Racial Justice Resources for Activists, Advocates & Allies

What is intersectionality?

• The interconnected nature of social categorizations such as race, class, and gender, regarded as creating overlapping and interdependent systems of discrimination or disadvantage; a theoretical approach based on such a premise.(OED)
•  The idea that any liberation movement that focuses only on what all members of the group have in common will best serve the members of the group who are least oppressed. (Amia Srinivasan)
• Intersectionality is a theoretical framework that posits that multiple social categories (e.g., race, ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation, socioeconomic status) intersect at the micro level of individual experience to reflect multiple interlocking systems of privilege and oppression at the macro, social-structural level (e.g., racism, sexism, heterosexism). (Lisa Bowleg,)
•  intersectionality is the concept that all oppression is linked... Intersectionality is the acknowledgement that everyone has their own unique experiences of discrimination and oppression and we must consider everything and anything that can marginalise people – gender, race, class, sexual orientation, physical ability, etc. First coined by Professor Kimberlé Crenshaw back in 1989, intersectionality was added to the Oxford Dictionary in 2015 with its importance increasingly being recognised in the world of women’s rights.(https://www.womankind.org.uk/)

• The origin of the term ‘intersectionality’

Kimberlé Crenshaw Discusses 'Intersectional Feminism' Women's and Gender studies major Sara Hayet ’18 interviews Kimberlé Crenshaw about "Intersectional Feminism." Crenshaw served as the keynote speaker for the 30th anniversary of  Women's and Gender Studies Celebration, Lafayette College, September 17, 2015.

Now more than ever, it's important to look boldly at the reality of race and gender bias -- and understand how the two can combine to create even more harm. Kimberlé Crenshaw uses the term "intersectionality" to describe this phenomenon; as she says, if you're standing in the path of multiple forms of exclusion, you're likely to get hit by both. In this moving talk, she calls on us to bear witness to this reality and speak up for victims of prejudice.