More than that, it is the implied accessibility of the phrase that makes me feel uneasy, and distrusting of the term as well as the practice that follows from it. I say this because the politics of “safe space” does not account for the continual and visceral feelings of unsafeness that marginalized individuals feel and experience – have to feel and have to experience.

As we walked across campus, he, tall as ever with a distinct, darkened pigment, walked erectly. Never looking down or appearing as if he didn’t belong, he strode. With every step, he firmly claimed the space, this space, as his own. But the stares, they said otherwise. 

Space is imbued with difference and distinction and is made inaccessible to certain people because of that. To put it bluntly, space is more accessible to the non-marginal, to those stacked with social capital: heterosexuality, maleness, able-bodiedness, whiteness. Space, in fact, is this: it is heterosexual, male, able-bodied and white; and any individual outside of that – not privileged enough to possess the beauty that is normativity – is not afforded the same access to space. I painfully figured this out while walking across campus with one of my friends the other day. As we were walking together, from the library to the McConnell Engineering building and back up again, I noticed the stares. I’ve always gotten the stares. I didn’t necessarily know why I received them; I just did. And no, these stares weren’t particularly any different, not more intense or more off. They were the same. The only difference was there was another person there, another person of colour. Him, a black man, and me, a black woman. And before I could even turn around to say anything, he turned to me and said (something along the lines of), “I hate when people [though I believe he meant “they”] stare at me.”

In moments like these, I become so aware of how our bodies – racialized and Othered, deeply sexualized, and mine, gendered – were never seen as belonging to this space. Our bodies and our beings appear foreign, to them, to the normative. The blackness of our skin and its implied (hyper)sexuality do not belong in (this) space. Because, when seen, we are met with stares – unjustified stares – processing and registering the placement of our non-normative bodies in (this) space. Each stare, continuing to scan our bodies, further displaces us, telling us that we don’t belong.

“Safe space,” as such, was introduced to make the marginalized feel “safe,” to make space accessible to all and not just the normative.

But this (oddly enough) is exactly what I take issue with, because “safe space” politics, in making space accessible to all – normative and non-normative alike – erases the reality and intensity of the experiences I, as a person of colour and member of the marginalized, experience. It, in becoming accessible to everyone, also becomes accessible to those who already have immense access to it. And because of this, its politics can be, and in fact have been, co-opted by the non-marginal – the white, the heterosexual, the able-bodied, the male – and have been used in these really problematic, “I’m affected by oppression too, even though I’m not marginalized, so remember this is a safe space (for the normative as well),” counterproductive, pejorative ways. “Safe space” hides specification and gets recycled into this oppression-erasing, liberal-humanist rhetoric of “we all suffer from the (same) unsafeness of space” – even though we don’t. This move is dehumanizing and oppressive, and it produces the same unsafeness that it attempts to rectify.

I, as a marginal body, need something specifically for me. I need something for members of my communities, for the oppressed, and not something that can be easily co-opted by the privileged. I need something that sees the marginal as its sole and intended beneficiaries. I need something, and unfortunately, that something just isn’t “safe space” politics.

This piece is particularly dedicated to the black men I know in universities across the country (my brother being one of them). To the black men who are students, whose bodies are continuously treated as foreign, forced to endure the constant stares of confusion and delegitimization that scour your contours daily, having to affirm and confirm your place in the institution as legitimate bodies, intellectual and deserving to be here. I see you.

Christiana Collison is a U3 Honours Women’s Studies student. She has little to no fucks (care) left to give to either McGill or its oppression. Get at her at christiana.collison@mail.mcgill.ca.

The post Complicating space appeared first on The McGill Daily.

2. Despite its claims, The Daily is not entirely non-hierarchical, and The Daily staff has failed to adequately analyze power relations present within the paper.

3. There is a non-hierarchical relation amongst the editors at The Daily as they make decisions through consensus with equal voting power. This is something most other papers haven’t accomplished, or even bothered to pursue.

4. However, The Daily is made up of more than just nineteen editors as each issue includes contributions from numerous writers, columnists, photographers, and illustrators.

5. Despite this, the relationship between contributors and editors is a hierarchical one that favours the editors.

6. This hierarchy manifests itself in numerous ways. In practice, the editors determine the cover, illustrations, and stories for each issue amongst themselves, though contributors are free to participate. Additionally, in relations with writers, the editors have the power to overrule whatever they wish, regardless of the desires of the writer. Though editors are usually reasonable, they ultimately hold the power not to be.

7. Subsequently, the issues that are described in point six become even more damaging when one examines the editorial team. The editors have usually been extremely tight-knit, which certainly makes sense, but which makes it very difficult to overrule the recommendation of your primary editor: when a dispute arises, your primary editor merely asks other editors for their opinion on the matter (such as the Coordinating editor), and then returns with a verdict. Thus far, in our experience, this has always meant that the primary editor has made their changes with little or no consultation on the part of the other editors who solidified this decision.

