Question

Feminism promotes equality between men and women, and argues that we must address historical power imbalances in order to bring about such equality. Intersectional feminism builds on this idea, but recognizes that gender is not the only source of privilege or oppression: race, class, nationality, sexual orientation, disability status, etc. are other factors. We have complex identities, and a person can be privileged in some ways, but oppressed in others. Thus, intersectional feminism brings greater nuance to the quest for equality.

What are some possible benefits and drawbacks of using the concept of “intersectionality” to analyze literature? How might this concept help us better understand the themes or characters of a work?

Answer 1

As the statement given about feminism stands correct as feminism endorses equality between women and men but it has its own disadvantages. Whereas, Intersectionality speaks that the feminism is not only about the gender but it also includes race, class, nationality, etc. The term "intersectionality" is a theoretical framework for understanding one's political and social identities both combine together to have unique modes of discrimination. So, it actually aims to broaden the view of feminism that was largely focused on the experiences of white middle class women rather than the black women.

As black women, it has the logical political movement to combat the manifold and simultaneous oppressions that all women of color face. They argued not only for representation in both the feminist movement and Civil Rights, but it was also a recognition of a black woman, rather than just a black woman or just a female individual.

There are basically four benefits of intersectionality. They are complexity, simultaneity, irreducibility, complexity, and inclusivity. These concepts helped in greater part of black women's studies. It has had a number of positive aspects like, it has non-gender related sources of inequality, it has helped the feminism to include non-white, non-middle class people.

But, it also has its own drawback, like some times in some cases, where the actual proofs for the argument may not be done, by the time, it could be over extended than the expected level. It might leads to negative conclusion. The other drawback is that the experience of a black woman cannot be inferred from the experiences of either black men or white women. Here, what we can do is to examine the experience of the black women directly. This is actually time consuming.

So, you can conclude that the term intersectionality in view of feminism help us to better understand the themes and characters of a work only with that particular event and if it holds good you can apply the intersectionality; otherwise there is no need to follow this.