this is what i thought was helpful about doug's post earlier: that there are meaningful ways in which ignoring class is really not possible, even if you're not saying the word. you're soaking in it. and stuff.
<snip>
>
>
> Anyway, all of these groups in the book - and she focuses explicitly on
> what she calls militant black feminists b/c she's interested in black
> socialist feminist history -- emerged, only to quickly find that they
> faced
> their own issues that would make collective identify formation difficult.
> Reading it, it makes you realize that *all* politicized groups are
> involved in collective identity formation -- in so far as one *becomes* an
> activist engaged in struggle.
this is exactly -- or very close to -- what i've been thinking reading this thread. class identity isn't given. it's formed.
<ducking>
Identity Politics? It was the label women, people of color (e.g., the
> Combahee Collective) applied to their politics in 1976. Was it a bad
> thing?
> For Springer, no. It didn't divide the movement, it was part of the
> process
> of defining what it was.
doesn't that mean yes to the question of division? and isn't this discussion a great example of division as part of the process of defining movements and the ways that it leads to paralysis, burn-out, and all those other things? or am i making too much of the kinds of arguments on this list?
Did it lead to their demise? Not according to
> Springer. More often, it was just plain ol' burn out and the conservative
> backlash.
>
> So, I really have no idea what anyone means here by identity politics, but
> if it means attentiveness to the notion that, when one tries to say "we're
> all human" or "we're all women" or "we're all working class" "or we're all
> in this together", it can't hurt to ask, "Who is this we you're talking
> about?"
again, exactly what i've been wondering about. "identity politics," in my admittedly limited experience, is usually a derogatory term used by leftists who want identity determined by class, which is a sort of Thomist-Marxist Transcendental. but again, maybe i'm being too reductive or missing something here. it's certainly true that there's a lot disagreement about what class politics is or ought to be. i complain to my liberal friends that they talk about economics like it's the weather -- it's either raining or it's sunny, and you can't control it. you just get to decide whether or not you do your cookout that day. don't many leftists have a bad habit of doing the same thing with class?
j
-- http://brainmortgage.blogspot.com/