8. This process leads to articles being misinterpreted by The Daily community. For example, an article titled “Anti-intellectualism amongst the political right” (Commentary, October 31, 2011) was written with a quotation at the beginning, which was referred to multiple times in the article. When the article was put into print, the quotation was mysteriously removed, while the article was otherwise unaltered, ruining the entire piece. With greater dialogue, these errors could be avoided.

9. In the 2012-2013 academic year, The Daily will face a referendum which determines if it will continue to exist or not. We believe that The Daily will pass this referendum as it is undoubtedly the best newspaper on campus.

10. Regardless, this does not mean that the paper cannot be improved. And more importantly, the fact that The Daily has existed for over 100 years with an impressive history should not be used as the sole justification for its continued existence. Relying upon past accomplishments to justify presence in the present is a conservative tactic, and as a paper which prides itself on progressive ideas, The Daily must avoid it.

11. So, as writers primarily concerned with the Commentary section of the paper, we recommend the following changes be made to enrich the quality of the paper as a whole.

a. Ensure that The Daily becomes a more open and welcoming paper which the student body can really claim as its own. This can be done by working to create a team-like atmosphere which extends beyond the editors, so that Commentary writers are not just people who send in an article every two weeks, but rather feel like they are a part of the paper. This can imply mutual editorial draftings, Commentary meetings, and greater inclusivity in terms of determining section content, such as taking suggestions on what topics can/should be addressed weekly.

b. Strive for diversity in the issues tackled and taken up. That is, continue to challenge political structures of dominance in McGill society and society at large, but refrain from appealing to and maintaining white, privileged, and elitist ways of thought.

c. Push towards broadening the Commentary section by addressing issues that deal with people on the political and social margins of society and go beyond surface-based structures of oppression that are verbatim to white “leftist” issues commonly found in The Daily. An example that The Daily missed this year was an analysis of how the Montreal protests have privileged white protesters who have not had to deal with or experience racial oppression on a reoccurring basis at the hands of the Montreal police or the McGill administration.

12. In order to move into the next 100 years of its existence, The Daily must uphold all that it believes it strives to stand for. It needs to prevent itself from becoming a site of alienation and exclusivity, stagnant where it was once progressive. And so, in analyzing inequalities and hierarchies in the world, The Daily must turn its scope on itself, as the inequalities within the paper, unlike many of the inequalities in the world, are something Daily members can easily and readily fix.

Christiana Collison and Davide Mastracci are former Daily columnists. They can be reached at christiana.collison@mail.mcgill.ca and davide.mastracci@mail.mcgill.ca.

The post A critique of The McGill Daily appeared first on The McGill Daily.

Boom and blast! This was probably the most badass comment I’ve ever received. Why? I was totally called a militant, that’s why. I can’t even tell you how flattered I was, because, before this, I had never thought myself to be a militant. But unknown to me at the time, I was in fact exactly that: a black woman feminist, and in essence, a militant.

The life, work, and consciousness of a black woman feminist will always be one of a militant. For the black woman has, under the most strenuous adversities, survived and continues to survive. This is undeniable. Professor Michael Eric Dyson, on a segment of the show Tyra, shares this sentiment when discussing the black woman. On this segment entitled, “Changing Stereotypes of Black Men”, a guest describes black women in similar terms: militant, belligerent, and obnoxious. Dyson then states, “…if you find a sista with that kind of strength that got to race through slavery, that got to race through Jim Crow, that stood us [black men] up when we couldn’t stand up, you expect that sista to be strong…Don’t be mad when she shows strength now.”

And to this I say, against the never-ending patriarchy and its inseparable oppressive counterpart, white supremacy, the black woman feminist – the militant – still strives to race through. She does not stop; she cannot stop.

But I admit. Sometimes I do wish that it could stop. I wish as though I could stop this life, work, and consciousness. Sometimes I vehemently wish to reject it, reject it all – everything. For sometimes it is tiresome and frustrating and saddening and painful and suffocating. It is so  fucking suffocating! This life, work, and consciousness become you. You embody this. You embody this existence every moment, of every second, of every day. The world becomes a more distrusting and disheartening place filled with what seems like impenetrable structures of racism, sexism, and hatred. And I admit. I know I distrust this world, and, too, its people. I realized and accepted this after my first attempt at sharing this mystique with others during my first year. But it’s safe to say that the black woman feminist, for them – for the world – wasn’t a good look then, and still isn’t a good look now.

