In 1979, The Scholar & Feminist VI: The Future of Difference showcased formative theories of sexual difference across a range of disciplines, from psychoanalytic, linguistic and literary criticism to history and political science. The following year’s conference, Class, Race and Sex: Exploring Contradictions, Affirming Connections, set out to understand how economic, political and cultural institutions divide women by class, race and sexual preference. Moderated by Elizabeth Bernstein, Assistant Professor of Sociology at Barnard College, this panel explored how notions of “difference” have evolved over the last thirty years, and how strategies for securing economic, racial and sexual justice have contributed to contemporary feminist movements. Panelists included:
- Siobhan Brooks, sex worker organizer
- Leslie Feinberg, author and transgender lesbian activist
- Amber Hollibaugh, author and activist
- Surina Khan, political consultant
Professor Bernstein opened the conversation by inviting the panelists to speak about their work and the biggest challenges that work presents to mainstream feminist theorizing and activism. In their candid discussion of a range of experience – from union organizing for sex workers to the challenges of introducing radical politics into national, non-profit organizations – the panelists revisited themes that formed the foundation of the historic conferences mentioned above: the challenges of building a movement that truly honors and incorporates difference, that seeks to build connections that are tensile enough to allow for divergent, even contradictory, approaches and thoughts. Both Siobhan Brooks and Surina Khan spoke passionately about the need to build outward from single-issue movements, while Amber Hollibaugh addressed the problems of putting that desirable theory into practice: “we’re not a very generous movement when [new or uninitiated] people enter it,” she argued, urging us to “step forward and out into the places where we don’t know everything,” where total agreement is not necessarily a foregone conclusion.
In speaking of the barriers that are easily, often unconsciously or unintentionally, erected between members of movements who share the same vision, the same goals, Leslie Feinberg discussed where feminism has most succeeded in response to difference and where it has most failed. Siobhan Brooks criticized a narrow version of the second-wave feminist movement, which seemed blinded to the needs of poor women and women of color by its single goal of equality: “we need to get beyond equality,” Siobhan said. Surina Khan echoed this concern by focusing on the structure of non-profit organizing, claiming that current tax laws help eclipse the concerns of poor women of color by providing funding to larger, more established groups that tend to fight for more mainstream, more middle-class causes; this issue was later revisited during the question and answer session, as an audience member inspired a lively discussion of the “non-profit industrial complex.” In order to realize this vision of a more inclusive social and economic justice movement, Leslie Feinberg reminded us that the “interrelationship[s]” between various movements that have most fruitful have been the relationships between “marginalized groups, groups that [were] the most disenfranchised or downtrodden, or most the target of repression . . . that [had] just become intolerable.” She invited us to consider the history of the left wings of the gay liberation movement, the civil rights movement, the women’s movement, each of which demanded that its members stand up not only for themselves but for everyone. Amber Hollibaugh saw the potential to return to this sort of organizing; because we live in a time where “the luxury of single-identity politics is really being moved to the side profoundly,” we face the exciting (and, no doubt, challenging) possibility of crafting a movement that takes into account the complexity and multi-dimensionality of our lives, struggles and experiences.
Text: Full Transcript (PDF, 176 KB)
Video Clips: Play Clip 1
Siobhan Brooks talks about the challenges of claiming a feminist identity in communities of color, and the larger issue of being marginalized within an already marginalized group Play Clip 2
Surina Khan discusses the need to identify and “[shift] power structures” not only in the systems we’re working to change, but also within our own movements Play Clip 3
Leslie Feinberg identifies the social and political conditions that prove “the most fertile ground for coalition building” Play Clip 4
Amber Hollibaugh urges each of us to take responsibility for the limitations of the movements to which we belong, and to strive to do the work that those limitations leave undone
