Defining Black Feminist

Patricia Hill Collins in her essay, Defining Black Feminist Thought, starts with asking who can be called a Black feminist, which turns out to be a highly questionable criteria. She talks about the radical feminists who thinks that only women can be feminists, because it is biologically embedded in them. She also questions if only black women can be black feminists because they have endured the suffering related to the color ‘black’. Collins gives example of little Black girls who became victim of this culture of suppression and also of the rape culture which is more prevalent in the young girls. Their struggles are such that delivering one’s sibling to school safely is marked as an achievement. The working class black women faces the dilemma of being thought as illiterate and only capable of remembering and not thinking. She also points out the struggle of Black lesbian women who have to stay in a …show more content…
He shows a connection between nature and women, how both of them are oppressed yet they defy the norms of patriarchy and rise above it. Ahlawat points out how in The Bluest Eye nature and women are merged when the novel is divided into four seasons but totally opposite things happen, for example he says that spring is the time of renewal and rebirth but it becomes the time when Pecola gets raped. It is a way of showing how contradictory things happen even though they shouldn’t. He also explains the importance of nature in giving them courage and hope for a better life. Ahlawat says in Beloved nature serves as a healer, giving comfort to the miserable condition of the characters. They serve as a get away from all the mayhem inflicted on the Blacks. The scar of chokecherry tree symbolizes beauty as well as darkness of the humanity. To conclude, Ahlawat is of the view that if nature can destroy it can also heal and that is what it does in Toni Morrison’s