temlnlsm.

IV I My grandmothertaught me how to play jacks. This is a nostalgic memorymy fatherreminds me about.I can recallonly one timewhen I was playingjacks with her.My parentswere havinga horrificbattle in the next room. Whateverit may have been about domestically,it was alwaysabout interracialstrife and economicstanding. In this case my grandmotherwas beingdeployed as part of the battle.My fatherlikes to rememberthat she taughtme to playjacks because he likesto see the similaritiesin us. My grandmotherand I were/areboth small, full- breastedwomen with sharp features,hooded eyes, and long-fingered handsslightly too largefor our bodies.Our skin tones were different; my grandmotherwas reddishbrown and I range from a pasty light yellowishcomplexion to a nicer olive dependingon the weather.My grandmothersat therethat day while they ragedabout her but really about everythingelse it meantto be an interracialcouple in the US. Theywho had sent love lettersto eachother that I had snuckunder the bed to read. Love lettersabout beautifulbrown hands and monkey- bittenthighs. She nevermissed a beat in our jacksgame that day, but I did. My grandmothertaught me that day to play jackswithout missing a beat,no matterwhat storm is ragingon the horizon. I thinkabout the womenon my father'sside of the family.My auntsand cousins.The real aunts were all generationsolder than him andreligious. Theytaught us childrento sit up straight,say pleaseand thankyou, and wearour hairneat, if possible.The other aunts were really cousins but so mucholder that we calledthem aunts.Some of themwere different,a littleless constrained; apart from the church they belonged to socialorgan- izations.Except one aunt-cousin.She was unruly,brown, and beautiful. I do not know if she was an activeblack radical and blackfeminist but I she seemedto know a lot. She workedhard each day, and had her up and down daysso I thinkshe was a blackradical and feminist.She was considereda she-devilin the familybecause she did what she wanted:a 17

This content downloaded from 130.58.64.71 on Sat, 09 Jan 2016 19:46:13 UTC All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions @,, drinker,smoker, and cultivatorof shadymale lovers.I used to have to a beg to go over to her houseeven thoughit was her five childrenwith '' whomI attendedschool and did call cousin.She told us so manythings * the othergenerations of blackwomen in my familywere unable to. o 3 On those raremoments when I had her to myselfas we watchedlate- , nighttelevision she spoketo me as adultsoften do to childrenwho are z not their own: honestly.She comfortedme over my parents'raging, X affirmingthat my mother'snew opinionson racewere a resultof herdis- illusionedimmigrant naivete as a resultof beingmarried to my brown fatherin 19S7 in the US, not a heartfeltsentiment. She revealed precious familygossip that I couldn'tget anywhereelse, and that helpedme to understandsome of the racialtensions in my familydespite, or because of, the fact that it is a studyin skin shades.For instance,after being in the US a shortwhile my motherasked my grandmotherwhat race my father'sreal father was. My grandmotherfound this inquiryso ill- manneredand intrusivethat she drylydeclared to my father,'If it was whiteyou had wanted,there's a half dozenblack girls in the neighbour- hood whiterthan what you pickedup but still blackenough for me.'To whichmy motherresponded, 'I'm not white,I'm Neapolitan.'Knowing how intrusiveand stubbornlyillogical my mothercan be, I laughabout this incident.I also imaginethat she, only recentlyfamiliarized with the rigidityof the Americancolour line, musthave beenthinking there was going to be some middleground that was undiscovered- a mestiza modelof race.Further, in this blackfamily tree - as I suspectin others - paternitywas not an issueof interestto anyonebut an outsider.In her essay 'Mama'sbaby, Papa's maybe: an Americangrammarbook' (1987) HortenseSpillers has made the most astutehistorical analysis of this systematicallyenforced silence originating in slaveryand its effect of devoidingblack female sexuality of any agencythrough constructions of immoralityand voraciousness.This was what my aunt-cousinendured - andspent frustrated energies trying to pushaside - angrycondemnations. My motherhad no conceptof the relationshipbetween colour and silence in the US and thereforesecured her outsiderstatus with this inquiry. Fromthen on, my grandmotherfound her to be 'frayin'on her nerves | and illin'to her stomach'. I think about many of these complicatedfemale bodies in my family: complicatedin relationto each other throughtheir own complicated desiresand subjectivities.For me, queerblack feminism should have a complicatedhistory of bodiesand desires;it has to be able to acknowl- edge these complicationsto furtherresist the shame and oppression someof thesebodies are made to be silentabout. At the infamous'Scho- l18 lar and FeministIX' BarnardCollege Conference in 1982, whereanti-

