I Am Woman

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/12/09/AR2009120904546.html?sid=ST2010041904904- Helena Andrews

The second issue I hear, mostly from heterosexual black women, is a deep concern about being un-partnered, which I blame on an overwhelming discourse around this idea that there are no available black men.
So in some ways, young women may be more connected to these gender scripts than we were, because marriage and motherhood is at the center of popular discourse.- Beverly Guy-Sheftall
http://www.theroot.com/views/root-interview-beverly-guy-sheftall?page=0,2

These are two very different articles, but both relate to feminism, although in the first article, a profile of Helena Andrews, author of the memoir Bitch Is The New Black, the author refers to our generation as being one that is "post-feminist". The ssecond article, an interview with Beverly Guy-Sheftall, a scholar and feminist, deals with Guy-Sheftall's opinion of feminism now and how it relates to us, in comparison to when she herself was younger.

The above quote stood out to me because I agreed with Guy-Sheftall. Black women in my generation, and I'll add my mother's generation to this category as well, are very concerned about being partnered. In all honesty, I know very few Black women who are married, including my mother. From conversations that I've heard practically all my life, it is definitely a concern for them.

I began reading Bitch Is The New Black over the summer, and once school started back and I became busier, I wasn't able to finish the book in its entirety. I was quite fascinated with how much emphasis Helena Andrews placed on her relationship status. To her, it wasn't just a status, it was a definition. SINGLE. It was like a curse word.

I noticed, too, that in the headline of the profile on her, it uses lonely and successful almost as synonyms. Andrews, to me, is the epitome of success. She graduted from Columbia University and Northwestern University, wrote for Politico, O, The New York Times, and now has a movie deal possibly in the works, in addition to a book out. But the majority of the book and the article focuses on her lack of a relationship.

Is this the new face of feminism? We don't define success by our jobs or education--it's as if we almost take that for granted. Attending Columbia and Northwestern, two of the top schools in the country, are thrown into the book and article like an afterthought. Attending an Ivy-League is an amazing feat; it is supposed to set you apart from others. However, in a post-feminist word, it makes you a regular old Joe. Andrews says that she has friends who are lawyers, social scientists and more--those with presumably lucrative careers, but again, she states it as if she's mentioning the walk that she gave her dog that morning.

We're not feminists anymore. We're not even successful. We're just lonely.

It's scary.