El Mundo Zurdo: The Vision
GWS Project by Alec Cohen, Kat Escutia, Christina Han, Cyenna Lindsey, Neveen Mohammad-Musa, Yareli Otega, Justina Padilla, Sam Sylverne.
Gloria Anzaldua (Early Development)
In “El Mundo Zurdo”, Gloria Anzaldua and Luisah Teish discuss the idea that women are victims of their own benevolence (227). Anzaldua introduces this notion by claiming that since the beginning of time, women have undermined their strength and power indirectly while nurturing the men in their lives. In simpler terms, the unique traits and goals women have are hidden in their way of living beneath the men in their lives. Teish adds on to this theory by claiming women “have seen the child in men and nurtured it…so now you have a son growing up thinking that he can slap the mother who nursed him” (227). This is crucial in the feminist movement, because many women are still allowing themselves to be the support and backbone of men without receiving equal treatment from the intimate men of their life. By doing so, they allow themselves to remain victims. Both Anzaldua and Teish agree that women must take control of what they have to offer to the world and become confident in themselves, before they assume the role of protecting a man’s ego. The powerful actions of women must be known and not undermined. This discussion between Anzaldua and Teish relates to gender oppression because the weak persona given to women due to their motherly, nurturing and submissive ways is still very common in our modern day society. In our culture, there are still women whose actions go unnoticed. Feminists strive to live in a world where everyone’s actions are noticed and women can support their own spirit confidently in the same way they have known to support the spirit of a man’s.
O.K. Momma, Who the Hell Am I?: an Interview with Luisah Teish
In the interview between Gloria Anzaldúa and Luisah Teish, Teish is asked what her task is in life. To answer this, Teish expresses her memories of the beginning of the white feminist movement of the 1970s, while she fought for black lives. Originally, she believed it was a false account of oppression as it was more urgent to obtain racial equality than gender equality. But this changed when she found herself experiencing a vision in which she realized that her destiny was to also battle for her ability to be a woman as a woman, rather than that of the male ideal. Upon enlightenment, Teish began to see the oppression women in her community experience; the pitfalls of the powerful and nurturing capability that allow women to feel they are helping or supporting men, but in actuality they are manipulated into producing the men’s superiority. For example, if a man does not have enough money to pay for a meal, the women happily passes the money under the table so that he may present himself as dominate or that it was his doing all along—this is a form of oppression in the sense that women are expected to uphold male dignity rather than assert their own.
According to Teish, femininity and the women’s movement rests upon the manifestations of the desires of the goddess (223), who is stirring the momentum needed to destroy the male consumption of female power. To harbor this energy, women are to access ‘feminist spirituality’ which allows women to practice mystics that construct power within themselves. Teish’s everyday life includes facilitating these opportunities, which she claims actually generate productive results; “two charms that I think are especially important to women are those involving water and those involving earth” (225). For example, a woman stricken with poverty, must practice a water charm entitled “pouring the money” (225), in which she asks the woman to collect change over the course of the moon cycle, and on the new moon they create symbols of wealth for the individual over a pot of change and has her ask for what she needs most—like groceries. In her other responsibilities Teish also teaches focus and productivities through the use of plants and water. These charms allow Teish and the women who come to her to accesses their natural powers that which have been depleted or hidden by the uses of men, which males fear most.
Teish’s experiences and activities in life represent the theory of intersectional feminism as she recognizes the different concerns or modes of oppression certain women face due to their other identities. As acknowledged above, Teish did not associate with the feminist movement as she saw their fight being dedicated to alleviating the pressures of white women, not all women. Once she accepted her role within the fight for freedom as a woman, she also connected it to her experiences as a woman of color, which changed her needs within feminism as compared to non-women of color might prioritize. As a woman of color, Teish endured racism, sexism, and the lack of accessibility or visibility within society. Because of this, she found salvation in a unifying practice that which respects the differences amongst individuals and values the diverse perceptions it brings. If feminism is a collective, a movement with a common goal, that there must be multiple factors that interact with one another to deliver certain women with certain lives. With the identity of ‘woman’ being the common thread, intersectional feminism allows Teish to hone the power she believes we all possess and use it to benefit all women in the ways they need it most.
