My Artifact
Describe your image
Describe your image
The poem attempts to describe the marginalized peoples' struggles. There are a lot of people who are exploited due to capitalism, neocolonialism, and other forces. There are also people who face discrimination due to their intersecting identities. The poem tries to highlight that marginalized people are fighting to obtain their rights and their voices can change our society.
The picture suggests that each person should realized the diversity of the marginalized voices and their fights.
My ideal vision of feminism values the dignity of each person including the most marginalized people in the world. I believe if we can enhance the condition of the peoples’ lives at the bottom of the hierarchy in society, others’ lives will be also improved. My ideal feminism includes diversity but I would like to focus on the most oppressed people who are struggling with poverty, gender and racial discrimination, neocolonialism, and other factors. The focused problem is the ignorance of the most marginalized people’s voices because people cannot get true liberty unless other people who are suffering more than us get freedom as many feminists insist. I was especially inspired by the visions of “Intersectional” feminism and “Global” feminism that attempt to acknowledge the existences that had been ignored in the mainstream and include the diversity of human identities. My ideal feminism would like to provide the platforms where people can express themselves no matter what race, gender, age, and class so that people in the world can raise their voices by themselves and others can support them. Every person’s voice is precious and the marginalized people who live in poverty and with intersecting identities can change the world.
My Inspirations
Who Said It Was Simple
By Audre Lorde
There are so many roots to the tree of anger
that sometimes the branches shatter
before they bear.
Sitting in Nedicks
the women rally before they march
discussing the problematic girls
they hire to make them free.
An almost white counterman passes
a waiting brother to serve them first
and the ladies neither notice nor reject
the slighter pleasures of their slavery.
But I who am bound by my mirror
as well as my bed
see causes in colour
as well as sex
and sit here wondering
which me will survive
all these liberations.
Audre Lorde, “Who Said It Was Simple” from From a Land Where Other People Live. Copyright © 1973 by Audre Lorde. Reprinted with the permission of the Charlotte Sheedy Literary Agency
Source: The Collected Poems of Audre Lorde (W. W. Norton and Company Inc., 1997)
Audre Lorde
Lorde was active as a black feminist and lesbian. In this poem, she describes the oppression that the marginalized people are exploited even among women. The women who had privileges can raise their voices to improve their lives but the ignorance of the minorities' voices happens. The poem tells us that there is still inequality in feminism. She shows that people should be aware of the existences that have been silenced and disadvantaged by the majority, and that not only racial identity but also gender identity shape each person.
Bell Hooks
Hooks insists that feminism should include people all over the world. The main feminism movements have improved women's lives but the focused group was the privileged women in the global north area. She teaches us that it is time to widen our perspective so that feminism movements can include people even in poor countries and to support each other to make the whole world better. She stresses the importance of feminism to reveal the inequalities that many people have not been aware of.
"It is a feminism that recognizes individual diversity, and freedom, and equality, defined through and beyond north/ west south/ east dialogues"(Hooks 2000:47).
"The goal of global feminism is to reach out and join global struggles to end sexism, sexist exploitation, and oppression"(Hooks 2000:47).
Hooks, bell. 2000. “Global Feminism,” in Feminism is for Everybody: Passionate Politics. Cambridge, MA: South End Press. Pp. 44-47.
"We cannot all succeed when half of us are held back."
"If we want to achieve our goal then let us empower ourselves with the weapon of knowledge and let us shield ourselves unity and togetherness. "
Malala Yousafzai
Malala Yousafzai is a Pakistani activist. Her quote, " one child, one teacher, one book, and one pen can change the world" is famous. I was also moved by her other words. She explains that the most oppressed people; women and children are struggling with many inequalities but they have the right to raise their voices, the right to live safely, and the right to get an education. She leads us to speak up to protect ourselves, instead of relying on others. In addition, she tells that people need to corporate to achieve an equal world where every child can have an equal opportunity to educate themselves.
