Womanhood today is all inclusive of the joys and struggles of being a woman in 2020. Women’s rights are still not considered human rights. I am a queer, multiracial, Afro-Latina female, who works the creative arts in the United States of America. That’s a minority with a capital ‘M.’ Despite all of those labels, I celebrate every trait that makes me not only a phenomenal woman, but a phenomenal human.
My brand of womanhood is confident, sensual, strong: spine of steel, ice and fire, mother of dragons, wearer of rainbows. My brand of womanhood is making a way when society says there isn’t one. Regardless, the woman writing these words today will be very different in 10 years. Our definition and understanding of womanhood will continue to evolve, as it should, because it’s a woman’s prerogative to change her mind, ok?!
How would you define womanhood and/or femmehood and how is that current definition shifting?
I have never really been able to identify or feel a sense of comradeship with the mainstream idea of “womanhood.” Black womxn and femmes have been constructed as everything that is not white, and the fear of our sexuality — and mere existence — is used to maintain pious white womanhood. This is an ongoing product of slavery that I still feel today. I am not pious. I am not white. And, most of all, I am not interested in submitting to white supremacist patriarchal concepts of gender. This is why I identify as a femme. Being a femme honors my personhood fully, allowing me to exist at the intersections of my race, gender expression and sexual orientation. Being a femme gives me space to move freely through my femininity, masculinity, and everything beyond.
Where do you think feminism is heading and where should it go?
The feminism I currently practice is decolonial and revolutionary, meaning that it exists within and is integral to the struggle against capitalist imperialism. The mainstream, white, pussy hat feminism that we can’t escape serves to maintain capitalist interests. It says, “Yes, women can become CEOs too,” instead of abolishing wage theft and class oppression. It says, “Yes, women can join the army,” instead of dismantling the global militarization of the west. I am motivated by the militant, radical feminism that centers QTPOC and understands, quite deeply, that the struggle against oppression has and will always be led by womxn and femmes. I am from the Asante tribe of Ghana and a proud descendent of Yaa Asantewaa, our Queen Mother who led the war against our British colonizers in 1890. This legacy is what informs my feminism and my identity.
What is your relationship to womanhood and/or femmehood and how has it changed throughout your life?
My relationship with femmehood was something that was used against me to target and ridicule during my early years. Now it’s my sexuality, my body, my connection to others, it’s my link to activism. It’s my identity and power.
How would you define womanhood and/or femmehood and how that current definition shifting?
It’s a feeling deep inside that says this is who I am. It’s not fitting in a box that society gives you. It’s not limits or outside expectations. It’s full of possibility. It’s who I am.
Who are some women/femmes who have inspired you and how?
I’m really inspired by Michelle Obama’s determination and the way she re-defined what it meant to be a First Lady. I’m also inspired by Ruth Bader Ginsburg, who is fiercely intelligent and courageous, speaking to truth to power again and again. Young activists like Gitanjali Rao, Jordan Reeves, and Khloe Thompson inspire me every day in the way they raise their voices, use whatever resources they have around them, and change the world with their passions!
Responses have been edited for length and clarity.
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