This content downloaded from 130.58.64.71 on Sat, 09 Jan 2016 19:46:13 UTC All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions porn feministsand sex-radicalsbattled it out, it seemsto me that this 1e queerproject was begunon one frontand requires further consideration: w that is, in termsof racializedand classedsexualities. In GayleRubin's z essay,'Thinking sex: notes for a radicaltheory of the politicsof sexuality' l E (1984), resultingfrom this conference,she arguesthat feminismcannot z addresssexuality because it is a theoryof genderoppression and as such t is limitedin analyticalscope and definition.In statingthis, the trouble must also be statedabout racedand classedsexualities, and from this we have a fundamentalindication of class, race,and sexualityas inter- sectingdiscourses. Feminist bodies are sexuallymarked bodies and they need to be definedwithin their concernsas class and race marked bodies.Amber Hollibaugh's contribution, 'Desire for the future:radical hope in passion and pleasure',to the conference-inspiredanthology, Pleasureand Danger:Exploring Female Sexuality (1989), statesthe class problemwithin feminist analysis of sexualitysuccinctly: I have always been more ashamedof havingbeen a dancerin night clubs when I've talked about it in feministcircles than I ever felt in my hometown,working class community.There are many assumptionsat work behind feminist expressionsof surpriseor horror:I must be stupid or I could have done some- thing better than that; I must have been forced against my will or I was just too young to know better;I have prefeministconsciousness; I had a terrible family life; I must have hated it; I was trash and this proved it; and finally, wasn't I glad I'd been saved? (Hollibaugh,1984: 404) Hollibaugh'sstatement suggests the implicationsof 'consciousness'on classedbodies and this can furtherilluminate racial complications within feminismthat need disentangling. So, with all these problems,why not toss feminismand be queer?In thinkingabout queerblack feminism, and the intersectionof feminism and queer,it shouldnot be establishedthat one supersedesthe other. Queerowes a debt to feministanalysis, especially that of genderas a socialcategory, a debtfeminism can be remuneratedfor by takingadvan- tage of queersex radicalpolitics of pleasure.A sexualpolitics that links to the notionof queeras a socialtheory in oppositionalstance to and confrontationalreappropriation of deeply held norms and discourse mightenable feminism to regenerateits sexualpolitics, to toss asideits own normalizingsilences. This feministpolitics has too often been unableto plugthe knowledgeof genderor raceor classoppression into an outletof desireas powernot fullyexplored. One cannot toss feminism for queer,they are inextricablybound togetherhistorically as social theories.Further, for me queerhas been most expressivelyarticulated throughblack feministwriters although they are not often accredited l19

