Intersectionality: Unpacking Systematized Social Inequalities - Essay Sample

Introduction

Intersectionality refers to a feminist sociological framework that explains how culturally and socially constructed identities interconnects on multiple levels resulting in systematized social inequalities. Crenshaw coined the term intersectionality to refer to various identities within a society that contributed to oppression and thus it has found usage in seconstructing domination, oppression, and discrimination. Intersectionality alludes that long-established identities - cultural, biological and social - such as race, gender, class, abilities, age, and sex among others overlap leading to various form of oppressions, threats, segregation, and domination (Lepinard, 2014).. Crenshaw and Patricia Hill have used everyday experiences in women's lives to demonstrate how women can experience oppression in different ways and degrees, depending on how their cultural and social levels overlap.

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History of the Concept of Intersectionality

Crenshaw dealt much in illustrating how sexism and racism interact in a manner that leads the marginalization of women of African descent more distinct by both black men and white women. The theory would later gain prominence when women of color realized that their social identities were different from the mainstream feminist movement - which was predominantly led by the whites (Delaney, 2010; Lepinard, 2014). The whites' mainly fought for education and workplace discrimination, as the society perceived them only suitable for domestic duties, which contrasted significantly with blacks, who were struggling againist slavery. Therefore, intersectionality gained prominence in defining racially instigated discrimination due to the difference in conditions from the whites.

Coincidentally, as the Black women gained a realization that they were not best-fitted for mainstream feminist groups, there were also an overwhelming number of women who faced oppression in the form of sexism and racism as they participated in the civil rights movement, thus often precludeded from leadership positions. The two intersectional experiences; sexism and racism in the civil rights movement and feminist respectively cemented the Black women's resolve to demand inclusion into the feminist (Wilber, 2018). The experiences of the black women gave rise to their understanding of their position to with regards to racism, sexism, and class oppression. Although intersectionality majored on addressing gender and race, it has expandend to incorporate other aspects such as sexual orientation, color, class, and age among others (Harris & Leonardo, 2018). This is because people face oppressions and threats differently.

Components of Intersectionality

The concept of intersectionality is made up of three elements. Crenshaw identified three components of intersectionality that affects women of color: political intersectionality, representational intersectionality, and structural intersectionality (Garry, 2011; Paik, 2017)). Structural intersectionality looks at how women - particularly of black the African descent experience various forms of oppression like rape and domestic violence in a manner that is different from the whites. Representational intersectionality looks into how race, sexuality, and gender are interlinked and in a way that imposes discriminatory stereotypes of color in various form of media, particularly television and in the film industry (Garry, 2011). Political intersectionality looks at how policies and laws intended to foster equality have incongruously reduced the violence against women of colors. In light of these three components of the concept of intersectionality, Crenshaw provided an in-depth depiction of how social injustice and objectification of black women has continuously been subliminally enforced in different form of media.

Significance of the Concept of Intersectionality

The concept of intersectionality is crucial in deconstructing the overlapping that exists between various forms of personal attributes such as gender, race, and social class is interconnected. Getting a better understanding of how diverse social identities interconnects with each other offer a critical view of how some people become less advantaged in various social aspects (Levine-Rasky, 2011). A prime example that brings this into perspective is instances where a woman is labelled as a white woman or a black woman, a Christian woman, or a Muslim woman. Despite the fact these two individual are all women if one was to look at them purely from the biological aspect of their sexes, their gender intersects with other social identities that in turn make them look different from one another

When reading or in interpreting sociological theories, applying the concept of intersectionality is crucial as it enables one to critically examine the intersecting social identities and interconnected systems of domination, segregation, and oppression. A sociology student can be able to establish the overlapping networks of oppressions that intersect with education and which could derail them from accomplishing their achievements and how they can be dismantled (Cornileus, 2004). By critically interpreting a theory by applying the concept of intersectionality can also enable someone to identify and combat the interwoven segregations and prejudices that people face in our daily lives. Intersectionality demands that both disadvantages of others and the privileges of our identities be critically scrutinized, not as a base to compare the levels of oppression, but as a matter of developing a better understanding of the universalism of oppression (Mabry, 2016). As a result, we can acknowledge the experience of oppression and the paths for oppression that may not really have any impact on us but nevertheless are both unjust and wrong and look into ways that we can get rid of them.

In the contemporary world, the concept of intersectionality is instrumental in facilitating social equity work. Community establishments and the activists have been demanding for and play a role in advocating for more dynamic discourses about the distinctions in experience among people with intersecting identities (Cornileus, 2004). In the absence of intersectional lenses, movements and events arranged by activists or community organizations that focus on addressing injustices meted towards a particular group may turn out to extend systems of inequities to more groups of people. If the concept of intersectionality is not critically considered, and as such, community organizations or activists would not ultimately accomplish their core goals. What's more, is that it enlightens women of color to be conscious about the health disparities.

