Intersectionality: An Intellectual History

by Ange-Marie Hancock

Intersectionality theory has emerged over the past thirty years as a way to think about the avenues by which inequalities (most often dealing with, but not limited to, race, gender, class and sexuality) are produced. Rather than seeing such categories as signaling distinct identities that can be adopted, imposed or rejected, intersectionality theory considers the logic by which each of these categories is socially constructed as well as how they operate within the diffusion of power relations. In other words, social and political power are conferred through categories of identity, and these identities bear vastly material effects. Rather than look at inequalities as a relationship between those at the center and those on the margins, intersectionality maps the relative ways in which identity politics create power.

Though intersectionality theory has emerged as a highly influential school of thought in ethnic studies, gender studies, law, political science, sociology and psychology, no scholarship to date exists on the evolution of the theory. In the absence of a comprehensive intellectual history of the theory, it is often discussed in vague, ahistorical terms. And while scholars have called for greater specificity and attention to the historical foundations of intersectionality theory, their idea of the history to be included is generally limited to the particular currents in the United States. This book seeks to remedy the vagueness and murkiness attributed to intersectionality by attending to the historical, geographical, and cross-disciplinary myopia afflicting current intersectionality scholarship. This comprehensive intellectual history is an agenda-setting work for the theory.

Genres: Feminism, Nonfiction, Theory, History, Politics, Philosophy, Gender

274 pages, Hardcover

Published January 11, 2016

Reviews

[Sahel's · Rating 3 out of 5]

So this book … is it odd to say that it went over my head? I mean the sentences were easy to read, linguistically. Also, this helped your eyes and your mind sweep through paragraph after paragraph, but I did not grasp what exactly the writer had in mind! Was it to survey a history of intersectionality? If so why in this scattered way?
So here are the sum of things I learned:
The book brings up literature and academic writing that is intersectionality-like in pursuit of intersectionality history. The chosen pieces and examples are highly interesting to read. In this way, the book emphasizes the importance of background history to Crenshaw's intersectionality and other scholars in this area.

The concept of visibility project in intersectionality has been underlined as important in unveiling problems of race and gender like the importance of finding a voice.

[i. · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read this alongside Hill-Collins and Bilge's Intersectionality (2016). Both offer similar and related, though not nearly identical, accounts of the development, usage, critiques, and possibilities for the analytical mode and praxis that is "intersectionality." As per the title, Hancock offers an intellectual history of intersectionality, and pushes back against the normative (institutional?) history of intersectionality in two crucial ways. First, she does this by pushing against the narrative of intersectionality finding its starting point with Crenshaw, and instead, traces intersectionality's genealogy back to black feminist thinkers of the mid-to-late-1800s. Second, Hancock situates both the Combahee River Collective Statement and Crenshaw's articulation of intersectionality as part of a dialogue of "both/and" and "neither/nor" among many women of color thinkers, including Indigenous and non-black women of color thinkers. In doing so, Hancock outlines important tenants and elements that structure intersectionality as an intellectual project: visibility and de-exceptionalization of multiple oppressions, the problematization of binary relationships of oppressor/oppressed, and contingency/recognition of identity-as-coalitionary. In outlining what intersectional ontology is, how it has been used, how it came to be, who major players are, and what major critiques are, Hancock offers a vast overview of this important arena of knowledge and understanding.

Though this text is valuable, and I will have to go over it much more, I do have critiques of Hancock. There is much to be said about "giving credit where credit is due" and showing how Indigenous and non-black women of color contributed to and developed intersectionality-like thought, but I wonder if something is lost in this claim. What does it mean to call intersectionality a "feminist" or even a "women of color" analytic, rather than an analytic that owes very much to prominent black women thinkers? What does the work of finding non-black genealogical predecessors do to our understanding of this analytic? Yes, Hancock parries Puar's critique of intersectionality successfully and deftly, but also, what other work is being done? I'm not sure I have the answer to that. I'm not sure I have the answer to any of these. Maybe the answer lies in a closer reading of this text. But I do know that this is an important, path-breaking work, one that deserves more attention, both in my own reading, and in citational practice.

[Natalie · Rating 3 out of 5]

Very dense in sections, but overall good. I was happy to find this source to use as foundation for my master's paper.

[Stef Rozitis · Rating 5 out of 5]

Very useful for putting together the pieces when reading intersectionality literature.

[Mills College Library]

305 H2343 2016