This content downloaded from 130.58.64.71 on Sat, 09 Jan 2016 19:46:13 UTC All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions a withsuch analyses in thosetexts purporting to defineor do queerstudies. X Nor perhapsdo manyblack feminists feel at libertyto claimqueerness in , an atmospherein whichtheir status is alreadytenuous. O I suggestthat, like other black feministwriters, black lesbianfeminist 3 AudreLorde, expressing this need for exploringthe politicalpower of , desireearly on in her essay,'Uses of the erotic:the erotic as power' z (1984),anticipated recent queer social theories. Certainly Barbara Smith's X earlierwork is crucial,and in her 'The danceof masks'(1992) Smith takesthis use of the eroticeven furtheras she writesher desiresout in an inspiringnarrative combination of fear and agencyabout the sexual powerof her butchbody and desiresas she expressesthem. In heressay, 'Themyth and traditionof the blackbulldagger' (1991), SDianeBogus challengesnegative images of black femalesexuality by reclaimingthe historyof the blackbulldagger as the site of an empoweringmythology andlegend about self-defined sexual agency. More recently, black feminist scholarJackie Goldsby, in heressay 'Queen for 307 days:looking b(l)ack at VanessaWilliams and the sex wars'(1993), demonstrates the impor- tance of understandinghow black feministtheory queersqueer and feminists'sex radicalstance. Goldsbydoes so in a theoreticalmove analogousto my criticalsuggestions about the historyof Rich'sprivileged silenceabout lesbian sexuality. Goldsby interrogates the sex radicals'sex war debates'historic proximity to and silenceabout Vanessa Williams, the firstblack Ms Americabeauty queen who was dethroneddue to the expose of lesbian porno photos. In Goldsby'sanalysis of Vanessa Williams'image she links a personalnarrative with an incisiveanalysis of historicallyrace-premised social and economicrelations of black | femalesexuality, that of it as an owned commodity.Further, Goldsby pointsto the underlyingassumption of the whitenessof lesbiansex culture to assesshow both factorscontribute to the silencearound black femalesexuality that the lack of lesbianfeminist discourse on Ms Wil- liams'public fall demonstrates. In thesefew examples,if queeris in oppositionto normativediscourse then it is alreadypart of the terrainof black feministcritical practice. Further, black feminist destabilization of opposi- tional categoriesreinscribes and breaksthe silenceof what queerand feministmight mean as morethan 'naturalized' identities. For me, as an umbrellaterm queer has a gloss to it that can only be sharpenedwith feministhistory: a historyoften grapplingover and in contradictionwith raceand class and sexualitybut with a saliencyand experienceof pushingbodies and politicsagainst each other. Queer, as it is often claimedby academicallypowerful white masculinity,sometimes suggestsand describesits politicalconstituency as seductivelyfluid, 21 o unmarked,ambiguous, and chosen.This fluidity sounds dangerously like

This content downloaded from 130.58.64.71 on Sat, 09 Jan 2016 19:46:13 UTC All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions the statusof white masculinityto me. For instance,one couldcompare o MichaelWarner's notion of an individualpractical self-reflective queer- X nessin his introductionto Fearof a Queer Planet(1993) to the queerness l > articulatedthrough complicated familial interrelations, experience, fan- E tasy, social systems,and in contradictoryconnection to others that z ThomasAllen Harrispresents in his documentaryfilm on queerblack = siblings 'Vintage:Families of Value' (1995). Furthermore,in what appearsto me as a directcontrast to queersof colour,this sametype of queertheory often calls for an analysisof classand racealongside sexuality withoutproducing it. This predominantunfulfilled project is what | queerblack feminism is capturing.I contendthat queersocial theory is indebtedto blackfeminism: that queerblack feminism's anticipation of a praxisof sexualityand bodies,premised on its axis with a feminist historyof fraughtrelations of class and race, articulatesan analysisof sexual politicsthat could reconstitutethe understandingof queerness altogether.

V Pursuingpleasure has becomecentral to my understandingof a queer blackfeminist model. The couragebehind the pursuitsI owe to exploita- tive sexual imageryno matterhow convolutedand screwedup the analyseswhich were enacted.Feminism did not have modelsor access for me as a queered-outyoung woman feelingsexual, grappling with race and class status. Nor could feminismaddress women like my motheror aunt-cousin,women who liked to fuck men, who wanteda betterlife but did not want morerules about how to get it. Indeed,a queerblack feminist analysis comes into play whenI can re-evaluatemy aunt-cousin'sand mother'ssexualities as differingbut interlockedsystems of raceand class domination, ones in whichwhite dominance differently pathologizesand penalizestheir desiresbut does so by a dependence on constructinga pervasiveand excessiveperversity of blackness.This constructionworks againstdeveloping an analysisof black women's strugglesfor sexualagency while it locatesdegeneracy in the psycheof the femaleinterracial violator. Instead of a persistentparalleling of black women'ssexual oppression to that of Angloor Europeanwomen's as if that encompassedthe extent of the systems,an understandingof the specificnegative significance of blacknessin relationto femalesexuality offersone way of graspinghow the repressionof blackfemale sexuality exceedsthis reductivepositing of sameness.Certainly, it is not the only way. Lookingfor pleasureinvites me to look at my mother'sidentity as a fem- | inist in termsof her ethnicity,interracial violations, class, and sexuality. S21

