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Ain't I A Woman? newspapers, June 1970-July 1971
1971-03-12 "Ain't I a Woman?" Page 9
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...Fanon and the whole black liberation struggle have recently extended the dictionary definition of imperialism or colonialism to mean a group which is prevented from self determination by another group - whether it had a national territory or not. The psychological and cultural mutilation is particularly intense and the colonialism more brutal when the group that colonizes and the group colonized have different defining physical characteristics that set them clearly apart... Women, set apart by physical different between them and men, were the first colonized group. And the territory colonized was and remains our women's bodies... Our bodies are free territory to other male colonizers when not "protected" by an individual male colonist. What is rape but an imperialist act upon the territory of our bodies. There are two forms of colonization of our bodies (territories) by males. Most males have an individual colonial relationship to an individual female and most males identify with and act on the group colonization of women.. 4th world... ...Fanon shows that it is not enough for the colonizer to control the territory and subject the inhabitants of it to his rule. The colonizer must destroy the culture and self respect of the colonized,,, Fanon says, in The Wretched of the Earth, that "Colonialism...turns to the past of the oppressed people, and distorts, disfigures and destroys it." p.210 He says the colonized (in his book speaking of blacks) "must demonstrate that a Negro culture exists.",... History (of art, politics, literature,etc.) as related by males has engraved upon women's minds a male image of the world. Women Are Now In the Process of Having to Prove that a Female Culture Exists... .. We also hold that female and male culture began with the definition of females as embodying all those human attributes which males as dominators could not reconcile with their own self-image and therefore projected onto females - thus causing a schizophrenic split of personality into masculine and feminine. That women, defined by these attributes (such as emotional, intuitive, etc.) by males and further limited by their physical position in society as to work and tools, developed a female of "feminine" culture - and a culture of resistance to male domination. Although the concept of the "feminine" was imposed upon women, we have, through the centuries, developed and created within the confines of the feminine. a female culture.. (Differences in habits, customs and language)... they are the superficials that cover up the fundamental similarity of all national cultures the world over. This fundamental similarity is the split between male culture and female culture... The problem is that the split is so obvious and taken for granted that practically nobody can see it... Let us again take up those things (habits, skills, art, concepts and institution) which distinguish one culture from another according to Webster's definition. Part of the customs of a culture are its habits.. It is clear that women and men have very different daily habits. Women - in most all parts of the world - whether they are working outside the home or not - have responsibility for the cooking, cleaning and child "raising" chores of the society. This means that most women spend their time with children . This in itself is a cultural split as men go out of the home and mix mainly with other males in the male world outside the home. Generally males do not do any of the work designated as "female work". Women, mainly in the company of other women and children, organize their time and routines and socializing on an entirely different basis than males. Female work - being so completely caste labor - is organized and done by women in ways peculiar to the female view of things (which is very much determined by women's secluded work place i.e. the home and its environs) The whole daily routine of a man and a woman is totally different .. ,,,, Most males cannot understand what is going on in female culture - art. The worth of female art is thoroughly suppressed in a male dominated society. A FEMALE CULTURE EXISTS, IT IS A CULTURE THAT IS SUBORDINATED AND UNDER MALE CULTURE'S COLONIAL. IMPERIALIST RULE ALL OVER THE WORLD. UNDERNEATH THE SURFACE OF EVERY NATIONAL, ETHNIC, OR RACIAL CULTURE IS THE SPLIT BETWEEN THE TWO PRIMARY CULTURES OF THE WORLD - THE FEMALE CULTURE AND THE MALE CULTURE. The female soul, suppressed and most often stereotyped in male art, is defined by negative comparisons to the male. The eternal feminine is seen as a passive, earth to be molded and formed, mysterious, unthinking, emotional, subjective, etc.. The fact that women live under the power of belief in these characterizations causes a certain outlook which molds the female culture. Woman's position in society, her economic and psychological dependence, reinforce the female stereotypes. Because of the belief in these attributes and woman's position in society, not because of our inherent "female nature", women's concepts of the world are much different from men's... [hand drawing] Speaks ...Though it appears that both men and women live together within the institutions of a society, men really define and control the institutions while women live under their rule. The gov't, army, religion, economy and family are institutions of the male culture colonial rule of the female... Crossing national boundaries often awakens a women;s understanding of her position in society... it is everywhere - there is no place to escape.. Most males all over the world perceive and compare females as a caste group all over the world ... The repression of female culture is only a question of degree all over the world - the underlying reality is basically the same - the denial of self-determination for women.. But it too often happens that women falsely identify with "their" country's dominant male culture and so cannot communicate with their sisters in subjection in other lands or in other races. This female identification with male cultural supremacy must be overcome if the Women's Movement is to be a truly liberating force... ..."NATIONAL" Culture is the Dominant Male Culture...