And so this struggle, mystique, and existence can, too, become one of loneliness sometimes. The battle to eradicate the oppressions of this world becomes a battle fought alone. Then the frustration continues and increases and intensifies, and hurts. It hurts a lot.

This woman’s work. This (black) woman’s work is something we as the defined, titled, and self-bestowed black women feminists/militants must never stop. This world needs us. This world that ceases to rid itself of its racisms and sexisms needs us, and needs our work. We must fight by any means necessary to make this world a post-racist, post-patriarchal, and post-oppressive world. We must stand by our struggle, for, as (the beautiful, so beautiful) Desmond Tutu states, “If you are neutral in situations of injustice, you have chosen the side of the oppressor.”

Indeed, I am black; I am a woman; I am a feminist. And, as a black woman feminist, this too makes me a militant. I am a militant. I am a militant who will not stop and cannot stop this woman’s work – this (black) woman’s work.

And so I wish to share this piece of advice with all my black women feminists – my militants – who feel sad and angry and frustrated and disgusted and tired and suffocated with this life and this work and this consciousness, in this world of constant oppression. I promise, it works. Find a comforting spot, turn on your computer, and go straight to Youtube and search for Maxwell’s track “This Woman’s Work”. For, he is speaking to you, to us. And as the melodic sounds fill the room say these lines with him: I know you’ve got a little life in you left, I know you’ve got a lot of strength left.” These lines speak truth. For when all is said and done, we – the black women feminists, militants – may have just a little life in us left. But we will forever have a lot of strength left.

Tyrone Speaks is a twice monthly column written by Christiana Collison on the subject of black feminism.  You can email her at tyronespeaks@mcgilldaily.com.

The post This (black) woman’s work appeared first on The McGill Daily.

Pause. Let’s just pause right here for a moment.

Black women, how many times have you heard that question? The infamous, “Is your hair real?” or “Can I touch it?” or, the pinnacle of all, “Well, where’s your real hair then?”

The surveillance of black women’s hair in both black and non-black spaces has been a longstanding and terribly unaddressed ritual for quite some time now. The racial specificity behind these questions have a direct link to the social devaluing of black women’s aesthetic in mainstream society. It also provides another example of the entitlement wider society feels they have over black women – in this case, their aesthetics. An entitlement, I’d like to point out, they don’t have.

Hair, cross-culturally, has been constructed as something very central to the establishment of femininity. To put it bluntly, a woman without hair is not really a woman at all (that is, according to normative claims of femininity, or normative characteristics of what the feminine ought to be). In other words, hair has, for several women, become intrinsic to the construction of their feminine identity.

If we take this centrality of hair to a woman’s (aesthetic, at the very least) identity formation to be true, then I’m quite sure we can see the real problems implicit within those particular questions posed towards black women, and specifically the question, “Is your hair real?”

As I pointed out to my sushi dinner buddy, questions that inquire about the biological validity of one’s hair are extremely gendered and racialized. That is to say, non-black women and both black and non-black men are never asked the question, “Is your hair real?” and, thus, are never asked to validate the natural “ownership” of their hair. The sheer thought of me posing this question to a non-black female or any man, for that matter, had my date in tears of laughter at its supposed absurdity, despite the fact that men and non-black women can and often do wear extensions, hairpieces, toupes, and wigs.

But yet, the ease at which women and men alike, both black and non-black, stop me on the street, in subway cars, and at my job (at almost every shift) to ask if me if my hair is real is quite astounding. It is telling of the many ways black women are constantly asked to account for their aesthetic being.

I say this because those individuals who seek to freely question the “biological” realness of black women’s hair do not know that this questioning has rooted hostile implications. This question, “Is your hair real?” asks no other women but black women to essentially prove their feminine aesthetic identity – an identity that, as I have stated, becomes devalued every single time surveillance is enacted. Black women are forced to affirm or deny, at least once in their lifetime, the validity of their femininity and of their identity as woman. A problem? I think so.

Now, let’s get back to the incident that occurred at the sushi restaurant.

Unfortunately, I did answer the hostess, unwillingly of course. Will I share what my answer was? No, of course not. I did however tell my friend at dinner that I would no longer answer to the self-righteous inquiries of my identity as a woman.

But, obviously, I still get asked this question. Perhaps it is because of misguided and curious people who act as if they have never seen (black women’s) hair before and problematically feel that they have the right to ask about it (a right, I repeat, that they do not have). Or maybe it’s on account of my periodic teetering between two seasonal hairstyles throughout the year. My most beloved afro, which I affectionately call Tyrone (hence, “Tyrone Speaks”), and my dimed-out “Poetic Justice” braids. The latter, a hairstyle I admiringly stole from Janet Jackson in the movie Poetic Justice, consisting of super long and thick braids…like real long, like down to my waist, long.

