Gender and Race Issues
in the Black Community

Samantha Mattox, a student at Roosevelt University, has started a Black Feminist Discussion Group,to talk about gender issues within the African American community. News of the NOW talked with her about this subject, and her views about racism and sexism.

How did you first get involved in feminism?
When I was younger, I remember always having an interest in the women's suffrage movement and Elizabeth Cady Stanton. I saw that the early feminists had problems trying to get women to realize they had to fight for the right to vote,I thought that was pretty interesting. And the early black feminists that I read said these issues had a commonality,issues of sexism are issues all women share. We've been taught to fight amongst ourselves, in competition for men, etc. So that was my early interest. But I also didn't take these issues as seriously until I got older,I didn't see that sexism was as important an issue as racism. And it wasn't because I didn't think these problems exist,I saw them in my own life,but I didn't have a word to describe what the problem was. I saw it as "normative behavior', so I didn't challenge it until much later.

So when did you really become an active feminist?
A year ago, I went to the Black Radical Congress and they had a black feminist discussion group,and Angela Davis was there. It was wonderful! It inspired me to read more about it. So I spent the summer after that just reading about feminism and the history of women's rights.

Is feminism a dirty word, so to speak, in the
African-American community, like it is in some other circles?
There are a lot of negative stereotypes around the word which just aren't true. People need to understand that; and they should understand what feminism is, have a working definition of it. Women need to know that they are not alone [in their experiences],that's would be a big start.

Are there some misconceptions about feminism?
Oh yeah. It's a complex issue. When people think of feminism, they maybe think of Betty Friedan,housewives with free time who didn't have anything else to do. And her main point that housework was work . . . black women saw that and compared it to their reality, the problems, the pay inequities... and thought "we've always worked, we've faced sexual harassment . . " So there was a difference in viewpoint. There is a misperception that white women never had to "work,' but that's a myth. Even during slavery, only 1/3rd of white people owned slaves,which meant 2/3rds didn't, and did their own work. There were a LOT of working women. In some cases, black women and white women worked side by side,like during World War II. So there were some privileged white women,but there were also privileged black women.

And there were instances when southern black women joined women's organiza-tions, and word got back to the community that some white women were prejudiced . . . which deterred black women from joining those organizations.

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