# One national culture vs. another national culture is simply one male dominated society vs. another male dominated society with women carried along or used outside their subservient role temporarily if this is necessary for victory of the male national culture.... ...."Our" own male dominators always want us only to resist the other males' domination in the guise of the destruction of "our common culture" - which they have always excluded us from and subordinated us to.. ... For example, Fanon, in the chapter "Algeria Unveiled" in a Dying Colonialism, makes this "mistake" and exposes his own identification with male cultural supremacy. Fanon takes the veil as the symbol of Arab and Algerian culture. "The veil worn by the women appears with such constancy that it generally suffices to characterize Arab society" . p.35 And he says "The way people clothe themselves, together with the tradition of dress and finery that custom implies, constitutes the most distinctive form of a society's uniqueness..."p.35 Now the veil can be seen as a distinctly Arab cultural trait, or a national cultural trait. We have shown that the national culture has a unified way of defining and limiting the female through the veil. The female cultural suppression is symbolically represented by the veil which must be worn by pubertal females on up. Fanon is correct in saying that the French tried to destroy the Algerian (male) culture and this is a typical colonial tactic of one male culture vs. another colonized male culture. But Fanon shows a typical male inability to see the brutal colonization of females by males.. ... Fanon reveals the hypocrisy of the male Third World when he mocks the "allegations" made that the Algerian female is oppressed. His defense of Algerian male culture is every bit as smooth as the French justification of colonial rule. And he denies female oppression under the guide of defending the Algerian national culture from vulture-like attacks by the French. No one will doubt that the French were brutal colonizers of the Algerians but that does not either deny or excuse the equally brutal colonization of Algerian females by Algerian males... ... Never once does Fanon see the Algerian woman simply as a pawn of both the French male supremacist culture and the Algerian males - neither of whom were interested in her humanity. What he does instead is to deny her oppression and then to sympathize with Algerian male colonists who used her oppression as a symbol of their manhood and Algerian culture ... ... We use the example of Algeria only to show that a nationalist, anti-imperialist revolution does not free women because the dominant male culture is identified as the national culture and male supremacy is never attacked. Women have always been used and abused in male revolutions because the male revolutionists are colonialist imperialists in relation to females. It's as if the Algerians fighting with the French in WWII expected the French to liberate Algeria. The French didn't want to be dominated by another country but they wanted to continue their own domination of Algeria. Males don't want to be dominated by other males or another male culture but they have no intention of discontinuing their domination of the female culture. Fadela M'Rabet, an Algerian woman, a few years after Algeria won it's independence, wrote a book entitled La Femma Algeriennne (published by Maspero).In it she charged that the women who fought in the Resistance were used in the Algerian nationalist revolution only to be returned to their former subservience after "independence" was gained. She said that not very many women participated in the struggled and their lives were never affected in any way ... She says, "In order to understand the situation of the woman (and her reactions) it is necessary to start with the man; if she submits or revolts, if she accepts her condition or does not, the Algerian woman has evolved in a world which is made by men, for men, and at his advantage only. The Constitution, without doubt, and the resolutions of the Congress proclaim the equality of all citizens; but the gap is such between the texts and the facts that all is as if the texts did not exist" Claudine, in an interview in a New York Times magazine (Oct.,1967) article after Algerian independence was won, said that she was lucky that her father allowed her to go to school and not to wear the veil. (Most Algerian girls get no schooling - even after the revolution - because as Fadela M'Rabet said, too much schooling for a girl is considered very dangerous by the male society) Fadela M' Rabet argues eloquently for a female revolution now. "Must we wait several generations under the pretext that our society is not 'ready'? We (Algeria) are the product of 300 years of colonialism. But how many centuries of exploitation have women lived under: Their colonizers have been the men." THE FOURTH WORLD MANIFESTO IS A 32 PAGE PAMPHLET WHICH CAN BE ORDERED FROM: WOMEN - FOURTH WORLD, 741 W. BETHUNE, DETROIT, MICHIGAN 48202. 50c EA. - FOR ORDERS OF 100 OR MORE 35c EA. a woman? march 12, 1971 9
