Intersectional feminism beyond U.S. flag hijab and pussy hats in Trump's America. Issue 5 (4th May 2017)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Gökarıksel, Banu; Smith, Sara
• Is Part Of: Gender, place and culture. Volume 24:Issue 5(2017)
• Page Start: 628
• Page End: 644
• Publication Date: 2017-05-04
• Subjects: Intersectionality -- feminism -- women's marches -- political symbols -- Trump -- white masculinity; Human geography -- Periodicals; Feminism -- Periodicals; Géographie féministe -- Périodiques; 305.305
• DOI: 10.1080/0966369X.2017.1343284
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 0966-369X

Abstract

Abstract: Since Trump came to power, he has undertaken a series of executive actions meant to threaten and terrorize a multitude of 'others': immigrants, Muslims, women, African Americans, Native Americans, transgender people. The defensively aggressive strategies of deportation, walls, and internal violence aim to define who belongs within the U.S. national territory and protect a threatened white masculinity which is portrayed as both victim and victor. Women and allies have been at the forefront of voicing opposition to Trumpism by organizing one of the largest marches in U.S. history on the day after inauguration and continue to resist through strikes, demonstrations, and other actions. They are raising their voices against the walls, hatred, and deportations embedded in the global turn to the right and attempting to embrace an intersectional feminism that recognizes racial, ethnic, religious, class, and other differences. Yet, in the protest signs and the embodied experience of the 21 January march itself, there were also spiraling redefinitions of what it means to be woman, what it means to be 'American, ' and whether that is an aspirational goal or the terms of nationalist exclusion, settler colonialism, and imperial feminism. Intersectional feminism does not come easily and its challenges are manifest in some of the iconic symbols of the women's movement – from the Muslim Woman in the U.S. flag hijab to pink pussy hats. We find spaces of protest fraught but crucial sites of for forging forms of solidarity that are radical in their feminist formulations.