Term
| Indian Relocation & Termination Program |
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Definition
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- Complete assimilation and declaration of NAs as non-existant.
- Forced NAs to move into cities and get jobs.
- Problematic b/c it caused original Americans to become "invisible" Americans.
- NAs were seen as economic pawns only.
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Term
| Occupation of Alcatraz Island |
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Definition
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- Alcatraz became the new Indian center - a place for gathering and activism.
- Richard Oaks was the head person.
- Publicity decreased and people left. Groups split.
- No $ from gov't.
- Different politics led to problems with leadership.
- Rumors created to stop support in Alcatraz.
- Seen as militant, not rational.
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Term
| Positive Results from Occupation @ Alcatraz |
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Definition
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- Victory, pride, and being able to freely roam the land.
- Having a strong sense of community.
- Were able to take back some of the land.
- Body/Spirit activism awoke tribes, media, and US gov't.
- Raised consciousness and new interests in tribal communities.
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Term
| Purpose of "Un-Thanksgiving" Celebrations @ Alcatraz |
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Definition
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- Reminded struggle and rights that people take for granted.
- Celebrates the fact that they survived.
- Goes against the muth of Thanksgiving.
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Term
| "Who is Your Mother?" - Paula Gunn Allen |
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Definition
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- Refers to your roots, significance, position, value system, traditions, culture, identity, & HISTORY.
- Knowing your mother is the knowing your relationship to Earth and society.
- Without knowing, you lose yourself. Lost, unknown, no history, abandoned, and alienated.
- NAs have an importance with continuity with one's cultural origians while American ideas are to forget one's traditions.
- Gives solid sense of identity.
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Term
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Definition
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- Women of All Red Nations.
- Founded by Madonna Thunder Hawk & Lorelei DeCora Means.
- WARN was seen as an act of tyranny or terrorism & FBI/CIA tried to shut them down.
- Issues were being ignorned b/c AIM was seen as male-dominated.
- Dealt with environmental concerns, concious of and loving for world.
- NA women misrepresented in pop culture (team mascots, sports, tobacco, etc.)
- Struggled for NA women and their family (healthcare & food).
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Term
| Role of Memory in Oppression - Paula Gunn Allen |
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Definition
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- Many NA women are seen as beasts, squaws, & traitors.
- "We must remember our origins, our cultures, our histories, ...for without that memory, which implies CONTINUANCE rather than nostalgia..."
- **Oppression starts from loss of memory (e.g. NAs were the real Americans before European settlers came in).
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Term
| NA's Impact on Contemporary American Culture |
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Definition
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- Government was a product of American Indian ideas. Women helped shaped the Iroquois Confederation. Iroquois federal system was very similar to the U.S. fed system today.
- Medicine
- Sexuality: Orientation
- Bathing
- "Dream" - Self-fulfillment
- Environmentalism
- Child rearing
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Term
| Pocahontas/Squaw Perplex - Rayna Green |
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Definition
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- Painting of Pocahontas in European attire was an ad for NA's to assimilate and a way to pleasure European eyes.
- The classic story is that she lived "happily ever after," but that wasn't the case.
Europeans saw Indian women as--
Princess: saviors of white men, sacrificed culture for white culture, lighter, younger, leander, a virgin, and Christian.
Squaw: drunk, worthless, thieves, darker, savages, lustful, ugly, and dysfunctional.
**These lists are detrimental models or constructed/man-made. They were tools for control. Made a difficult and "perplexing" situation for Native American women.
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Term
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Definition
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- Represented all women in old stories.
- Stories told about a woman doing both good (heroic) and bad deeds.
- Women and men were created equal.
- Daring woman, crossed traditional boundaries of ordinary behaviors during times of crisis in order to save hometown.
- Posses beauty of passion, daringness, and sheer strength to act.
- Her stories preach comfort with individual differences.
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Term
| The Mankillers' Relationship to the SF Indian Center |
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Definition
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- A place to share experiences and feelings of frustrations with people of similar backgrounds.
- It provided security and socialization (picnics, sports programs, work, dances, bingo, get-togethers); it built a strong sense of community.
- It was considered a CONSTANT--always there for the Mankillers during times of turmoil and anguish.
- Went to Indian Center for solace.
- Atmosphere brought feelings of change.
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Term
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Definition
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- SueLinn: Didn't know her hertiage, didn't know what bracelet meant, didn't really know her mother.
