Reem’s Reviews > Talking Back: Thinking Feminist, Thinking Black > Status Update

Problems arise not when white people choose to write about non-white people, but when such material is presented as authoritative.

When we write about the experiences of a group to which we do not belong, we should think about the ethics of our action, considering whether or not our work will be used to reinforce and perpetuate domination.

For white and non-white women, black people and all individuals from ethnic groups who are gay there have been historical moments wherein each of our experiences were most studied, interpreted and written about solely by white males... They became the authority to consult if anyone wanted to understand the experiences if these powerless groups. This is the politics of domination.

Audre Lorde's poem 'Litany for Survival':

and when we speak we are afraid
our words will not be heard
nor welcomed
but when we are silent
we are still afraid

So it is better to speak
remembering
we were never meant to survive.

Reading it [my first book] critically, I saw that I was trying not only to address each different potential audience, but that my words were written to explain, placate, to appease. They contained the fear of speaking that often characterizes the way those in a lower position in a hierarchy address those in a higher position of authority. Where I was talking to black women was the voice I felt to be most truly mine.

...the absence of a humane critical response has tremendous impact on the writer from any oppressed, colonized group who endevours to speak. For us, true speaking is not only an expression of creative power, it is an act of resistance, a political gesture that challenges politics of domination that would render us nameless, and voiceless. As such, it is a courageous act - as such, it presents a threat.

While punishing me my parents often spoke about breaking my spirit. Now when I ponder the silences, the voices that are not heard, the voices of those wounded and/or oppressed individuals who do not speak or write, I contemplate the acts of persecution, torture - the terrorism that breaks spirits. That makes creativity impossible.