This content downloaded from 130.58.64.71 on Sat, 09 Jan 2016 19:46:13 UTC All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions ^ Insteadof negatingher as anti-feministbecause she participated in her a ownoppression, I can map out herbrand of feminismas it workedfor , her.My mom didn't have access to complicatedpolitical analyses, or the *- timeor trainingto acquireit. Shewas justangry about the structure. O Shewas going to beatit- on thatpoint she was determined. After her , divorcein the 1970smy momhad a bit of a timeto findemployment < sinceshe had been housewifing it for sixteenyears or so, hadthree kids z to support,and a foreignhigh school degree. She finally landed what as - a childI consideredan excellentposition: the salesclerk in the Kmart pet section.Kmart, that large departmentstore whereinexpensive 'brand'name clothing and greasy french fries could be purchasedunder the sameroof. Unfortunately it paid little and she had to keeplooking fora secondjob. In the meantime she had had to go to thewelfare offices to askfor AFDC: the US financial social service of Aidto Familieswith DependentChildren. It was destinedto be a disasteras all experiences withAmerican bureaucracy were for her.I recallher retelling the indig- nitiesin herheavily accented, high-pitched fast voice to herthen good friendand co-Kmart worker F (simultaneouslyshe was cutting years off - Fs facewhile cutting bangs in herhair). Apparently, when all documents wereproduced, the socialworker had instructed my mom to correctan itemin thepaperwork before processing: the children's father was black thereforethe childrenwere black. That worker seeking accuracy above all probablynever knew what hit her,but she had certainlystruck at one of my mom'ssore spots with the US. 'My children are not blackI told the bitchand threwthe papersback in her face!In European families,in myfamily, we havegrandparents from Ethiopia, from Spain. We say we are Italian,we do not say we are black!This, this is the hypocrisyof thisdamned United States. Who is a goddamnedAmerican anyway,show me their faces.' (Checkone box only: facism or racism.) It seemsa coupleof weekslater that my mom had learned of a women's meetingthat was conveninglocally. It promisedsupport and action. Frommy perspectivenow I assumeit wasa placidapolitical version of a femaleconsciousness raising group, middle-class suburban style and, knowingthat, I realizedthe pain that must have cut through my mom's optimismwhen she told herrecent story and asked for action- now. No oneunderstood her anger, they probably had no paradigmsfor think- * ing of genderin relationto classor raceand, worse, I feelcertain they foundher display of illogicalfrustration, loud desire for revenge,and evenperhaps her interracial ties appalling. Obviously the socialworker was correct,why was this woman upset? Obviously to me,my mother

2 '2 was irrationaland racistin the targetof her anger.But what has

This content downloaded from 130.58.64.71 on Sat, 09 Jan 2016 19:46:13 UTC All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions becomeeven clearer is thatin my mother'sracist attempts to insiston her 14 childrenas not-blackshe had made an astutecorrelation between the X overlapof black and class in the US, an observationthat mainstream > feminism'sinsistence on genderoppression was ignoring.For my mother m white statusimplied privileged class statusin the US, and blackstatus Iz was dominatedclass status,and havingaccess to class privilegewas to z participatein powerand pleasure.My mothermay not have been able to put this into abstractenunciation, rather, without defining it, attempt- ing to 'pass'her children was her retaliation. One of the difficultiesin writingthis essayhas beento resista tendency to write separatestories about conflictingintersections: to write about the influenceof my mom'sclass-marked pursuit for pleasureas queer materialfor refiguringfeminist practice and, second,to write out the strifeover my racialidentification within my relationshipto my mother as I actuallyclaim her as a feministmodel. The oddityis that this seems parallelto the storyof feminismand womenof colour.Although gender providedthem with some commonground, race created vast divisions. AudreLorde's essay 'An open letterto Mary Daly' (1981) exemplifies this fractureas Lordetakes Daly to task for her racialassumptions and erasures.Actually this comparisonbelies a slightdifference. While feminism deniedovert racism, my motherpractised at timesjust that. Without retractingthat last statementin the least,I know it was not a sustained racism;I know it came in angrybouts; I know it was a US-induced racism;and I know it was juxtaposedagainst a predilectionfor dark bodies. It is the natureof the beast that my mothercould complimentmy brother'sbrown skin for being just that- a lovely colour- and still spout epitaphsof slicingdesire to annihilatethe black in us. Yet my fatherwas by no meansthe last blackor maleof colourwith whommy motherwas sexuallyinvolved. How is the predilectioninvolved in the angrydisavowal? Was my mothera womanwho cannotclaim her desires becausethey are entangledin taboosthat make her a nastygirl in social exchanges?Did this nastinesstitillate her to furtherfulfil the taboo- crossingdesire and simultaneouslyfill her with shame?What I am suggestingis a particularcomponent of my mom'sracism that is about her genderedrelations to race as an interracialinterloper, but also an indicationof how desire,gender, class, and raceare pittedtogether. If it is understoodthat desireitself might be fuelledby shameover ourselves, overour own desires,then perhaps the questionis not how do we over- comethis shame/desirebut it shouldbe how do we addressthis shameful desire and make it empowering,resistant, a politicalstance? Beyond analysingthe socialrelations and historythat producesthis shameand 1 223