Self-Empowerment & Self-Acceptance
Although we grow up hearing that individuality and uniqueness should be embraced, it isn’t easy to create an identity for oneself without taking the pressures of society into consideration. Society has created specific standards that idealizes a specific individual and discriminates against those who do not meets those standards. The reading “El Mundo Zurdo: The Vision”, emphasizes the importance of accepting oneself and allowing our unique identities to give us a sense of power in who we are are and how we fit into the world that we live in.
One important step that can be taken to listening to the voices inside of us to motivate us to take action and be the change that we want to see. It’s important to act on the oppression that is against who we want to become rather than rely on internal thoughts and feelings. We can use our flaws and weaknesses to our advantage if we work to use them to strengthen who we are as individuals. It is also important to acknowledge that one person cannot make the changes in society alone, colored women who are at the bottom of the oppression ladder and struggle the most must come together to create an international feminist movement.
In the section “La Prieta”, the author Gloria E. Anzaldua writes about her struggles throughout her childhood to accept who she was in a family that did not tolerate deviations from specific standards. She struggled with race, class, and her sexual identity. Society also create challenges for her as she states, “though the power may be real, the mythic qualities attached to it keep others from dealing with me as a person and rob me of my being able to act out my other selves” (227). We need to be persistent and know what we are setting out to achieve because society will definitely try to prevent that. It begins with empowering ourselves and seeing ourselves as being worth more than what others tell us we are worth. It is important to listen to the voices in our head instead of the ones that influence us from the outside as she writes, “between them and among others, I build my own universe, el mundo zurdo. I belong to myself and not to any one people” (232). Being able to love who we are and what we will become starts within ourselves, no matter what anyone else says. On page 255 she writes, “And it’s only now that the hatred of myself, which I spent the greater part of my adolescence cultivating, is turning to love”.
During the black feminist movement, black women needed to create an identity because they were vulnerable to the racism and prejudices of society. It was important for them to create a unified feminist movement and it all started with accepting themselves and being proud of that. In the reading “Brownness”, the author Andrea Canaan emphasizes the inferiority that any race other than white face in society. Inferior races are seen as being poor, abusive, dirty, and basically worthless. Although society seems like the problem, Canaan explains that all of this begins with how we see ourselves and what we choose to accept in creating our identities. She writes, “but part of our victimization is self-oppression” (233). Often times we want to hurt less so we will accept the negative connotations and influences thrown at us, but it is important that this all contributes to being powerless and humiliated. We need to go against these beliefs and stand up to fight for who we are and what we believe in.
It is not easy finding ourselves and identifying who we are and how we are going to fit into society. There are many challenges and factors that are fighting against who we want to become, but it is important to accept who we are because ultimately being different is not bad. Individuality and uniqueness are qualities to appreciate and loving who we are starts with accepting the fact that everyone is different-including ourselves.
The Black Feminist Statement: A Movement Divided
In the “El Mundo Zurdo” section of “This Bridge Called My Back: Writings by Radical Women of Color,” there was a particular section that exploited the raw truth of feminist movements. This section is called “The Black Feminist Statement,” but I like to refer to it as “A Movement Divided.” I prefer to refer to this section as such because it foreshadows the oncoming truth of the feminist movement. The feminist movement was supposed to be a general movement that fought for the equality of women as a whole. Although, in truth, the initial movement only benefitted the women of the Caucasian persuasion, and left out the other multiple oppressions of third world women. Caucasian women and third world women, specifically black women, don’t suffer from the same systems of oppression. Caucasian women generally suffered from sexist oppressions, so through their movement, they focused on sexist oppressions. Meanwhile, black women suffered not only from sexist oppressions, but classist, racial, economic, and political oppressions also. During the 1960s and 1970s, Caucasian women did not face racial oppression because their race was already of higher value and power than all others. They did not suffer from political, economic, nor classist oppressions because these women were already part of upper and middle classes. These women had more privilege than black women, and these privileges protected them from being oppressed by the same systems as black women.