Regardless of the reason, I will no longer be answering this hostile and unlawful question. Misguided and supposedly curious (but, really, more like ignorant) people who feel entitled to inquire have no reason at all to ask me, or any black woman for that matter, about the realness of my hair – ever, period. So stop.

Simply put, perhaps it’s time watchful society focuses their eyes on their own hair and not my own, you know? So I kindly ask, don’t fucking ask me if my hair is real.

Tyrone Speaks is a twice monthly column written by Christiana Collison on the subject of black feminism.  You can email her at tyronespeaks@mcgilldaily.com.

The post “Is your hair real?” appeared first on The McGill Daily.

I have a six-day cycle, which means I get a sufficient flow of blood for six days straight. I also have an eight-day pain cycle: five days of pre-menstrual pain – kind of like a warning before the secretion actually takes place – and then three days of unfathomable, unfailing, and uncontrolled cramps that send me into a state of immobility and unconsciousness.

But as the piercing throbs ring across my abdomen and penetrate throughout my body, and the pain –so strong, almost too strong to bear, –cuts through me like, “oh, my goodness, have mercy on me, please”, I am forced to stay silent, regardless of where I am or what I am doing. I am forced to pretend as if nothing is happening. I am forced to carry on with my duties, or, better yet, I am forced to “work through the pain.” But as you may already be able to tell, this silence, this carry-on-with-your-duties, work-through-the-pain shit just isn’t really working for me.

The silencing of menstruation in both public and private spaces – not only by women, but by greater society – has enabled the de-legitimization of menstruation and pre-menstrual syndrome. Little girls are told to carry pads, tampons, and the like at the bottom of their purses – far away from the public’s eyes. When the uterine lining’s shedding begins, they’re taught to only say, “I need to use the bathroom” or “My stomach hurts”, rather than the reality of, “I’m on my period” or “I have cramps.”

This coerced silencing of menstruation in the everyday lives of women on account of the patriarchy has got to stop. For, the longer menstruation continues to be relegated to the realm of mere “female problems,” the longer it will be viewed as an unworthy excuse and as illegitimate for reason. Even feminist writer Simone de Beauvoir, in The Second Sex, has characterized menstruation as signifying “illness, suffering, and death”. Death, she says! An experience said to signify death? Well hot damn!

I do, however, think that a clot the size of grape pushing through my body during the middle of an exam – sending lighting bolts of pain through every crevasse of me, leaving my mind in a state of throbbing unrest and my entire being motionless (true story) is quite the Beauvoirian-menstrual experience. It’s reason to, at the very least, be allowed to go to the bathroom during said exam for how ever long I need to “get myself together,” without the fear of having less time to complete the exam. Doesn’t sound like too much to ask, considering the circumstances, huh?

It’s time that the silencing of menstruation comes to an abrupt halt. Ladies, let’s take baby steps. Rather than telling my boss I have stomach pains when asked why my head is down on the job, I will instead reply, “Sir/Madam, I’m on period.” Rather than sitting in Adams Auditorium writing an in-class exam fearfully anticipating the worst pains of all – and before I can even shout in agony, its piercing throbs having rushed straight to my brain – I will quaintly go to my professor or teaching assistant prior to the exam and let them know, “I’m menstruating and will need to go to the bathroom a couple times during this test; would it be possible if I could maybe get five to ten minutes after the exam to make up for the time I missed having to change my pad?”

I refuse to remain silent about my menstruation and I refuse to aid in the perpetuated de-legitimization of pre-menstrual syndrome. Like I said, currently, I’m on day three and luckily for myself and The Daily, the deadliest pains of all have come and gone prior to writing this article. For, if they didn’t, let’s just say I’d probably be crouched over on the floor trying to muster up the strength to send an e-mail to the editors letting them know my article was going to be late. Why? Because I’m on my period.

Tyrone Speaks is a twice monthly column written by Christiana Collison on the subject of black feminism.  You can email her at tyronespeaks@mcgilldaily.com.

The post Let’s talk about menstruation appeared first on The McGill Daily.

I want to consider two specific videos from J. Cole’s hip-hop repertoire, exploring the existence of (get ready for it…) shadeism. For those of you who are unfamiliar with the term, it refers to a form of oppression that, according to an excellent documentary entitled Shadeism directed by Nayani Thiyagarajah, can be defined as “the discrimination that exists between the lighter-skinned and darker-skinned members of the same community.”

I want to look at the perpetuation of shadeism within the black community as maintained through hip-hop, exploring how the women of darker shades featured in Cole’s videos are hypersexualized compared to the lighter-skinned women he features. I chose to explore “In The Morning” and “Can’t Get Enough” because both songs, lyrically, are essentially giving the same message: the sexual attractiveness of females in general, and of the ones present in the video. The songs are arguably on equal footing, and thus I will highlight the differences in the way the women in “Can’t Get Enough” were portrayed versus the woman in “In The Morning.”