This content downloaded from 130.58.64.71 on Sat, 09 Jan 2016 19:46:13 UTC All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions -> desire,how does queerblack feminist practice necessitate reclaiming our X historyof shamefuldesires? Feminism made some attempt at deconstruct- , ing shameand the femalebody in a varietyof configurations,obviously * by makingsex a topic of discussion.But it becameevident in the 1980s o when the sex wars were ensuringthat feminismhad never moved ¢, beyonda narrowperception of sexualityor raceand classin relationto = genderedshame. X SinceI am analysingmy mother'sdesires, a taskI findtroubling (exactly becauseI've got a ToniCade Bambara fear of hercoming into my room in the middleof the nightessay in hand),I shouldreflect on my own historyof desirein relationto my racialhistory: my own historyof shamefuldesires. It would help to begin with childhood.One of the games when playingwith my cousinsand friendswas a game about master/slaverelations. On morethan one occasionmy aunt-cousinwas sittingin the livingroom in a heateddebate with friendsabout Black US | SlaveHistory and we kids, beingan annoyance,were excludedto the basementor yard and took up the conversationfor our own use. We werewell-informed for our roles.Being light I was the houseslave, the one who got to dresspretty and eat well but who wouldalso be forced to sleepwith the masterof the house,until she was rescuedboth emo- | tionallyand physicallyby anotherfemale slave, her unknowntill then l blackersister and illegitimatedaughter of an evil owner.The drama heightenedas they facedpunishment but togetherthey wouldeither run away or kill everyone.If that soundselaborate, I can assurethe reader we had lots of variations,and despitethat we were usuallyall girlswe had plentyof gender-roleplaying going on. Keepingthe sanctityof the playgroundrule 'not to tell' I'll refrainfrom further details, and instead point out that what I am tryingto makevisible is an identificationof desireand gender that came through my racialidentification. The queernessof being black but light, the shameof being light but black,the genderedmediation of the two, and the acted-outfantasies of the historyof powerrelations embedded in the formationof thesecate- gories bears resonanceon my adult desires.Now certainlyI am not tryingto claimthat all my desireshave beenclearly in placethanks to childhoodgames. More to the pointI am tryingto claimthat interacting with one'shistory, with the desire,shame, and responsibilitiesembedded in thathistory, enforced through that history, should be a partof arriving at an understandingof the power of desire.It shouldenable a queer black feministreclamation of that desire,a resistanceto that shame. I haveto comprehend,accept, and speakout aboutthe certainposition l of advantageand disadvantageI have in the structuresof oppression. 24 1 I needto turnthe shameof that positionaround and makeuse out of

