Skip to main content Accessibility help
×
Hostname: page-component-7479d7b7d-m9pkr Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-07-15T08:33:43.238Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

5 - Womanizing Malcolm X

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 May 2010

Robert E. Terrill
Affiliation:
Indiana University, Bloomington
Get access

Summary

In the early stages of this project, I told a colleague that I had been asked to write an article about women and Malcolm X. She didn't directly respond to this news but her expression was a talking book which seemed to ask: Is there really anything more for a black feminist to say about Malcolm X? I understand the premise of the question. After all, black feminists and womanists have already sculpted the dominant theoretical narrative on Malcolm X. For example, in the 1980s and 90s, black feminists wrote a series of essays generally praising his political insight and excoriating his misogyny. Michelle Wallace, Audre Lorde, bell hooks, Angela Davis, Patricia Hill Collins, and Barbara Ransby, among others, depicted Malcolm X as a race leader who was either the precursor to the core of misogyny at the center of Black Power politics, a warrior among the various leaders of the civil rights and black nationalist organizations of the 1960s, or a religious figure whose ministerial vocation and penchant for truth-seeking may well have enabled him, had he lived, to become a champion for women's empowerment. Women writers in the Black Arts movement such as Maya Angelou, Alice Walker, and Sonia Sanchez saw Malcolm X as a black hero and praised his love for his people as well as his strength, courage, and intellectual integrity. More recently, scholars such as Tracye Williams and Farah Jasmine Griffin have argued that black women can love what Malcolm X stood for but they must still challenge the sexism reflected in his teachings and in the movements he inspired.

Type
Chapter
Information
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2010

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Save book to Kindle

To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure coreplatform@cambridge.org is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.

Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.

Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.

Available formats
×

Save book to Dropbox

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.

Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

Available formats
×