First, I’ll take up J. Cole’s “In The Morning.” While I don’t deny that the main female love/sex interest is sexualized – and some may argue even hypersexualized – her role as the sole and focal female of the video, I argue, de-hypersexualises her, especially in relation to the women in the other video. In this video, we see that the central female, who is clearly of lighter skin, is depicted as Cole’s potential “girlfriend” or specific “love interest.” This depiction is affirmed several times: first, when she’s given special entrance backstage after watching Cole’s performance, and is later seen seated under J. Cole’s arm; second, when Cole exclusively introduces her to Drake.

This personalized, interactive and heightened status as his sole potential love interest is paramount to understanding how shadeism is at work here. Her potential for girlfriend status de-hypersexualizes her. Rather than being merely a “hit in the morning,” her girlfriend potential allows for a “hypersexualized transcendence,” of sorts. It transforms her from a state of immobile sexual objectivity to one of mobile potential girlfriend subjectivity – a mobility evident in the physical movements of the varying females in both videos. The lighter-skinned woman literally moves throughout the entire video: she walks with Cole, she dances to Cole, et cetera. The darker-skinned women in “Can’t Get Enough,” however, are seen dancing in one position, and only experience movement when they’re relocated from the yacht to the beach, and back. Thus, the women of this video, who are predominantly of darker skin, do not experience this same hypersexualized, active transcendence.

I’ll now explore “Can’t Get Enough.” Both this video, and J. Cole, have received great praise for the significant use of darker-skinned women throughout the video, something that has become more and more absent in the rap video of today.

We are introduced to the women of this video in very impersonal shots in which they are shown dripping in water, wearing swimsuits. Mere visual objects of stimulation, these women, unlike the main female in the former video, receive no personal interaction with Cole – no introductions, no arm on the shoulder, nothing. Rather, they are positioned dancing on a yacht while Trey Songz blurts terms like, “mistress” and “hoe” during their shots. There is even a point where Songz, when saying “hoe,” opens his arms to indicate he’s referring to the women – predominantly dark-skinned women – at his back. No joke.

Thus, unlike the prior video, the women of “Can’t Get Enough” do not experience a personalized, interactive element, such as the one the lighter-skinned woman in “In The Morning” experiences by being characterised as the “potential girlfriend.” These darker-skinned women experience no “hypersexualized transcendence.” Rather, they become increasingly hypersexualized throughout the video, seen bouncing, wining and gyrating on the beach behind Cole.

While some may characterize this difference as coincidental, that it just so happens that “Can’t Get Enough” has darker-skinned women and “In The Morning” has a lighter-skinned woman, I’d like to refrain from such foolery. Not to say, however, that it was intentional. I simply wanted to show how a close read of hip-hip videos (even from, comparatively speaking, more enlightened and socially conscious rappers such as J. Cole) can, and still do, perpetuate and reassert shadeism. This trend is not only demonstrated by having lighter-skinned women portrayed in interactive and more personalized positions, but also by depicting darker-skinned women as impersonal, hypersexual objects of mere aesthetic validation.

Tyrone Speaks is a column written by Christiana Collison on the subject of black feminism. It appears every other Wednesday in commentary. You can email her at tyronespeaks@mcgilldaily.com.

The post The politics of shade: J. Cole, hip-hop, and the hue complex appeared first on The McGill Daily.

A classed Othering? Yes! A classed Othering. To understand this concept, I want to first look at how black women are essentialized according to their class location. Then, I want to place this classed Othering within racialized black spaces in the university and evaluate the university’s role in this, as an elitest economic structural power. And, further evaluate how the impact of this role has a specific effect on certain racialized bodies.

Although not extensively, I have, in previous articles, spoken about the various ways black women are stereotyped. However, these problematic characterizations, when looked at intra-racially, take on a whole problematic other form. A form that would be best expressed if I provided a little anecdote, to help contextualize it.

I remember during my first year at McGill, I had become a lot more comfortable on campus. And, by comfortable, I mean loud. I could always be found scouring the campus yelling about something. Whether it was my hatred for McGill or issues pertaining to racialized or gendered bodies, I was always found forcefully asserting my opinion, as I like to call it, about something. However, at that particular time, it seemed as though my comfort at McGill seemed to instead reflect my racialized and classed location.

It seems like it was just yesterday, in fact, that I was eating lunch with a couple of my black friends in Redpath and talking about the possibility of discussing homosexuality in the black community. A friend of mine, who vehemently opposed having the the discussion, argued against its happening. I, however, totally wanted it – and when I totally want something, I tend to get a little intense…and loud. So, I got loud; so much so that I imagine the entire cafeteria probably heard me.

