Intersectionality Essay

Intersectionality Essay
Women's history is a history of oppression. Throughout time, women have faced systematic
domination, which has ultimately informed women's identities and shaped their roles in society.
However, the oppression of women is not uniform and different groups of women have experienced
sexist oppression to different degrees and in vastly different ways. This is largely due to
intersectionality, which is the idea that the convergence and interaction of various oppressed aspects
of one's identity uniquely affect individuals and social systems. As KimberlГ© Crenshaw discusses
in "Intersectionality and Identity Politics: Learning from Violence Against Women of Color",
women of color are situated in such a way that they belong to at least two subjugated groups. Their
particular position exemplifies intersectionality because they are victims of overlapping patterns of
sexism and racism, leaving them completely marginalized. Furthermore, intersectionality highlights
the interconnectedness and multiplicity of oppression in society. In her essay "'Intersectionality' is a
Big Fancy Word for My Life", Mia Mingus explains how the oppressed can also contribute to
oppression. This concept in culmination with discrepancies in discrimination within communities
leads to a fraught and complex dynamic that has lasting impacts. Societies must recognize
intersectionality in women' history in order to fully comprehend and rectify the oppression of today.
One area in women's history where it is important
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I will try to explain intersectionality. First of all you need to know what intersectionality is.
Intersectionality is a theoretical framework which explains violence or discrimination against
humans. Now I will give you an example and then try to connect it to intersectionality. I will use
an example of spider web to explain this theory. This example will give you some idea about
intersectionality. Think about a spider web. A Point in the centre and all threads connected to each
other. If we remove one thread from the spider web, it will fall apart. Now consider yourself. You
have some identities and these identities are connected just like spider web and we cannot remove
any identity from you. If we remove any identity from you, then...show more content...
I liked one definition of intersectionality which I would like to put here. "Intersectionality seeks to
provide a tool for analyzing the ways in which gender, race, class and all other forms of identity and
distinction, in different contexts, produce situations in which women and men become vulnerable
to abuse and discrimination."(1). When we try to study how the intersection of race, gender,
social class, effects humans and how are they connected then it means we are using
intersectionality theory. For example what are the problems of white, young, female and what are
the problems of black, young female. What will happen if we remove young from the equation
and replace it with old? Inequality of gender is clearly defined but inequality of same sex is
complicated. If we want to know the problems of women and man then we might just find some
sex related issues. But when we talk about just men or women then it's a different story. I heard that
all men are created equal but people use different lens to see it. For example, some time man is
called black man or white man, Muslim man or Christian man. They are all men but their gender
intersects with other identities and makes them different from one another. When somebody is
discriminated on the basis of color, we know this exist. Intersectionality tells us about other kind of
discrimination. For example black man with different religion. It means same gender, same color,
same language but different religion.

Intersectionality
Intersectionality of Gender Inequality
Name:
Institution:
Intersectionality of Gender Inequality For many decades, women have experienced all forms of
oppression and constant violence that threatened their existence in the male–dominated society.
Various forms of discrimination and oppression have been directed to women for decades.
Violence directed at women such as rape and battery were seen and treated as isolated scenarios.
However, as the need to foster gender equality took pace, such oppressive actions are now
perceived as elements of a wider system of dominance in the society that that needs to be addressed
as a whole rather than in singularity...show more content...
I had a firsthand experience with the intricacies surrounding the issue of gender inequality in the
workplace in Asia. I had a placement in one corporation in Hong Kong, and there was no female
employee in the senior management. Although there exist legal apparatus to accord female
employees equal opportunities at the workplace, many corporate risk legal suits for denying female
employees their fair share of the job opportunities in the fear of losing their market. Social constructs
and religious doctrines are so entrenched in Asian societies to the extent that accompany with many
female senior employees can lose their market. Therefore, tackling the issue of gender inequality in
the workplace should entail the analysis of all oppressive institutions in that society rather than
tackling the problem of the inequality in isolation (Crenshaw et al., 2013).
Reference
Crenshaw et al (2013). Toward a Field of Intersectionality Studies: Theory, Applications, and Praxis.
Chicago: The University of Chicago