- Mother passed and gave up, let herself die, or lost will to live.
- 3 mothers - Dolores (biological mom), Ms. Terell, & Sweet William.
- Mother tried to provide food, but failed to.
- Ms. Terell offered food to kids in class. Gave "food" in terms of education of SueLinn's history (the bracelet).
- Sweet William gave her peppermint tea and soup (warm: feeling of nuturing) and mothered her.
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Term
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Definition
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- A female bordache or cross-gendered female.
- Born into a time where cross-gendered identities were no longer accepted/preferred.
- Married a beautiful woman, men were jealous, saying she wouldn't be able to satisfy her a way a man does (phallic).
- The woman left her husband for Sahaykwisa, the husband grew furious, and RAPED Sahaykwisa as a way to show male dominance and gain ego again.
- Eventually had to pretend she wasn't cross-gendered, but died for being accused as a witch.
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Term
| American Indian Movement (AIM) |
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Definition
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- 1968: The Indian American Movement is a response to urban oppression.
- Faced high unemployment.
- 50% of state prisons, when accounted for 1% of general population.
- This movement was not made overnight. It was a gradual action.
- A prison watch was conducted to see how prisoners got treated and the living conditions they faced.
- Offered a job placement programs to help those who got out of jail.
- Also created access to legal advice for their cases.
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Term
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Definition
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- Phallo - “Phallus”: the structure of a male penis. EX: a tower, a hot dog, a banana, etc.
- These images creates a symbols connected with men for society. Guns show men as powerful. Towers show strength of a nation.
- Seen as male sexuality, but is also attached to male power and male dominance.
- Centrism “Center”: The focus.
- Ethnographers who conducted studies on tribes were considered phallocentric people. They saw the world as very male-dominated and male-defined.
- The fact that there was NO TERM for women as berdaches is evident that phallocentrism was present.
- Because there is no word/description for females, it is as if they have no existence (BERDACHE IS A MISNOMER).
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Term
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Definition
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- "Hottentot" was a nickname for the Khoi Khoi tribe because their language seemed to consist of stuttering.
- Being a “hottentot” was seen as inferior, dumber, slower, poor, savage, barbaric, and can be easily dominated.
Image of Saartie (“Sar-key”) Baartman
- Her name had a Dutch origin. Slaved to a Dutch family.
- The website considered her a “freak.”
- All her parts were exaggerated.
- She was “discovered” by William Dunlot.
- Dunlot saw Saartie as a form of entertainment for the people in England. He spoke to her owner into bringing her back to Europe. She agreed as well.
- In 1810 (during efforts to end slavery, a time of abolitionists), she sailed from Cape Town, Africa to England.
- At 20 years old, she was exhibited as a freak in Britian. She was forced to wear masks and skimpy lingerie, and viewers would be amused by her image.
- In 1814, she was sold to a French circus.
- They treated more harshly.
- Was placed in a cage, naked, and performed so viewers can watch her.
- Forced into prostitution.
- Also, in “peep shows” where men would pay a few cents to have a close upfront view of her NAKED.
- Her image was animalistic; it dehumanized her.
- She was also loaned out to parties as entertainment.
- Saartie passes away in 1815.
- Dies at the age of 25.
- She became an alcoholic.
- Possible that she suffered from syphilis and tuberculosis.
- Her name, “Hottentot Venus,” represents a goddess of love, lust, and beauty.
- It was a juxtaposition.
- It was a big sarcastic joke because her image went totally against European aspects of beauty.
- Her image was sexually alluring because it was controllable and inferior.
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Term
| Scientific Racism - Hottentot Venus |
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Definition
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- Saartie was taken to scientists for experiments to find traces of inferiority to the white race.
- Drawings of Saartie
- Front view and profile.
- She attempted to hide her genitalia.
- She fell in love with Dunlot and he was able to see her genitalia.
- The Musee de Phomme in Paris became highly interested in Saartie because of white supremacy.
- They took her body and cut out her buttocks and her genitalia and preserved it as scientific work.
- Displayed until 1985.
- In 1990 (surprisingly), a museum still offers to keep the exhibition of her genitalia because they believed it still held scientific significance.
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Term
| Contemporary Hottentot Venus |
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Definition
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- ‘Til this day, a woman is shown with big breasts and a big ass.
- Painted gold, shows value, that SEX SELLS.
- The image of being proud and defiant with her looks. She stands in a defiant way.
- Plays with the idea of pornography.