Even though this may pose as a good thing to the Caucasian women feminist movement, it poses a dividing question: What about us and our other struggles and oppressions? This question calls for black women to create a feminist movement of their own that will address their own realities and forms of oppression against them. It is through their exclusion in the initial feminist movement that black feminists learn that the only people that truly care about their oppressions is themselves. Thus, the black feminists would have to create a movement that surrounds their oppressions. Black women faced multiple oppressions. They were oppressed sexually because they were women and were deemed as inferior to men. Women weren’t seen as equals to men. They were oppressed racially because they were considered “damaged merely by the virtue of being Black women” (This Bridge Called My Back, pg. 236). They were also oppressed against economically and politically. In being black, these women are viewed as being people of lower and working class. Stereotypes against black women, especially black feminists play as oppressors also in assigning negative connotations to them. People of the public would view these women as hostile, and a potential danger if not ignorant and inferior. Generally, such factors hinder black women from climbing the economic and political hierarchy, raising their status.
In summary, seeing that black women are oppressed in so many ways. Their movement will and does address the oppressions of all women. Since all oppressions are included in the National Black Feminists Organization’s feminist movement, all women (including white and all women of the third world) are included which also means that the destruction of all these oppressions will liberate not only black women, but all women. This feminist movement is the movement that aims to end all oppressions of all women unlike the white feminist movement. Also, unlike the white feminist movement, black feminist did not turn against their men and discovered that a successful revolution would need to incorporate feminism and antiracism. In castrating racism from the movement all women will be able to face their oppressions together even though their oppressors may be different. The point is that we are all being oppressed and it is time that we face the oppressions together. The white feminist movement did not exclude racism which caused for the oppressions of other women, such as black women, to be disregarded.
In conclusion, the Black feminist movement teaches that three things are essential in the feminist revolution; feminism, antiracism, and unity amongst oppressions. In order to free all women, all oppressions must be destroyed. In order to be destroyed, they must be faced and struggled with by those that were oppressed by it. Seeing that different women have different oppressions, it is important to exclude racism in the movement so that no one is left out.
In “Brownness*,” Andrea Canaan accounts her understanding of the oppression which she struggles with as a brown woman. In her account she uncovers the struggle with self-oppression, systematic oppression, and colorism. Cannan also puts forth her critique of white feminism, and calls brown women to regain control of the movement.
Canaan does an excellent job of depicting self-oppression. She talks about the intensity in which she felt the difference between whiteness and brownness, systematic oppression, but then dives into how this all manifested in herself and amongst brown people, “There was an all powerful and real knowledge, like pungent smell of chitterlings cooking on a rainy winter day that not matter how good, how clean, how pious the brown, they could not equal the ultimate model of things right and good as white,” (232). Acknowledging the way in which Jim Crow laws fed systematic oppression, mentioning the way in which slave owners played a part in creating colorism Canaan draws out systematic oppression. She further explains that the concept behind self oppression as the idea that if you held yourself to a lower standard than white people, then their oppression will hurt less. These feelings stretch out to present day and can be seen one the monologues in Body/Courage in which the speaker talks about it being hard to look in the mirror and love their blackness.
Canaan’s trajectory of who was to carry the blame for the oppression spanned from herself, white men, white women, to brown men. She talks about the fear that white men struck in her, how she viewed white women as the enemy, and the pain that it caused her to recognize brown men as her oppressor, “I love him, I glory in his maleness and agonize in his degradation. I must refuse to allow him to oppress me while I must be concerned for his survival” (236). After examining the way in which each group could be signaled as the ultimate reason for oppression she writes, “The enemy is brownness and whiteness, maleness and femaleness. The enemy is our urgent need to stereotype and close off people, places, and event into isolated categories,” (236). This intersectional approach moves away from the idea that one group can save themselves or another group, but instead must work towards a great space of acceptance. She acknowledges that this can be difficult and isolating for brown women, much like viewing feminism as a struggle.
