In this week’s reading by Williams and Garza expanded my knowledge on identity politics because it gave me a different view of what it means to some but what it looks like. To Garza it looked like the blonde girl complaining about how everyone should be united instead of divided but does not knowledge that history of oppression not only to Black people but Black women’s most of all cannot be forgotten. Garza begins with his statement by stating that power is what drives “identity politics” and examine how the blonde women is the best example of how power works, when you have it you tend to not acknowledge those that do not. In this week’s read “The power of identity politics” the examination of what “identity politics” continue and even provide the same quote I was having difficulty with last week with the Combahee River collective, “The personal is politics.” That phares was used for the women’s movement and even with Garza explaining that in the case of Black women they had to put away their own wants of free for the sake of unity. Just like the blonde girl wants unity instead of acknowledging, she expects everyone white or black to put aside their thoughts and opinions just because she does not like how blacks divide themselves from others. This Is just a way of how he showed that this problem still occurs to Black people. In Williams “Too Latina to Be Black, Too Black to Be Latina” I learned that many would try to mold you into what they think you should be based of your features, complexion, even language but knowing every aspect of your identity is what should matter to you. Her story expanded my knowledge because I did not think that it was possible for something like that to happen. I guess since I have been living in New York my whole life and everyone here is diverse and does not follow the whole sticking to a kind of group based on your appearance thing I never really was brought to my attention how different other places are.
I have seen someone on the discussion board mention wanting to learn about capitalism more in depth, and I think that would be something I would like to read about more. This is because I mostly struggle with the subject of capitalism and how it could affect those who have less.
I agree, in many ways we are fortunate to live in our mixing pot of city. While I do think people still separate into their distinct groups in a city like New York, I do think there is more tolerance (and hopefully acceptance and inclusion) for diverse groups of people. The ability to find people like yourself while also mixing with such diversity is a privilege when compared with the isolation and forced conformity of less populous and diverse places. And those places are so quick to recognize anything that is other.
The old “lets just unite” instead of dealing with or discussing this particular persons social and economical hurdles is typical and a slap in the face. That tactic is convenient and it diminishes or dismisses the persons existence in my opinion
Hi Gisselle,
Thank you for sharing, I enjoyed reading your response. I like the way you reflected on Williams article, the idea that people will constantly try to mold you and put you in a box based off the way they view, perceive, and portray you. In relation to Williams, being a Latina but my complexion being so light skinned, people constantly just perceive me as a white woman. They often laugh at me when I tell them I’m 100% Hispanic; they tell me “you’re too white to look Spanish” or “wow, you are so light skinned for a Spanish girl”. It’s very insulting and often makes me feel like I should go get a tan to appear darker to others so they can view me as what I am, a Latina.
Hi Gisselle! It’s really sad, putting one race above another, I’ve always felt that you should never underestimate anyone or say that someone is better than the other person because you don’t even know that yourself. So the one that they have placed as the best example of the blonde woman was like ‘why?’ but I also understand that it is because for a long time it has been looking at how to put a race in different positions to see which is the best and show us how bad that is. It’s true what you say about how much diversity there is in New York and how well the variety complements each other. But I also feel that many times we let ourselves be carried away by our roots, that is, when I was in high school I could see groups where there were only Chinese, speaking their language, Latinos speaking Spanish, and so on. So unintentionally, we tend to look for our traits and be able to live with it, and I know that this happens more than anything because many times we do not master a certain language very well or just because we want to feel at home.