- The hard metal breasts and buttocks portray a shield.
• She is wearing dreads and jewelry proudly, tying her to her African roots.
- She also looks biracial and beautiful. Enhancing her with numerous forms of beauty.
- She is the redefining role as a black female.
- There is still a connection with black women in the past to black women today.
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Term
| 3 Dominant Stereotypes to Black Women |
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Definition
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Mammy
- Asexual, not seen has a source of sexual desire. Seen as “erased.”
- A heavy-set, fat/obese woman. Of very dark complexion.
- Seen with extremely large breasts and buttocks.
- Similar to the Venus Hottentot.
- Seen as religious, or deeply spiritual.
- Seen to run the master’s household and children. Loyal and faithful. Knows her place.
- The perfect slave to have.
- Stereotype for slaves to be okay with their lives.
- In truth, no one was happy with their lives as a slave.
- Dehumanized black women.
Jezebel
- HYPERSEXUAL – A promiscuous prostitute.
- Biblical History – wife of Ahab. Her actions exemplified lust.
- The name Jezebel is implied that such a woman is highly sexual.
- Insatiable sexual appetite and engage in sexual acts.
- Slave owners raped their slave women.
- Blamed their slaves that they’re the ones who “forced” them into having sex.
- Jezebel does not look completely black.
Sapphire
- Focuses on what happens when slavery ends.
- A black woman that is portrayed as wise-cracking, stubborn, and bitchy.
- An opposite figure of the mammy.
- Seen as ball-busting and strong-headed. A dominating woman.
- A slippery slope between a sapphire and a bull-dagger (butch lesbian).
? All these images work against the community.
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Term
| Moynihan Report & Emasculating Female - Angela Davis |
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Definition
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- Moynihan is the name of a Senator. An important figure.
- The report is deeply flawed of an ongoing stereotype of Black women.
- One of the main reasons black families were so poor was because they were missing the male role.
Emasculating Female: To remove the masculinity of a man.
- The woman who takes away a man’s manhood.
- To claim that black women do this is an insult.
- During slave days, perpetuators of Black Male Emasculation was WHITE MEN.
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Term
| Black Matriarch - Angela Davis |
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Definition
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- Cruel misnomer – because it implies a woman who holds dominance over a family.
- The term itself is a paradox.
- It took place during a time of slavery, so it was impossible to actual be a “matriarch,” let alone be a woman and a matriarch.
BECAUSE...
- Slavery establishes a distorted sense of family from the onset.
- Never looked like a “nuclear” family.
- Men and women never went through marriage rights.
- Children were raised by grandparents, aunts, uncles, or complete strangers.
- Introduced own hegemonic ideas.
- You must understand what the black family was like in the beginning.
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Term
| "Strange Twist of Affairs" - Angela Davis |
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Definition
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- A female slave performed the ONLY labor of the slave community that could NOT be directly and immediately claimed by the oppressor.
- “Domestic labor was the only meaningful labor for the slave community as a whole.” Allowed to bring nurturing/family-oriented skills to her own community.
- Mothering allowed her to help and it held value.
- Seen as survival and solid foundation for the black community.
- A form of resistance.
- Survival was the prerequisite of all higher levels of struggle.
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Term
| Examples of Female Slave Resistance |
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Definition
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- It was a counter-resistance.
- Sometimes they’d poison their masters’ food and burn down the houses.
- They’d run away.
BUT,
- Masters would burn women alive and post heads.
- To show dominance over BLACK WOMEN, a double sense of inferiority.
- Women were twice as badly off and TWICE AS DANGEROUS.
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Term
| Reasons Why African AMerican Women Migrated North After the Civil War |
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Definition
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- Slavery had ended and there was a high level of unemployment and poverty in the south.
- Whereas, the north started building factories, employing many.
- After the war, it was a RECONSTRUCTION period.
- Migration North – post-Civil War – 100s of 1000s left between 1915 and 1945.
Reasons for Removal for Women:
- General violence.
- More dangerous than the Civil War itself (bodies on trees).
- High unemployment.
- New job opportunities – factory work available.
- Sexual stigma.
- The perception that they could easily raped.
? GOING NORTH was seen as a fresh new start.
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Term
| Culture of Dissemblance (or False Appearance) |
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Definition
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- After migration to the North, Black women faced...
- Financial disappointment.
- Jobs were given to those of European descent above African Americans.
- Some Black men were able to find work, but women had less work.
