Coming into the article, I didn’t know what to expect. I wasn’t familiar with the concept of “womanism.” It seems that everything with “ism” always leads me to think of feminism, which to my luck, the article did mention. But womanism is feminism in a different way, a way that was never explained to me.

The article defined womanism as “a movement that realizes that the liberation of all of us as individuals, beyond the social constructs of race, gender, nationality, etc, is bound together.”

As a person that always strives for inclusion in a community, specifically at Parker, I found this an interesting topic to explore. As I understand it, womanism allows women to self consciously find liberation as individuals, to ultimately explore their identity.

Taylor Thompson, the author of this article, connects womanism to her personal identity as a woman of color. She writes about what she has learned and vividly explains how she is exploring the concept. One of the many interesting points Thompson mentions is how she realized that she had to write her own “narrative,” one that did not conform to her culture and surroundings. “Radical Subjectivity.” This I imagine took a lot to do!

I too identify myself as a woman of color, and yet I have been unconscious about this idea! I hope to discover more things about myself this upcoming year through topics such as womanism, just like Thompson. This makes me think a lot about the exclusion of women of color in “White American feminism,” and I think it’s a topic that should be explored in a discussion within the student body whether that be in a SOCA, MOCHA, or student government discussion.  

Priscilla Roman ’18