In closing Canaan warns against white feminism, “It is not an elitist class of white women hiding from men. It is a positive ever-growing movement of women who believe in the equality of all people. Women who are not willing to settle for token change but insist that economic and political resources and power of this nation this world be distributed equally” (237). She then calls on brown to understand that they have been most oppressed and must regain the movement.
Poetry in “El Mundo Zurdo”
The poetry in the section, “El Mundo Zurdo” embodies the themes of intersectionality, power, and self empowerment in the feminist movement. Both poems reflect many other themes in feminism as well. It is important to analyze the poetry in the book separately from the essays written, because poetry is a completely different medium and serves a different purpose than prose. Authors choose to express their thoughts and arguments through poetry when prose will not suffice. This is extremely important to note when it comes to feminist poetry because the poems express the experiences and thoughts of the women in a way that simply writing them out cannot. With poetry comes a sense of power and emotion, and that is extremely valuable in the feminist movement.
The first poem, Give me Back, is a poem with heavy imagery and figurative language. It is difficult to analyze until you really get into the message of the piece and read it multiple times. The first message that can be extracted from the poem is the idea that women are perceived to take up too much space, especially women of color, and do not belong to the structures that they are forced to be a part of. The piece is about shifting power from the oppressive structures and giving the power back into the hands of non-men and queer people of color to fight back against these systems. One line from the poem reads “mark out the space I am with knives,” which leaves a powerful image in our heads of a reclaiming of space by the writer who was previously given none to exist in. It says that we are here, and unapologetically. The poem also refers to “fresh blood,” which can likely be a symbol of menstruation, which has often been a symbol of power for feminist women who have uteruses. The poet also writes that she will “arrange [her] bones in their naming places”, which is her giving herself a place to exist and to exist without being told how to.
The second poem in the section of the text, The Welder, is mostly about coming together as a movement and intersectionality. The poem starts off by saying “I am a welder. Not an alchemist.” Welding is defined as to unite or fuse. Alchemy is a medieval form of chemistry concerned with finding a universal solvent to transform metal into gold. Immediately the poet is spreading a message of unity. The poet says “no magic here.” Making feminism intersectional is to acknowledge the stories and experiences of all types of folk, not to magically change them into someone they are not. It is not magic, it is work. The poet talks about how the movement will only work if “things get hot enough” (which refers again to welding), how we need “structures that can support us without the fear of trembling”, and ends the piece with “I am the welder, I am taking power into my own hands.” The poet recognizes we need heat and welding to make this movement work for every collectively, but it is also urgent for each individual to recognize how much power is inside of them and to use it.
Revolution: It’s Not Neat or Pretty or Quick
The United States has used other countries to make all of us have an accommodating lifestyle. We use others to have great meals, to drive from one end to the other in cars, to have clothes as well as other luxurious objects that other countries do not have. We live in an imperialist country that wants to control other countries by influencing their governments using the military force. Pat Parker elaborates more on the subject by making us notice what the United States has done to Iran for oil; Parker mentions, “We who are 5 percent of the world’s population use 40 percent of the world’s oil” (238). The United States wants to be seen as the best country with the right to defend and control other countries. Hence, the U.S. always uses the media to encourage people to help and support these purposes. For example, it encouraged all to support the military draft by using the media and if they did, they would be labeled as good Americans because that is what they were supposed to do.
Revolutionary feminists are not good Americans. Everyone deserves to be free. In order for this to happen there must be a revolution, which is possible. The poor and working class should be the leaders of this revolution for they are the ones being oppressed all over the world by imperialism. Feminists share the same issues as the working class and should work together to make this change. This change or revolution is not portrayed as fighting, winning, and it’s done. No.