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...Fanon and the whole black liberation struggle have recently extended the dictionary definition of imperialism or colonialism to mean a group which is prevented from self determination by another group - whether it had a national territory or not. The psychological and cultural mutilation is particularly intense and the colonialism more brutal when the group that colonizes and the group colonized have different defining physical characteristics that set them clearly apart... Women, set apart by physical different between them and men, were the first colonized group. And the territory colonized was and remains our women's bodies... Our bodies are free territory to other male colonizers when not "protected" by an individual male colonist. What is rape but an imperialist act upon the territory of our bodies. There are two forms of colonization of our bodies (territories) by males. Most males have an individual colonial relationship to an individual female and most males identify with and act on the group colonization of women.. 4th world... ...Fanon shows that it is not enough for the colonizer to control the territory and subject the inhabitants of it to his rule. The colonizer must destroy the culture and self respect of the colonized,,, Fanon says, in The Wretched of the Earth, that "Colonialism...turns to the past of the oppressed people, and distorts, disfigures and destroys it." p.210 He says the colonized (in his book speaking of blacks) "must demonstrate that a Negro culture exists.",... History (of art, politics, literature,etc.) as related by males has engraved upon women's minds a male image of the world. Women Are Now In the Process of Having to Prove that a Female Culture Exists... .. We also hold that female and male culture began with the definition of females as embodying all those human attributes which males as dominators could not reconcile with their own self-image and therefore projected onto females - thus causing a schizophrenic split of personality into masculine and feminine. That women, defined by these attributes (such as emotional, intuitive, etc.) by males and further limited by their physical position in society as to work and tools, developed a female of "feminine" culture - and a culture of resistance to male domination. Although the concept of the "feminine" was imposed upon women, we have, through the centuries, developed and created within the confines of the feminine. a female culture.. (Differences in habits, customs and language)... they are the superficials that cover up the fundamental similarity of all national cultures the world over. This fundamental similarity is the split between male culture and female culture... The problem is that the split is so obvious and taken for granted that practically nobody can see it... Let us again take up those things (habits, skills, art, concepts and institution) which distinguish one culture from another according to Webster's definition. Part of the customs of a culture are its habits.. It is clear that women and men have very different daily habits. Women - in most all parts of the world - whether they are working outside the home or not - have responsibility for the cooking, cleaning and child "raising" chores of the society. This means that most women spend their time with children . This in itself is a cultural split as men go out of the home and mix mainly with other males in the male world outside the home. Generally males do not do any of the work designated as "female work". Women, mainly in the company of other women and children, organize their time and routines and socializing on an entirely different basis than males. Female work - being so completely caste labor - is organized and done by women in ways peculiar to the female view of things (which is very much determined by women's secluded work place i.e. the home and its environs) The whole daily routine of a man and a woman is totally different .. ,,,, Most males cannot understand what is going on in female culture - art. The worth of female art is thoroughly suppressed in a male dominated society. A FEMALE CULTURE EXISTS, IT IS A CULTURE THAT IS SUBORDINATED AND UNDER MALE CULTURE'S COLONIAL. IMPERIALIST RULE ALL OVER THE WORLD. UNDERNEATH THE SURFACE OF EVERY NATIONAL, ETHNIC, OR RACIAL CULTURE IS THE SPLIT BETWEEN THE TWO PRIMARY CULTURES OF THE WORLD - THE FEMALE CULTURE AND THE MALE CULTURE. The female soul, suppressed and most often stereotyped in male art, is defined by negative comparisons to the male. The eternal feminine is seen as a passive, earth to be molded and formed, mysterious, unthinking, emotional, subjective, etc.. The fact that women live under the power of belief in these characterizations causes a certain outlook which molds the female culture. Woman's position in society, her economic and psychological dependence, reinforce the female stereotypes. Because of the belief in these attributes and woman's position in society, not because of our inherent "female nature", women's concepts of the world are much different from men's... [hand drawing] Speaks ...Though it appears that both men and women live together within the institutions of a society, men really define and control the institutions while women live under their rule. The gov't, army, religion, economy and family are institutions of the male culture colonial rule of the female... Crossing national boundaries often awakens a women;s understanding of her position in society... it is everywhere - there is no place to escape.. Most males all over the world perceive and compare females as a caste group all over the world ... The repression of female culture is only a question of degree all over the world - the underlying reality is basically the same - the denial of self-determination for women.. But it too often happens that women falsely identify with "their" country's dominant male culture and so cannot communicate with their sisters in subjection in other lands or in other races. This female identification with male cultural supremacy must be overcome if the Women's Movement is to be a truly liberating force... ..."NATIONAL" Culture is the Dominant Male Culture...