Crossing borders A black feminist approach to researching the comparative histories of black women's resistance in the U.S. South and South Africa

Abstract

This article is constructed around two primary themes. Rather than offer a complete narrative retelling of historical events, the author offers here a reflection on how she approaches the integration of comparative, black feminist, and African diasporic analyses of the oral sources so vital to understanding the liberation movements of the United States and South Africa in truer terms. Focusing her attention on the close-up life histories of little regarded working-class and middle-class black women in political resistance, she asks: how does she view the women about whom she writes, and how does she research and tell their stories so that they reflect a well nuanced picture of the women's own vividly remembered, lived experiences and meanings? The second theme provides a few examples of an important question within the production of women's history: the question of a black feminist practice. Through the stories that several Montgomery and Johannesburg women have given the author, she finds that, when positioned next to each other, these stories reveal similar themes, which require little manipulation from her.

Publisher

Taylor & Francis

Publication Date

4-1-2003

Publication Title

Safundi: The Journal of South African and American Studies

Department

African American Studies

Document Type

Article

DOI

https://dx.doi.org/10.1080/17533170300204102

Language

English

Format

text

Link to Full Text

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