In the Matter of Black Lives

In the Matter of Black Lives: Womanist Prose unabashedly and unapologetically takes the humanity of Black people for granted. In these essays, presented in the order in which they were originally published (with added postscripts where updated information is available), I examine the ways in which structural racism underscores issues of gender, education, colonialism/neocolonialism, the environment, gun control, human rights, mental health, patriotism, protest, and religion to...
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In the Matter of Black Lives: Womanist Prose unabashedly and unapologetically takes the humanity of Black people for granted. In these essays, presented in the order in which they were originally published (with added postscripts where updated information is available), I examine the ways in which structural racism underscores issues of gender, education, colonialism/neocolonialism, the environment, gun control, human rights, mental health, patriotism, protest, and religion to demonstrate that the struggle for Black liberation continues in this very hour. The long and short of womanism is as Layli Maparyan asserts in The Womanist Reader, "Womanism does not emphasize or privilege gender or sexism" but "rather, it elevates all sites and forms of oppression, whether they are based on social-address categories like gender, race, or class, to a level of equal concern and action." Having grown-up within the throes of matriarchy on my paternal and maternal sides, and my life experiences as an adult, particularly within the academy, have left me wary of assumptions that women exercise power in more equitable ways than their male counterparts. Womanism does not seek a seat at the table but rather like the historic Jesus, who entered into the halls of power and overturned the tables and seats of those who exploited the masses, our mission is to overturn and drive out all structures of oppression leaving no stone unturned. The womanist idea assumes that everything and nothing is sacred. All ideologies are equally interrogated and deconstructed.