Essay On Intersectionality
The idea of intersectionality is that all of our identities overlap and are also constantly affecting
our privileges and oppressions. People do not always think about their interactions despite them
playing a pivotal role in our human experience. This is what causes some writers to feel the need to
put them into words so that maybe more people will look at themselves and do some thinking about
their own intersections. Some of the authors that I believe have done this well are Patricia Collins in
her work titled Black Feminist Thought. Another work that discussed intersectionality well is titled
"A Black Feminist Statement" which is powerful in the way it discusses how race interacts with
womanhood. The final piece I feel as though needs discussed is Women, Race, and Class which is a
piece written by Angela Davis that discusses the intersections that can be seen in...show more
content...
In the early women's right's campaign there was not much focus on the intersectionality it was more
based on the issues that white women were facing at the time. This lead to many issue involved in
the feminist movement, due to the lack of intersectionality. As Davis points out this lead to the racist
undertones throughout the feminist movement one of the issues Davis mentions is when Fredrick
Douglass, a member of the feminist movement, sent his daughter away to a white school and she
was denied access by a woman claiming to be an abolitionist. These issues were rampant in my
opinion due to the lack of a more intersectional attitude. The first feminist movement wasn't all bad
as Davis points out. Many white women put their lives on the line to fight for the rights of their
African American sisters. As Davis explains a white woman refused to let he school be segregated,
therefor fought for the rights of young African Americans to receive the same education. As Davis
states "the

The notion of making the invisible visible is this concept that recognizes the forces of power
because they highlight how experiences and certain identities get constructed and normalized into
the dynamics of society. For instance, being a poor person of color, or a queer person allows those
people to be subjected under different layers of power, such as gender stereotypes, economic
expectations, which are ultimately social control mechanisms that place humans on this spectrum of
who deserves success and who does not. Intersectionality, in regards to Honduran Americans
references the different layers of forces which are subjecting them to be discriminated inside a white
dominated nation. For instance, white males are at the top of the spectrum while poor black queer
women are at the bottom of latter thereby indicating how oppression is reactionary toward subjective
identities. According to Vivian Mays article Intersectionality, her article highlights the narrowness
within her range of intersectionality, in which is has constructed a binary of analysis, so that
liberation frameworks get silenced from power dynamics. Power dynamics ensure the restriction of
autonomy, because of the ability to narrow the foundation of liberation in order to sustain the status
quo. May writes, Intersectionality exposes how conventional approaches to inequality, including
feminist, civil rights, and liberal rights models, tend to: mistakenly rely on single–axis modes of
analysis and redress;

Intersectionality Reflection
The first similarities I noticed within all four of my lists is that there were multiple words that
saw me as someone who achieves, works hard for, and is resourceful about meeting goals. I also
noticed that many words related to who I was as a family member and as a student. The
differences that were noted within these lists are how some people saw me as an individual,
whereas as others placed my characteristics as part of a group. I noticed here how many different
words, from different people, who knew me in their own ways came together to describe one thing.
This is where I believe intersectionality comes to show how humans are shaped and molded by
numerous interactions, not just one. I am not a cookie cutter mold, so I will not be exactly

Thesis On Intersectionality
1.5. Intersectionality
For the purpose of this thesis, the term, intersectioanlity will be discussed in this subchapter.
Intersectionality, a feminist sociological theory, is a term coined by a famous researcher KimberlГ©
Crenshaw in her essay entitled Demarginalizing the Intersection of Race and Sex: A Black Feminist
Critique of Antidiscrimination Doctrine, Feminist Theory and Antiracist Politics (1989). The notion
is connected with different forms of oppressions experienced simultaneously by African American
women. In her essay, Crenshaw compares discrimination to traffic. She states that women can be
victims of discrimination and its consequences that may come from many directions, which she
called in her research as an intersection of gender,...show more content...
Yet, Crenshaw admits, "it is not always easy to reconstruct an accident" (1991). The reason behind
this statement is a need to categorize the two dimensions of racism and sexism because the two terms
are closely intertwined. And "the intersectional experience", according to Crenshaw, "is greater than
the sum of racism and sexism, any analysis that does not take intersectionality into account cannot
sufficiently address the particular manner in which Black women are subordinated" (1991). The
scholar argues a black woman has an intersectional identity because of two key factors: she is woman
and she is black which shape her life from the very beginning and, more importantly, she may be
marginalized within them. Crenshaw divides intersectionality into three main categories (1991). The
first, structural intersetionality refers to the experiences of black women in terms of domestic
violence. Crenshew states at this point that there are many women of color who are excluded from
their societies in terms of education and work. Apart from that, they often become victims of the
class oppression and hierarchy that situate them at the bottom of the community structure. The
second, political intersectionality depicts a problem with violence against women who are often
marginalized. According to Crenshaw, it stems from the fact that women of color are often torn
between political groups presenting conflicting agendas. On the one hand, they still have to opt for
their rights as women in the male–dominated world and, on the other hand, they have to confront
themselves with white women. At this point, the intersectionality between race and gender is
visible. The third, representational intersectionality is directly related to the representation of black
women in a culture that is often biased and,