This content downloaded from 130.58.64.71 on Sat, 09 Jan 2016 19:46:13 UTC All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions whatit putsin my imaginationto arriveat any sexualagency. Related to my experienceof expressingmyself to others as black is the more complicatedexperience of outingmyself as a fem,an identitythat denotes certainsexual desires, but doingone is embeddedin doingthe other.The necessityof my alwayshaving to say I am blackto be identifiedas black marksmy light appearanceas both a privilegedand silencedhistory of powerrelations and shamearound interracial sexuality in the US. This has parallelroots in my alwayshaving to comeout as femto be identified as lesbianand then as a particulartype of lesbian,one investedin an overtlygendered erotic relationship. Along with my fem investmentin eroticizinglesbian differences I am often mistakenfor straight,another historyand set of powerrelations in this society.Concurrently, claiming my fem desireshas given me accessto my body,a light body that as black-identifiedI often am alienatedfrom, by allowingme to find ways to takepleasure in it despiteits racialand sexualperversities. This queer sexualityof minethen is engenderedby and engendersmy queerracial identity.This puts my historyat my service,this places my raceas central to my genderand desire,and this places my sexual fantasiesto my advantage.In thosedevastating moments when feminists defined practice as an eliminationof all power-taintedsexual fantasies their own 'overt' racialbias is most certainlyestablished as they shapepractice on white middle-classempowerment - not to mention,prescribe a sexualpractice as oppressiveand boringas it gets.

It is thisnecessity for continuallycoming out of closetsof knowledgethat I suggestqueer black feminism should embrace and I believeis already movingtowards. Once a systemof knowledgeis in place,once gender oppressionis underscrutiny, the focusshould include not only disrupting the stabilityof the categorybut findingmethods of makingone category alwaysa discussionof another.It just doesn'tprove enough to add the themes- here'srace, a bit of class, and a touch of sexuality- without allowingthem to disruptthe systemin ways that reconstituteit. A dia- logueon raceis a feministdialogue is a classdialogue is a queerdialogue already.Categories are queer.By this I do not meanthat categoriesare useless,obviously not when they are alreadyin place as a complex networkof socialmeanings and bodiesof knowledge.It has takenme a long time to come to understandmy mother'sidentity in the above terms,and therebystart taking a closerlook at my own. In tellingthis storyit is not an accomplishmentfor me to bashfeminism. The accom- plishmentin tellingthis storyresides in the acknowledgementthat at the placewhere theories and identitiesconverge to formpractice categories fall apartand practicecan no longer be prescribed.Feminists of the 1970s may feel angertowards the revisionismoccurring but they also 25

This content downloaded from 130.58.64.71 on Sat, 09 Jan 2016 19:46:13 UTC All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions @> needto movebeyond their own experience. With their anger I canboth X empathizeand disagree. , I < (Balanceand equality are core feminist values.)

> Vl u F In orderto betterillustrate the complexities involved in conceptsof com- a munity,identity, and politics at stakein a queerblack feminist agenda I wantto turnto a recentpublication of journalismand essays by Sarah Schulmanentitled My AmericanHistory: Les6ian and Gay Lik dxring - the Reagan/Bus/7Years (1994). This text is not a comprehensivehistory by anymeans, and in factcontains writings done mostly between 1981 and 1994, but, as I statedearlier, history has becomeimportant for feminismin the 1990sand this is one suchrecent history. I chosethis particulartext overother recent contributions because it is experiential andalready in an oddrelation to feminismwith its queertrajectory and thereforeprovides a complicatedfeminist identification. What the text offersthis essay is theperspective of a germinallesbian feminist political activistinvolved with queer activism, Sarah Schulman, and as suchpre- sentsan insider'sview on how movementsdefine themselves and their

. . communltles. To startoff Schulmanaddresses feminist revisionism with a competitive challengeto 1990sdykes over who is/was more sexually daring: Andthis linewas backedup by an amazinglydistorted revisionism on seven- ties feministsand lesbians claiming that they were sexually inhibited and prud- ish, when all the documentationfrom that periodpoints in the opposite direction.... In the end,I stilldon't believe that the ninetiesdyke enjoys sex morethan Catherine MacKinnon. * (Schulman,1994: 9) Well,we all haveto haveour 'beliefs'.I believeSchulman when she claimsthat sexual experimentation was laidopen by feministsand lesbiansin the 1970s.What I wonderabout is howstraight working-class womenlike my momor blackwomen like my auntswere supposed to get theirrocks off andstill be admittedto feminismas morethan an objectfor reform. What I wonderabout is whetherfeminist and lesbian sexualexperimentation made room for diversityor definedthis experi- mentalsex rathernarrowly and prescriptively; if it thoughtabout race andclass models for sexuality. I want to arguefrom my own understand- ingsof culturalfeminism, lesbian feminism, academic feminism, and pop- l ular feminismthat it seemsthat sexualitywas usuallyeither hetero- ;26 l sexuallydefined or politicallydefined and therefore narrowly defined by