This revolution takes time. It takes time to build a society with no classism, sexism, and racism. This revolution is not neat or pretty in the sense that hard decisions will be made. In order for this revolution to be successful, everyone must collaborate with one another. Blacks cannot make a revolution with only Blacks. The same applies to other groups.
In order to make a revolution for women, women must take control of their movement. For many years, white middle-class women have taken control of the women’s movement. However, white middle class women are not the only ones who represent the movement. Those who have been invisible to the eyes of the public should take the lead: the poor, working class, women of color, and minorities. In order to make this revolution happen, the “nuclear family” known as “the basic unit of capitalism” must be destroyed (242). Capitalism has done a lot of damage to women. Parker elaborates on the way men have prohibited women of having babies and using abortion to get rid of the babies. Men take control over the bodies of women, but women themselves, regardless of color, know whether to have babies or not. Men are not entitled to take control over women's’ bodies. It is not a decision that concerns any other person.
That is why, revolutionary feminists must go against the nuclear family, which will be a struggle, but can and will be possible. Although Parker made this speech at a conference in the 1980s in California, it still applies to every single one of us today. This revolution will not be easy. It is a struggle. It takes time. It is not neat or pretty. It is necessary to work on this revolution together in order for it to happen.
No Rock Scorns Me As Whore- Chrystos
In this segment of the reading, Chrystos examines the reasons she chooses nature over people. While doing so, she explores the concepts of dominant cultures and guilt. Chrystos discusses her thoughts on nuclear power plants, she considers them evil which falls in line with most of the other things in the dominant culture. She thinks that America will not last much longer with the way things are going now, and she accepts it. She claims that “we have made a much bigger mess than the dinosaurs” (243). She understands that she has contributed to this mess, but she still loves the Earth. She writes “I am not wise. However, there is no shame when one is foolish with a tree. No bird ever called me crazy. No rock scorns me as a whore.” (244) Chrysos is saying that the Earth does not judge her or confine her to roles such as the dominate culture does. However, the guilt she feels for not giving as much as she takes from the Earth is always in the back of her mind.
The dominant culture is presented in this writing in mainly subtle ways. First, she mentions how most things in the dominant culture are evil. As the reading goes on you can see that what she is running from is the constraints of the dominant culture. She longs to be free and away from judgment. She likes that nature has never judged her or shamed her. She sees the Earth as being the only honest and balanced thing around her. The dominant culture creates a system that only accepts certain people, but is discreet about it. Such as fashion designers not outright saying that dark skin is ugly, but they show it by not having a single dark-skinned model on their runway. This dishonesty and discrimination causes her to view this culture as “one of obliteration” (244).
With her criticism of the dominant culture, a sense of guilt is presented when she relates to them. She says, “I am ashamed I am heartbroken I still fight to survive. I mourn. I get up. I live a middle class life. Sometimes” (244). This is said right after she bluntly accuses her own people of being alcoholics (244). Her guilt is said in other places as well; she says she wants to grow food for herself but she doubts that to be possible. She then states, “I’m not thrilled about the idea of slaughter and I am not a vegetarian (244). Chrystos says this in a way that places the criticism on herself. Her passion for nature and animals spreads throughout this piece, however she admits that she is not ready to give up the technology that harms the Earth (243). Again, this is another demonstration of how her guilt is portrayed throughout this piece. This same guilt is the guilt that we all face. Conflicts between what we say is right and what we do/think. The eternal struggle is constant.
This piece shows a real life example of how dominant cultures and guiltiness affects us all. No one is free from America’s dominant culture. It affects us in every way possible, how we view ourselves, how we view others, what we deem to be acceptable or unacceptable, ect.. Guiltiness also affects everyone. Everyone is guilty of not always acting or thinking the way their morals and values expect them to. This in return causes a sense of guilt that cannot be shaken off unless it is confronted and acted upon.
Moraga, Cherrie, and Gloria Anzaldua. “El Mundo Zurdo: The Vision.” This Bridge Called My Back: Writings by Radical Women of Color. New York: Kitchen Table, Women of Color, 1983. N. pages 213-266. Print.