- Most worked domestically (for white families again), just as they did in the south.
- Often underpaid.
- Also, exposed to sexual harassment—the same kinds of problems faced before because attitudes hadn’t changed yet.
- As late as 1930: 15% worked in unskilled or semi-skilled factory operatives; over 80% worked as domestics or personal servants.
- Financial struggles and sexual exploitation.
- From rural environments to urban areas.
- Underpaid checks with a higher cost of living.
- Black women turned to having sex in order to make extra money (not totally in the form of prostitution).
- Church became a way to reconnect with others.
- Church views sex negatively, so...
- Secrecy forms to protect (pretend that certain things weren’t going on):
- African American community shame by having sex with numerous partners.
- Church expectations
- Continued sexism and racism against black women.
? Culture of Dissemblance comes from these protections.
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Term
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Definition
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- National Association of Colored Women: 1896 - Before The Migration North
- Protested derogatory images and negative stereotypes of Black women’s sexuality.
- Protested for change
- Set up boarding houses and job training programs.
- One way to get women out of exploitation from work and sex.
- Lobbied for legislation to win legal protection against rapists.
- Inspired 1000s of other local Black women’s clubs.
- Opens thousands of chapters within the U.S. to increase awareness.
? Addresses the way people create counter-movements.
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Term
| Panther Men and the Party |
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Definition
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- Men in the Black Panthers were very afro-centric and phallocentric--focused on male dominance (ex: passed stories like it was a "joint," "new gun," or "new woman).
- Very ego-based. Who's the bigger man? "If a man is what he eats, what part of a man do YOU eat?"
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Term
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Definition
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- Feminisits demanded voluntary motherhood; birth control was born.
- Considered outrageous and outlandish.
- A fundamental prerequisite for the emancipation (freedom) of women.
- Women of color were overburdened by their people's fight against racism and sexism.
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Term
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Definition
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- Demanded to take back federal funding for abortions, causing many state legislatures to follow suit.
- What was required was a campaign to defend the reproductive rights of all women, esp. those women whose economic circumstances force them to give up the right to reproduction itself.
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Term
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Definition
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- 1905, Theodore Roosevelt warned white women who engaged in "willful sterility" that they were committing a sin in which caused the DEATH of a whole nation-- RACE SUICIDE.
- Roosevelt was hegemonic in his statements, saying, "The chief of blessings for any nation is that it shall leave its seed to inherit the land," referring to Anglo-Saxons or whites.
- However, Roosevelt's ploy was a failure and only led to greater support for its advocates.
- Acceptance to race suicide reflected the racist posture of Southern women.
- B.C. could also have prevented race suicide, if given to women of color.
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Term
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Definition
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- Activist for birth control.
- From her past, she believed that working-class women had a special need for the right to plan and space their pregnancies.
- Wrote articles in "The Call."
- Affiliated with Socialist party.
- Approved eugenics sterilization laws.
"More children from the fit, less from the unfit."
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Term
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Definition
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- Eugenics was a scientific-based proposal to encourage or permit reproduction only to individuals whose genetic characteristics were considered desirable.
- Eugenics can be seen as an attempt to keep the separation and classification upon racial groups.
- It offered women of color not the individual right to birth control, but rather the racist strategy of population control.
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Term
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Definition
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- 2 young Black women, Minnie Lee (12) and Mary Alice (14) from Montgomery, AL were unsuspectedly carted into an operating room, where surgeons irrevocably robbed them of their capacity to bear children.
- Their mother unknowingly consented to the operation, having been decieved by social workers who handled the case. She was unable to READ and put an "X" on the document, thinking it was for more Depo-Provera shots.
- This shows how ethnicity affects the medical practices for women of color. Possibly tied to eugenics.
- Many cases simliar to this one came up. Some were even threatened to have their welfare payments discontinued.
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Term
| Combahee River Collective - Moraga & Anzaldua |
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Definition
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- A collective of black feminists who struggle against racial, sexual, heterosexual, and class oppression.
- Black women have always embodied (in their physical manifestation) an adversary stance to white male rule.
- Experience sexual oppression in day-to-day experience.
- Developments are tied to the position of Black people.
- Black women are inherently valuable and liberation is a necessity as human persons for autonomy.
- To be recognized as human, is enough.
- Addresses a whole range of oppressions.
- There are low values placed on black women--both racist and sexist.
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Term
| Black Panther Surivial Programs |
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Definition
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- Most successful was the "Free Breakfast for Children" program ran from a San Francisco curch.