This content downloaded from 130.58.64.71 on Sat, 09 Jan 2016 19:46:13 UTC All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions all campsin the feministdebate. It is not about who is 'badder',it is c abouthow to createa politicsthat allowsfor a claimingof one'sown X pleasure.Isn't it? > Schulman'sbook offers a reflectionon how feministcommunities worked 3 in the past and how they mightor mightnot work now. It admirably 3 revealsthe complexitiesthat occur with bodies and categories and boundaries.For instance, Schulman gives a well-deservedand righteous slap on the handto SusanFaludi's recent book aboutbacklash, a veryreal issue for the 1990s, by askingwhy five hundredpages and no mentionof dykes? Always straight feministsand lesbians had trouble getting together.Until of coursethey could align aroundgender values, make sex political,and oppressall othersexual paradigms. Whose utopia is it anyway?In anotherbreath Schulman defines core gay and lesbianissues and lesbiansin the militaryas not one of them:'Not only is theregreat dissensionwithin our communityabout the role of the military(which has madegrass-roots organizing on the issuedifficult and low key), but it seemsclear that the community'sown priorityis AIDS'(Schulman, 1994: 14). Granted,this may have beenan issuesent fromthe political top downbut black lesbians often join the militaryas an economicneces- sity and, as Schulmanherself acknowledges, are the firstbooted out on homosexualcharges (while othershave chargesdismissed).2 This cer- tainlyspeaks to the specificsexual stigmas attached to the blackfemale body.If the community'sown priorityis AIDS,one mightask, as Evelynn Hammondsdoes, how the gains madeby queeractivists around AIDS have disruptedthe stigmasattached to black women'ssexuality and AIDS in the African-Americancommunity. Schulman, who makes up your activistlesbian feminist community? And how do you go about analysingthe most pressingconcerns - does the communitydialogue on race incorporateclass at all? GrantedSchulman presents a diverseand impressivearray of analysesaround race and class,particularly with her inclusionof a narrativeabout Jewish working-class women and journal- isticexcerpts recording the contributionsof blackfeminists among other peopleof colour.But in her introductionSchulman critiques identity politicsand ethnicity divisions as enteringfeminist activism and de-activating it (Schulman,1994: 4). Class and race and sexualityand genderand feminism,what a dilemmafor the 1990s. Why can'twe all just work together? Schulman'srecent text intersectsfeminism with other agendasexpertly and, intentionallyor not, articulatesthe complexitiesfeminist agendas l have inheritedtoday. It is clearto me that pleasureis centralto all the debates.Schulman's participation in the organizationof a new method of lesbianactivism, the LesbianAvengers, illustrates her own feminist 227