In matters to do with feminism, with the knowledge of intersectionality one can critically analyze and determine how the passing laws without examining them with intersectional lenses can end up affecting a particular group of people. For example, the passing ill-disposed anti-abortion laws and the closure of women's health clinic can unreasonably affect women from low resource settings and who in this case are predominantly women of color (Center for Reproductive Rights, 2015). The right for women to get reproductive rights should not depend on the resources they have.

How Black Feminist Thought Utilizes the Concept of Intersectionality to Critique Positivism and Universality

Before the concept of intersectionality was coined, the mainstream feminist claimed to represent all women, sociologist and feminist researchers like Patricia Collins and Professor Crenshaw later came to debunk this popular belief. Collins (2000), demonstrated that women are perhaps alone as it pertains to the degree in which they have embraced intersectionality. She described how women of African descent were facing different challenges, such as having been brought to the US as slaves in situations of exploitations and many other forms of oppression. Collins (2000), states that at that time. In the wake of slavery that detrimentally affected blacks, the white women were facing different issues, and it is the intersection of class, gender and race oppression characteristics which they experience from their slavery, which shaped all the subsequent relationships that black women had within the black community in America. This is also created a political ambiance for the women's of color intellectual work. Collins utilized the concept intersectionality in critiquing positivism by indicating that it is a mistake to separate knowledge from the connected knowers and making it a critical theory in the absence of praxis. Her methodological concerns were looked at the participatory action research and how the hierarchical levels between the subjects and scientist can be broken down (Ferree, 2018). The understanding that someone to get from an intersectional analysis to people who think about complex and converging identities is meant to be tied to an intersectional praxis.

Role of Resistance in Black Feminist Thought

Black Feminist thought offers information that is essential in putting into perspective the struggles black women have faced as they try to decrease or eliminate identities such as class, gender, sexism, and racial inequalities. Collins (2000), offers an analysis of the concepts of women of color that shows their consciousness in opposition to domination and oppression. Collins articulated black women's resistance in opposition to oppressive images as a vitally important step in exercising self-definition. The dismissal of black women's definition by the dominant and most influential group and subsequent imposition of self-definition among black-women demonstrates consciousness among the black women.

Summarily, the incorporation of intersectionality within various social aspects implies the recognition of diversities of women and the different experience their multiple experiences. Besides the strong symbolic sense that such recognition confers, there innumerable expectations concerning the theoretical and practical potentialities to ensure all women enjoy equal rights with their counterparts.

References

Alinia, M. (2015). On Black Feminist Thought: thinking oppression and resistance through intersectional paradigm. Ethnic and Racial Studies, 38(13), 2334-2340. DOI: 10.1080/01419870.2015.1058492

Center for Reproductive Rights. (2015, May 10). New Research Reveals Devastating Impact of Clinic Shutdown Laws on Texas Women. Retrieved August 14, 2019, from https://reproductiverights.org/press-room/new-research-reveals-devastating-impact-of-clinic-shutdown-laws-on-texas-women

Collins, P. H. (2000). Black feminist thought: Knowledge, consciousness, and the politics of empowerment. New York: Routledge.

Cornileus, T. (2004). A critical examination of the impact of racism on the career development of African American professional men in corporate America (Ph.D.,). The University of Georgia.

Crenshaw, K. (1991). Mapping the Margins: Intersectionality, Identity Politics, and Violence against Women of Color. Stanford Law Review, 43(6), 1241. DOI: 10.2307/1229039

Delaney, P. (2010). Dorothy Height and the Sexism of the Civil Rights Movement. Retrieved 14 August 2019, from https://www.theroot.com/dorothy-height-and-the-sexism-of-the-civil-rights-movem-1790879502

Ferree, M. M. (2018). Intersectionality as Theory and Practice. Contemporary Sociology: A Journal of Reviews, 47(2), 127-132. DOI: 10.1177/0094306118755390

Garry, A. (2011). Intersectionality, Metaphors, and the Multiplicity of Gender. Hypatia, 26(4), 826-850. doi:10.1111/j.1527-2001.2011.01194.x

Harris, A., & Leonardo, Z. (2018). Intersectionality, Race-Gender Subordination, and Education. Review of Research in Education, 42(1), 1-27. DOI: 10.3102/0091732x18759071

Lepinard, E. (2014). Doing Intersectionality. G...