A couple weeks later, another friend of mine, who wasn’t in the cafeteria at the time, had told me that he heard I was yelling in the cafeteria. He said, “Yeah, my friend said they saw you. They said you were acting like a black girl.”

What? Huh? Wait! A what?

This phenomenon of “acting” like a black girl is a precise example of, not only an essentialist characterization of black women, but of classed Othering. For, the evident racialization, not just of myself, but more importantly of my behavior implicit within this phrase, “…acting like a black girl” denotes its classed nature.

How so? This phrase, firstly, invokes a certain undesirability. That is, to be a black girl is not a good thing. Secondly, it particularizes black women. In other words, it makes the assumption that there is a certain type of black woman – a type of black woman one should not want to be, let alone be. And thirdly, it rests its particularization of black women on a classist premise. That is, to be a black girl is to be the quintessential black girl – the “hoodrat,” the “cyattie” or my favorite, one of the many “gyal dem.” For those of you who aren’t aware of those terms, it refers to an essentialized grouping of black women who are, almost always, of lower or lower-middle class backgrounds.

That occurrence, that statement, reflects exactly this notion of classed Othering; for, in that immediate moment, I was made to be the Other on the basis of my demeanor as understood in a classed context. A context which, I argue, is both perpetuated by and helps maintain the elitist economic power structure known as university.

University, an institution that prides itself on its exclusivity and knowledge-acquiring superiority, is also a space of hierarchy. It both hierarchizes and is hierarchized. It hierarchizes in many ways; one that most significant is economically. Students in these spaces are expected to maintain a certain level of economic status; a status that can be projected in many ways. If not monetarily, it must be reflected socially. This elitest socialization of students is fundamental to the maintenance of the university’s status – a status of superiority, of exclusivity, and of preeminence.

For, it is through this perpetuation of elitism by not simply the university, but also my fellow black peers (of all socio-economic backgrounds mind you) that I came to understand how classed Othering occurs in university spaces and how that further maintains the status of the university.

For, through this classed Othering occurs a racialized, classist social policing of sorts in which my behavior, demeanor, and lifestyle is monitored and then scrutinized if not fitting into the desired realm of university’s elitism. In other words, for the particular Other – the classed Other – the university space becomes a classist space of Othering, of policing, of enforced conformity and of social, and, further, self-regulation. And it is this self-regulation that, once adopted by the classed Other, effectively aids in the perpetuations of the university’s status as the elitist economic power structure. Ultimately, and most importantly, rendering the classed Other helpless in the very space that helped create it.

Damn university, you are truly something special!

Tyrone Speaks is a column written by Christiana Collison on the subject of black feminism. It appears every other Wednesday in commentary. You can email her at tyronespeaks@mcgilldaily.com.

The post Acting like a black girl appeared first on The McGill Daily.

Tyrone Speaks is a column written by Christiana Collison on the subject of black feminism. It appears every other Wednesday in commentary. You can email her at tyronespeaks@mcgilldaily.com.

The post Complicating preferences appeared first on The McGill Daily.

This occasion, as metaphorically implied by the joke, was just another form of what bell hooks had coined as “eating the other,” in her piece entitled Eating the Other: Desire and Resistance.

Halloween is a holiday in which white society can publically commodify and exploit Otherness. It provides white society the opportunity, for one day, to embody what they are not – the Other. However, embodying Otherness is not simply restricted to adorning a racist costume; it also extends itself to action, speech, and comportment. For example, Halloween enables the white female draped in colourful feathers and caramel suede, dressed as a “native,” to further embody this costume by jumping around with a stick in hand bellowing out “native american” calls or speaking in “indigenous” dialects in attempts to further authenticate this highly racist costume.

The fact that the same Halloween proceeding Antoine Dodson’s fifteen minute rise to Youtube fame was saturated with white bodies in blackface sporting Dodson costumes and mimicking not solely what they believed to be his personality, but what were also essentialized and stereotyped notions of poor, inner-city black youth (i.e uncouth, loud, primitive, etcetera) all speaks to the whiteness of this holiday.

Halloween has become a consumerist holiday in which white society’s desire to be, embody, and commodify Otherness is not only accepted, but also popularized. hooks explains this idea best by stating “within commodity culture, ethnicity becomes spice, seasoning that can liven up the dull dish that is mainstream white culture.” This further speaks to the celebration and popularization of Halloween; for, “The commodification of Otherness has been so successful,” Hooks argues, “because it is offered as a new delight, more intense, more satisfying than normal ways of doing and feeling.”

