Chapter 2 Readings
Patricia Hill Collins
Representative Works
 Black Feminist Thought: Knowledge, Consciousness




and the Politics of Empowerment
Race, Class and Gender: An Anthology (edited with
Margaret Anderson)
Fighting Words: Black Women and the Search for
Social Justice
Black Sexual Politics: African Americans, Gender,
and the New Racism
From Black Power to Hip Hop: Racism,
Nationalism, and Feminism
“Toward a New Vision”
 Need to rid ourselves of either/or and
dominant/subordinate dichotomous thinking
 Instead we need to reconceptualize oppression by
uncovering connections between race, class, and
gender as categories of analysis
Oppression
 Institutional (antebellum plantation) – who holds
positions of power, and who holds lowest positions?
 Symbolic – socially sanctioned ideologies used to
justify relations of domination and repression
(stereotypical images)
 Individual – cumulative effect of our life experiences
within multiple structures of oppression
Transcending Barriers
 We need to recognize that each of us lives within a
system that vests us with varying levels of power and
privilege.
 We need to build effective coalitions instead of
focusing on a common enemy.
 We need to develop empathy for the experiences of
individuals and groups different than ourselves.
 We all need to examine our position.
Questions
 How can we begin to reconceptualize race, class, and
gender as categories of analysis (how do we move
beyond either/or and superior/inferior)?
 How can we begin to develop common causes and
develop empathy, no matter which side of privilege
we inhabit?
Marilyn Frye
Representative Works
 Politics of Reality: Essays in Feminist Theory
 Willful Virgin: Essays in Feminism, 1976-1992
 Feminist Interpretations of Mary Daly (edited with
Sarah Lucia Hoagland)
 “Essentialism/Ethnocentrism: The Failure of the
Ontological Cure”
 “Categories and Dichotomies” in Encyclopedia of
Feminist Theories
 “Categories in Distress” in Feminist Interventions in
Ethics and Politics
“Oppression”
 What is oppression?
 How does being oppressed differ from being judged
or criticized harshly?
 Are women caught in a series of no-win situations?
 Who is doing the criticizing/judging? (For example,
who criticizes women for being sexually active or
sexually inactive? Who criticizes women for having
children or not having children? For marrying or not
marrying?)
Felice Yeskel
Representative Work
 Pioneering lesbian activist in 1970s
 1985: Co-founded the Stonewall Center at the
University of Massachusetts, one of the first GLBT
Centers at a major university
 2001: Economic Apartheid in America: A Primer on
Economic Inequality and Insecurity
 2005: co-founder and Executive Director of Class
Action (www.classism.org)
“Opening Pandora’s Box”
 Adding classism to the list of “isms” makes us






uncomfortable
No commonly agreed upon definition of class
Gap between rich and poor in US greatest it has been
since 1929
Economic class is much less fluid than people think
Myth of the American Dream
Classist stereotypes/prejudice
Existence of class necessitates class inequality
Group Questions
 Do we as a society blame the poor for being poor?
 Why are we so uncomfortable talking about issues
related to class?
 Do you agree with Yeskel’s statement that
“Disrespect is harmful”?