Intersectionality Speech
Students,
Today we are going to talk about black women, racism and sexism, but first we are going to talk
about cars.
Imagine you are at an intersection. Traffic is free to come and go in four directions, and you are
standing in the middle. Discrimination, just like an intersection, can flow in many directions and an
accident can occur from any to all of them. Similarly, if a woman of color is hurt because she is
standing in the middle of an intersection, her injury could result from sex or race discrimination, or
even both. However each are a constant threat, just as the moving cars are. Intersectionality lies in
understanding that multiple oppressions are not each felt separately but rather as a single, unified
experience. Black women

Intersectionality In Family
Until quite recently, the traditional view of family that has predominated society has been
comprised of gender roles. The "ideal" family in the past has consisted of a white, middle–class,
heterosexual couple with about 2.5 children. In this heteronormative nuclear family, the father is the
head of the household and the breadwinner of the family, while the mother is the one who cares for
the children and completes household duties. Of course, most families do not fit into this mould and
those who do not fit have been repeatedly marginalized due to their differences. It is no question that
race, class, sexuality, ability, and many other identity markers intersect in how forms of family may
vary. As explained by the concept of intersectionality, gender must be analyzed through a lens that
includes various identity markers which contribute to how an individual experiences oppression. It is
through the use of intersectionality, the discussion of patriarchy, and the deconstruction of "family"
that bell hooks (1990) and Michelle K. Owen (2001) paint family as a site of belonging and
contestation.
In her article, bell hooks (1990) argues that the home is a site of resistance for black people. She
recalls being raised with the mindset that women, particularly black women, took the lead in running
the house. According to hooks, the home was a place that provided warmth, comfort, food, and
nurturing. It was a place that taught the young about dignity, integrity, and faith. Black

Intersectionality Importance
If I were to say "intersectionality", most people I know, besides the ones outside of this geography
course, would have no idea what I meant. As a matter of fact, I myself had never heard of
intersectionality before the guest lecture. So, what exactly is intersectionality, why is it important,
how does it affect identity, and how does it fit into the context of a geography class? I will be
answering all these questions in my essay. So, to begin to understand intersectionality and its
importance, it might be easier to introduce intersectionality with a dictionary definition.
Intersectionality, as defined by the Oxford Dictionary is "the interconnected nature of social
categorizations such as race, class, and gender, regarded as creating...show more content...
Intersectionality is also important in a movement front. The more we as a society can recognize that
there are marginalized groups who may be marginalized in more than one way, the readier we are to
make an everlasting change on the way we treat those people. Intersectionality's relationship with
perceptions and conceptions of identity is rather complex. First, it may be easier to explain their
relationship with intersectionality by defining perception and conception. Perception is how others
view someone, while conceived is how someone views themselves. Intersectionality affects first
perception both negatively and positively. It could be said that intersectionality limits us to
observing people by their physical characteristics, as that's what intersectionality's primary focus is –
marginalized race, gender, sex, religion, etc. The way people and society sometimes perceive
others based on these physical characteristics is not always correct. As an incredibly extreme
example, some people may perceive a Muslim man speaking in Arabic on an airplane to be a
terrorist threat, as has happened before. Simply, the way we perceive others just isn't always how
the person we are perceiving identifies themselves. It is because of this misperception that things like
stereotypes and misunderstandings arise, simply because we as a society may be making
judgements about