In other words, the normalization of white society as “society” does not enable its white members to deviate from who and what they are – white. The inability to be other than white, thus creates a mundane and unexciting space for white bodies. For, within this society (which I would like to point out has been created by white, heteronormative patriarchs for white, heteronormative patriarchs), white bodies are normalized and therefore, unable to embody anything but “the normal.” Thus, as hooks points out, commodification of Otherness presents itself as an alternative way to “liven up the dull dish that is mainstream white culture.”

Halloween does just that. It enables white participants to indulge in the “exotic” – the wonders that are Otherness, ethnicity, and racial difference. To wear different national, racial, and ethnic identities, whether it be the native or black, as previously mentioned, or to adorn sarees or turbans claiming to be “dressed up” as an Indian or Muslim or perhaps to sport a sombrero riding a stuffed donkey calling oneself a Mexican, Halloween provides a shameless and ridicule-free way of allowing white people to break free from the restrictive, dull, and mainstream holds of white society to be whoever  they wish to be – including the Other.

Tyrone Speaks is a column written by Christiana Collison on the subject of black feminism. It appears every other Wednesday in commentary. You can email her at tyronespeaks@mcgilldaily.com.

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In Black Skin, White Masks, Fanon argues that the inescapability of black skin renders the black male subject a slave to his corporeality, subjecting him to the normalizing gaze of white society. Having read Fanon’s text – specifically his chapter that my quote above is taken from “The Fact of Blackness”, at least three or four times in my academic life, it is only recently that I have come to see how limiting his theory of the objectifying, normalizing white gaze is in relation to conceptualizations of the black female subject.

In fact, it was during the unavoidable entrance into my dreadful twenties that I came to realize how masculinized this theory of the racialized normalizing gaze really was. Fanon fails to acknowledge how this gaze is not only racialized, but is also hetero-normatively sexualized, for the black woman.

Perhaps sharing a little anecdote will contextualize this concept a bit.

During my second year at McGill, I found myself in quite a predicament – a predicament that I believe altered my conceptualizations of the normalizing gaze.

I remember I was sitting in the McLennan library, cornered alone in my self-proclaimed seat, reading Locke, Rousseau, and Gandhi in preparation for my Introduction to Political Theory exam. Head buried deep into my books, I was greeted by a new friend who came to visit me. Having met only two weeks or so before this encounter, one could say our friendship was quite fresh. Jokingly ignoring him, I remember him then picking up my phone – it was a BlackBerry at the time, how disgraceful – and proceeding to play with it. Then, without warning, he put the phone down and left. Thinking he went through my photos, text messages or Twitter, I expected to find some type of remnants of him on my phone. And I did. Instead of a tweet or photo of his, leaving his “I was here” stamp, I was left instead with a conversation. He had added to BBM (BlackBerry Messenger, for you non-BlackBerry users) and created this conversation between himself and me in which he asked me for, (wait for it…) sex.

Baffled by my findings, I asked myself, “did I have “gives head this way” tattooed across my forehead?” Or perhaps someone stuck a “loves to fuck” sign on my back. Regardless, I thought that there must have been something about the nature of my being that gave him the idea that sexual requests after a two-week friendship were warranted or even appropriate.

In essence, I really just wanted to find a way to theorize why I constantly found myself in situations of sexual enticement and requests from my male counterparts. I wanted to attempt to uncover, for example, the differences between the sexual comments I receive and the comments received by my white female counterparts.

Upon reaching my twenties, it all made sense. Perhaps it was my forceful removal from the innocent-like wonders of teenagehood and unwanted thrust into adulthood that allowed me to make sense of it all. Or, maybe, it was simply that my twenties marked an exponential increase of sexually objectifying experiences, not unlike the one I shared, that prompted me to rationalize these ever-so feminized situations.

Race coupled with femininity is inherently sexualized. In other words, I realized that implicit in my already racialized materiality were constructions of sexuality. Hyper-sexuality to be specific, or, better yet, racialized constructions of female hyper-sexuality; that my racialized materiality – as discussed through works done on racialized bodies, such as Sarah Baartman – the “Hottentot Venus” – is a sexualized materiality. This is what Fanon failed to address. By failing to understand how the black female moves throughout white male heterosexual society, Fanon fails to see how the normalizing gaze,thus becomes hetero-normatively sexualised in nature. For this, I heuristically call this normalizing gaze, the hetero-normatively racialized/sexualized normalizing gaze.

It is because of this gaze that instances like my sexually induced library break – that have occurred with apparent frequency throughout my budding twenties – occur and why I believe they will continue to occur throughout my lifetime as a racialized female. For, whether situated on public transportation, in classrooms, while walking down the street, or embedded in courting methods by various men, the racialized nature of my feminine materiality renders me helpless to the objectifying sexualized and racialized stares of male society.