This content downloaded from 130.58.64.71 on Sat, 09 Jan 2016 19:46:13 UTC All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions >1 understandingof pleasure'srelationship to politics.The handbookuses a sexy imagesand slogansonce seenas exploitationfor politicalfliers. On , one flier Pam Grierof blaxploitationfilm fame appearswith artillery * and hot pantsluring members to a fund-raisingparty. Direct and con- o frontationalpolitical actions known as 'zaps'are detailed.The Lesbian , Avengersmethodology seems to be capableof attackinga variedline-up < of politicalconcerns, and seemsto be able to make it appealingto a z largerconstituency by extractingpolitical involvement from prescriptive X sexualpolitics. Where can the typesof feministand sexualpolitics links that Schulmanpresents with her avengermodel, where there is not an explicitanalysis of raceor class,be furtherdefined? I suggestthat queer blackfeminist understandings of pleasureand politics are 'id' for feminist agendas. Whatare the purposesin this clueerblack feminism being claimed out of creatinga sexualpolitics of pleasure?Abstractly, the answeris a cultural analysisand reclamationof queer black femalesexualities: sexualities that have had a long historyof beingdenied pleasure. But this queer black feminismmay seem to be consumedby sexualitywhile other issuesare laid by the wayside.What about equality of wages,opportu- nity,and rights?I will riskarguing that the feminizationof povertyis an issueof the rightof womento definetheir own pleasureas muchas it is an issueof wageearnings precisely because it is the samebody being sub- jectedto serviceand circumspection,because one type of oppression inheresthe other.When public discourseand legal legislationdefine singleblack mothers receiving public aid as sexuallyimmoral and irre- sponsiblein orderto enforcethe use of birthcontrol technology and evensterilization as a conditionof theirpublic aid, thensexual agency is clearlyat stake.Queer black feminism can best be understoodto take up sexualityin ways that makeit simultaneouslyabout race, class, and I genderin ways that politicizepleasure - not just personalizeit as a politicsof being.The constituencyfor queerblack feminism may alter daily,may be organizeddifferently around class or race,and may carry agendasfrom welfareactivism to academiccultural analysis. It should exhibitthe methodsfor a changingagenda by changingthe conceptof the feministbody and its pleasureand its history. Queerblack feminism's attention to pleasurewill not be viablefor all feministagendas. But queer black feminismunderstands pleasure and sexualityas bodiesseeking rights and wagesin a way earlierfeminism was unableto do: in a way thatdoes not requirea conformityto 'ideal' models of genderand pleasurein order to demandpolitical rights. Queerblack feminismdoes not extractone type of identityfrom the

2 t8 otherby containingand silencingmarkers of identitywithin boundaries

This content downloaded from 130.58.64.71 on Sat, 09 Jan 2016 19:46:13 UTC All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions of gender.The category of womanhas been sexualized precisely by mark- °m ingsof classand race, and inner-circle feminist oppression has occurred w preciselyby attemptingto eliminatethese markings with gender. Hence, > straightwomen who understandthe libertyto fuck as emancipation = mighthave found feminism more accessible if theirdesires had been z recognized.Black lesbians might have found it moreaccessible if raced 3 andclassed constructions of sexualityhad informed the theories.Since thisresulted in an areaof contentionfor mainstreamfeminisms, queer blackfeminisms can now takethe opportunityof historicallylocating, analysing,and redrawing the bodies at stake. In conclusion,I want to reflectupon the writing of thisessay. I wantto drawupon a facetrevealed in the personalaspect of thisessay that is apparentin arrivingat the end.I findit illustrativeof the dynamicsof the complexityof identitythat, althoughmy queerblack feminist agendacalls upon a combinationof popculture and intellectual arenas, it relieseven more on beinggrounded by the interrelatedand different experiencesof bothblack and white straight working-class women grap- plingwith oppressions - women who havea complexset of ethnicand racialand genderedcircumstances. The agency,pleasure, vocality, and particularityof struggledenied these subjects inform this essay. Is this a problemor a solution?Perhaps the groupingof queerand black and feminismresides in just such a contradictoryand tentativealliance. Perhapsthe possibilityof suchan allianceand diversity of queerblack feministsis conditional.Queer black feminism recognizes this; already its subjectivitiesare creatingtheories/practices/alliances with which to work.

Notes

l LauraAlexandra Harris teaches in the Women'sStudies Department at California StateUniversity San Marcos. Currently, Harris is the recipientof a UC President's DissertationYear Fellowship that will give her an opportunityto finishwriting her dissertationthis coming year. Her projectis entitled,'Women writing resistance:bodies, class, and race in the HarlemRenaissance'. Her e-mail address is: [email protected]. 1 It was TeresaDe Lauretisand Florence Howe, respectively, who proposedthese dilemmas. 2 AliciaHarris, my cousin,was partof a groupof womenbrought up on homosexualcharges in the 1980sin the Navy in whichonly the blackwomen were discharged.It was a fairlypublicized event with muchmedia distortion and | (mis)representation. l; 29

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