- Free clothing distribution.
- Free medical clinics.
- Classes on politics, economics, self-defense, & first-aid.
- Drug/alcohol rehab, transportation to jails, ambulances, and testing for sickle-cell disease.
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Term
| Black Panther Party - Timeline |
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Definition
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- Founded in Oakland, CA as a way to fight Black oppression in interest for African American justice.
1960s African American Activism – The Black Panther Party
Timeline
• 1940-50s Civil Rights Period (voting/Jim Crow)
- Voting - They were allowed to vote, but were discouraged to. Sometimes their lives were threatened.
- Jim Crow – Who allowed “separate, but equal” (segregation).
- Civil Rights – Having the same types of access as everyone else.
- You see women going to jail as often as men.
- Church (Christian-based, Protestant, Catholic, and Baptist) gave African Americans a place to gather, talk about issues, and places to organize from.
- A period when a lot of anger built up, murders, rapes, & slander.
• 1960 (SNCC) Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee
- Started in the south, created by children.
- From here, a lot of leaders of the Black Panthers’ leaders emerged.
• 1965 Malcom X killed
- Usually associated with violence. MLK’s counterpart.
- Not necessarily true. He did not embrace violence, but included it.
- He never carried a gun or incited political riot, and no violence resulted from it.
- Understood capitalism and advocated boycotts. Blacks were expected to buy products.
- Killed by his own people.
• 1966 Stokely Carmichael joins SNCC
- Criticized SNCC for having a passive role.
• 1966 Bobby Seale and Huey Newton found the Black Panther Party
- Carmichael joins.
- “Black is beautiful.” – This was not the idea during these times. African American physical features (hair, body, face, and language) were not seen as attractive – mainly affected women. Even jazz music was considered “jungle music.”
- The Black Panthers wanted to start a new belief centered around African culture.
- African Americans changed their names and converted to other religions.
- Afrocentric/Nationalist – The idea that they had to put at their center, African American beliefs and morals, in order to grow as a nation. Everything marginalized to that.
- Paramilitary/Militant. – They became willing to take up arms.
- Former prisoners and people with a criminal past would join.
• 1968 MLK Killed
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Term
| Challenges Experienced by Women in the Still Revolutionaries Film |
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Definition
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- Faced distrust and a loss of control within their own communities.
- Violence began to turn internally between comrades, rather than the police.
- Women were beat up and threatened.
- They felt the need to regain strength. Some felt suicidal and the need to redefine themselves.
- They have no regrets of past decisions, and hope their children don't take their histories for granted.
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Term
| Black Panther Platform & Program |
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Definition
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- Wanted old payment of 40 acres and two mules as currency distributed throughout communities.
- Wanted full employment, decent housing, food, & freedom.
- Wanted to stop police brutality.
- Wanted blacks to retire from the military; why fight for a nation that doesn't protect them?
- Wanted all blacks to face a fair trial.
- **May be seen as overexaggerated, but you can see their passion and determination to fight for the freedom/equality of their people.
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Term
| Elaine Brown's Relationship w/ the Black |
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Definition
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- Women were considered not as partners, but as "revolutionary soulmates."
- Women were expected to pick up after men, cook, wash clothes, clean the house, and have sex whenever the man desired to.
- Even within the Black Panther circle, the oppression of its own people was taking place--the oppression of women.
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Term
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Definition
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- It has been argued by commentators and casual observers that the imagery and lyrics of popular rap music and videos normalizes or even promotes the degradation of women, especially Black women.
- Women are the subject of hip-hop songs more often than they are their author.
- There are traditionally two sorts of hip-hop treatments towards women, echoing the Madonna-whore stereotype in society at large. One is their stereotypical position in the nefarious version of hip-hop as the expendable bitch, who must not only have an incredible physical attributes, but is also a sexual adventurer, there to satisfy her man in every way . However, these women are denigrated and rejected due to the perceived (actual or imagined) gold digger mentality, conniving for ways to exploite the riches of the rapper.
- Alternatively, women are also spoken of endearingly or hyperbolically as royalty.
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Term
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Definition
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- In the Combahee Collective, women who were seen as "smart," were also seen as "ugly."
- Developing an intellect was a cost to the "social" life.
- The sanctions
in the Black and white communities against Black women thinkers are
comparatively much higher than those against white women, particularly ones from the educated middle and upper classes.
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