It is without question that woman is object. Word to Simone de Beauvoir. However, I – and many other minority feminists of my time – have taken it a step further, arguing that the woman of colour is dualistically made object and Other through her racial and sexual corporeality. Denoting, then, that the difference between my white female counterparts and I is that my race is inherently sexualized along with my gender – which is too inherently sexualized. This distinction, thus, subjects the racialized woman to not a single, but a double objectification – a doubled sexualized objectification.

Therefore, to gender Fanon’s theory of racialized corporeality, drawing back on his conceptualization of the normalizing gaze, I argue that the duality of the black female subject’s feminized and racialized corporeality subjects her not only to the normalizing racialised gaze of white society, but also to the heteronormatively sexualized gaze of male society.

I bet you are wondering what resulted from that library debauchery with my friend. Oddly enough, we never spoke of it. Perhaps I will send him a copy of this article and get his opinion on it. Knowing him, it’ll be quite the interesting conversation.

Tyrone Speaks is a column written by Christiana Collison on the subject of black feminism. It appears every other Wednesday in commentary. You can email her at tyronespeaks@mcgilldaily.com.

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It all began when I attended a talk at the University of Toronto in which the guest speaker – and reason for my attendance – was erotic novelist and black activist, Sister Souljah. As a lover of her books – having read two so far, The Coldest Winter Ever and Midnight, I came with the intent of hearing her response to one question and one question alone: why did Midnight, who was characterised as this beautiful dark skinned Sudanese, Muslim man, and embodied (and damn near, epitomised) black hypermasculinity and hypersexuality, choose a non-black female as his love interest?

Midnight was a necessary accessory to my budding womanhood at the time of our first meeting. I remember reading it in the twelfth grade and swooning over by this fictional and almost mythological character of sorts. However, in the same way that I possessed a literary crush on Midnight, I too detested him. For he, forcibly rejecting black women as his love interest, instead finds love in Akemi, a Japanese woman.

After long winded questions about other aspects of her novels, a spectator finally asked the question I was too scared to ask: why was Midnight’s wife not black? But, as soon as Souljah answered the question, the response that I had long awaited became the response I wish I had not heard.

She argued that her reasoning for choosing a Japanese woman rather than a black woman was because black women, she claimed, act in manners that are not beneficial to themselves. Our certain ways of speech, our ways of dress, and our attitudes are more abrasive than others. Using terms such as “militant” when describing how black women love, she seemed to denote that, implicit in black femininity, was hostility and anger (oh, how I love the essentialised notions of the “angry black woman”).

Well hot damn, I was – to say the very least – more than stunned. Without a single attempt to contextualize any of the claims she made, she denounced the character of every single black woman in that room.

But she is definitely not the first to make these claims. This construction – or shall I say, misconstruction – of black femininity has plagued the black woman for quite some time. This monolithic, misconstrued, essentialised and non-contextualized notion of black femininity is, simply put, defamatory toward black women.

The gendered racialization of my mannerisms – for example, the fact that I like to speak assertively (and sometimes loudly) or use expressive hand gestures when I speak, that I enjoy challenging my peers (male or female) in witty repartee and discussion – are all unjust characterizations that have often been used as a framework for misguided rhetoric surrounding the racialised woman. Rhetoric that includes: claims to her fearful or non-receptive self, her unapproachable exterior or, my favourite, the reason why the heterosexual black woman is finding herself alone and man-less time and time again in comparison to her non-black female counterparts.

The essence of black femininity is not homogenous. It is fluid and hybrid, crossing intersections ofclass, shade, geographical location, sexual orientation, privilege and lack thereof.

Black femininity is a myriad of characteristics because the black woman is a myriad of persons. She is a woman of different hues who is perceived and received differently by wider society. Her encounters with race and femininity differ greatly on many levels. For example, her geographical location compounded with her social class alters the way she adopts and performs black femininity. I, growing up in the lower class sectors of Toronto’s inner city neighbourhoods, received black femininity harshly and gave it back just as harsh. I was taught to be tough, strong, and fearless, relying solely on myself.

However, I am one black female, of one particular geographical location, belonging to one specific social class. Black women span across geographical locations, residing in hoods and suburbs and gated communities or residing nowhere, possessing no homes or claiming no geographical locations. They belong to middle classes, upper classes, and middle-upper classes to working classes, educated, and non-educated classes. Hence, I, as a black woman, am in no way a universal being, nor am I an archetypal model of black women. I am me.

Thus, I repeat, black femininity is a myriad of characteristics because the black woman is a myriad of persons.

Tyrone Speaks is a column written by Christiana Collison on the subject of black feminism. It appears every other Wednesday in commentary. You can email her at tyronespeaks@mcgilldaily.com.

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