Black Feminism As A Human Culture
Anthropology is the study of humankind, and among the areas studied by socio-cultural anthropologists are socialization, gender, beliefs and other expressions of culture. Anthropologist Franz Boas (1940) theorized that cultural variation is complex; there are no universal laws governing all human culture. Woman as a social group lends itself as an object of study by anthropologists. Within this category is black feminism. Black feminism is an ideology that supports improving the status and rights of Black women so that they could gain control over their lives. Black feminists argue that there is no "unitary women's perspective or point of view" (Moore, 1988, p. 188). They make the point that race is not additive, that the experience of race transforms the experience of gender, and that it brings into question any feminist approach which suggests that "women should be treated as women first, and only after that as women differentiated by race, culture, history and so on" (Moore, 1988, p. 190).
Black feminists sought to reinterpret a white defined, male defined society from the perspective of black women, to re-invent feminism for themselves. Self-identification in place of allowing others to define you is crucial to self-empowerment. As Black feminist poet Audre Lorde (1984) wrote, "I have come to believe over and over again that what is most important to me must be spoken, made verbal and shared, even at the risk of having it bruised or misunderstood" (Lorde, p. 40).
Psychologist William E. Cross, Jr. developed a model of black identity development that is relevant to the higher self-esteem and personal strength of the black feminism movement. It is Cross' theory that African Americans move through stages in which being Black changes from low or neutral to high salience or prominence (Cross, 1971). It may be theorized from this that by adopting feminist beliefs, Black women develop high...