# One national culture vs. another national culture is simply one male dominated society vs. another male dominated society with women carried along or used outside their subservient role temporarily if this is necessary for victory of the male national culture.... ...."Our" own male dominators always want us only to resist the other males' domination in the guise of the destruction of "our common culture" - which they have always excluded us from and subordinated us to.. ... For example, Fanon, in the chapter "Algeria Unveiled" in a Dying Colonialism, makes this "mistake" and exposes his own identification with male cultural supremacy. Fanon takes the veil as the symbol of Arab and Algerian culture. "The veil worn by the women appears with such constancy that it generally suffices to characterize Arab society" . p.35 And he says "The way people clothe themselves, together with the tradition of dress and finery that custom implies, constitutes the most distinctive form of a society's uniqueness..."p.35 Now the veil can be seen as a distinctly Arab cultural trait, or a national cultural trait. We have shown that the national culture has a unified way of defining and limiting the female through the veil. The female cultural suppression is symbolically represented by the veil which must be worn by pubertal females on up. Fanon is correct in saying that the French tried to destroy the Algerian (male) culture and this is a typical colonial tactic of one male culture vs. another colonized male culture. But Fanon shows a typical male inability to see the brutal colonization of females by males.. ... Fanon reveals the hypocrisy of the male Third World when he mocks the "allegations" made that the Algerian female is oppressed. His defense of Algerian male culture is every bit as smooth as the French justification of colonial rule. And he denies female oppression under the guide of defending the Algerian national culture from vulture-like attacks by the French. No one will doubt that the French were brutal colonizers of the Algerians but that does not either deny or excuse the equally brutal colonization of Algerian females by Algerian males... ... Never once does Fanon see the Algerian woman simply as a pawn of both the French male supremacist culture and the Algerian males - neither of whom were interested in her humanity. What he does instead is to deny her oppression and then to sympathize with Algerian male colonists who used her oppression as a symbol of their manhood and Algerian culture ... ... We use the example of Algeria only to show that a nationalist, anti-imperialist revolution does not free women because the dominant male culture is identified as the national culture and male supremacy is never attacked. Women have always been used and abused in male revolutions because the male revolutionists are colonialist imperialists in relation to females. It's as if the Algerians fighting with the French in WWII expected the French to liberate Algeria. The French didn't want to be dominated by another country but they wanted to continue their own domination of Algeria. Males don't want to be dominated by other males or another male culture but they have no intention of discontinuing their domination of the female culture. Fadela M'Rabet, an Algerian woman, a few years after Algeria won it's independence, wrote a book entitled La Femma Algeriennne (published by Maspero).In it she charged that the women who fought in the Resistance were used in the Algerian nationalist revolution only to be returned to their former subservience after "independence" was gained. She said that not very many women participated in the struggled and their lives were never affected in any way ... She says, "In order to understand the situation of the woman (and her reactions) it is necessary to start with the man; if she submits or revolts, if she accepts her condition or does not, the Algerian woman has evolved in a world which is made by men, for men, and at his advantage only. The Constitution, without doubt, and the resolutions of the Congress proclaim the equality of all citizens; but the gap is such between the texts and the facts that all is as if the texts did not exist" Claudine, in an interview in a New York Times magazine (Oct.,1967) article after Algerian independence was won, said that she was lucky that her father allowed her to go to school and not to wear the veil. (Most Algerian girls get no schooling - even after the revolution - because as Fadela M'Rabet said, too much schooling for a girl is considered very dangerous by the male society) Fadela M' Rabet argues eloquently for a female revolution now. "Must we wait several generations under the pretext that our society is not 'ready'? We (Algeria) are the product of 300 years of colonialism. But how many centuries of exploitation have women lived under: Their colonizers have been the men." THE FOURTH WORLD MANIFESTO IS A 32 PAGE PAMPHLET WHICH CAN BE ORDERED FROM: WOMEN - FOURTH WORLD, 741 W. BETHUNE, DETROIT, MICHIGAN 48202. 50c EA. - FOR ORDERS OF 100 OR MORE 35c EA. a woman? march 12, 1971 9
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