Berlyn Valdez
WGS 150
October 16, 2017
Midterm Essay
Intersectionality
The term intersectionality is a very complex word with room for an open range for multiple
definitions. Intersectionality is used to understand numerous types of oppressions and
discriminations against people. Although, intersectionality wasn't used as a term until the 1980's by
Kimberle Crenshaw, an american civil rights activist and feminist, as a label for the types of
oppressions women of color experienced. This is crucial for our understanding of US womxy's
history. The term reflects to the reality that we all have multiple identities that intersect to make us
who we are. The concept of feminism doesn't just include activism for women's rights but for the
rights...show more content...
This analogy can be used to educate those who don't quite understand the abstract concept of
intersectionality. Throughout history women of color have been double discriminated due to their
gender, race, and sexuality. The notion of intersectionality brought forward the oppressions women
of color struggle with into mainstream society. Now that these injustice acts have reached attention it
can better the lives of those oppressed.
Being an immigrant can be an "intersection" of intersectionality. An example of this notion would be
Gloria Anzaldua's "Borderlands/La Frontera". Anzaldua is a queer immigrant women with many
identities. She writes about her struggles as a queer immigrant in the united states. As Anzaldua
begins to discover herself she creates new identities for herself which lead to new oppression or
"intersections". Immigrants throughout the United States will continue to face the idea of
intersectionality throughout their lives. Society needs to realize the wronging in this to fit in all of
different race, gender, and sexualy orientation.
The upcoming analysis of intersectionality threatens the hetropatriarcy society we live in. The idea
of hetropatriarcy falls back to colonization by the Europeans. The colonization created the notion of
gendered conquest. The Europeans created stereotypes and disregarded

Critical Intersectionality
"Making My Head Spin; Critical Intersectionality" : The Characteristics of Inequality Depending on
the individual who is pondering around the complexity of "Intersectionality" may cause a dispute of
what they believe is the definition. Victoria L. Bromley, the author of Feminisms Matter: Debates,
Theories, Activism illustrates a feminist view of how intersectionality is the root of oppression,
which is all interconnected to our identity. Bromley, refers to this as "identity markers" this is how
we categorize or describe individuals in a society. That being said, identity markers are bias, and not
factual, they are used and believed to maintain the status quo. For example, with minimum
knowledge, you see a white man on the street who is dressed...show more content...
If not met to the status quo, our sex,gender, ethnicity, able–sim, and class can cause us to be seen as
less in society, thus effecting our multiple identities, the amount of power we have, and
empowerment we feel or give; which ultimately excludes or includes our privileges. In conclusion,
intersectionality is a growing problem in our society today; it continues to enforce oppression and
enable people to truly define

The classifications of race and gender have intersected and caused conflicts with the lives of those
close to me, shaping the social world in which I have grown up. Intersectionality is the junction of
many factors like sex, gender, race or class that bring forth oppression, domination or discrimination.
It attempts to present the multiple factors that structure one's experiences and explains that each
individual is not the same. Everyone comes from different backgrounds so one cannot assume that
everyone shares a commonality due to their characteristics. The white upper–class women have been
the dominant feminists, although they create oppression while generalizing and assuming that
everyone has the same experiences as they do. An example...show more content...
As the year went on I noticed that he was quiet and alone quite often. I did not know him too well
but later in the year I became friends with him and got to know him better. He told me the things
that I, as part of the privileged majority, did not notice because they were not affecting me. He
explained how uncomfortable he felt not fitting it and how it really bothered him. As he was both
Asian and American, he didn't feel accepted into each culture separately. He was 'too white' to be
considered Asian and be part of the traditional Asian lifestyle and since he looked Asian he wasn't
fully accepted into the American culture. Also, because he was an Asian–male he was raised a bit
differently than some 'normal males' at my school. He wasn't brought up to be athletic or muscular,
he had a good sense of fashion, and he was very intelligent, so therefore was seen as 'less
masculine'. In my opinion, these are all positive qualities. Now, he has met some friends with the
same Asian–American intersection who share the same physical qualities as him but those should
just be a small part of the people he is accepted by. Just because people look a bit different
physically does not mean that they don't share the same interests socially or mentally. An
African–American male and an Asian–American male could share more similar experiences than
two males that that are

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