On Afro-Feminism & The Health of a Nation

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via Yaqeen Institute

“The most complete of believers in faith are those with the best character, and the best of you are the best in behavior to their women.”

—Tirmidhi

As Black women, we have a great capacity to survive and, one would argue, thrive. Despite all that befell us over the past 500 years, we participated in communities and societies and made great contributions to bettering those communities and societies. We’ve held our families together, providing education and inventions while, at the same time, holding onto and passing down the cultural and spiritual heritages of the Black communities and societies we belong to.

How well we thrive is a litmus test of how equitable, advanced and civilized the communities and societies we find ourselves in are. In a healthy, sound society, women (and especially Black women and girls) are valued, and their worth and contributions are not only advocated for but also found essential to the collective growth and prosperity of their societies and communities.

Take, for example, the West African Sokoto Emirate (Nigeria, Niger, Cameroon, and Burkina Faso), founded in 1804 by the Fulani scholar, Shehu Usman dan Fodio.

Shehu Usman Dan Fodio via dailytrust.com

Soldier from the Sokoto Caliphate via namuwiki

Aisha Balarabe Bawa writes in Historical Narratives of Women’s Contributions to Education in Northern Nigeri: "In Islam, seeking knowledge is obligatory upon every Muslim, male and female.

​In view of this, the renowned scholar Sheikh Usman Dan Fodio was categorically clear on the affairs of women in relation to education, where he counseled them to seek knowledge. 

The 19th century jihad and the subsequent establishment of the Sokoto Caliphate produced great scholars including women."

“The Believers, men and women, are protectors, one of another.”

—Quran, Surah Al-Tawba, 9:71

Sojourner Truth via Wikipedia

In her famous speech in 1851 at the Women’s Rights Convention in Ohio, Sojourner Truth asked, “Ain’t I a woman?" Afro-feminism is founded on that same question. While White feminism asks "Am I not an equal citizen?", Black women have had to ask "Am I not a human, a woman, and—lastly—an equal citizen?"

Black feminism took form in response to a loss of agency and power, and to fight erasure. Knowing we have an intellect and unique spirit in a world that is designed to take from our gifts while simultaneously silencing or ignoring our personhood, Black women of the diaspora felt compelled to fight for a just and equitable place in the societies they found themselves in.

“You can never have civil rights until you have human rights. Human rights represent the right to be a human being. Whenever you are recognized and respected as a human being, our civil rights are automatic.” 

—Malcolm X

Anna Julia Cooper, who was known as the ‘Mother of Black Feminism’ alongside such famous names as Ida B.Wells, Frances Harper Watkins and Mary Church Terrell, created the National Association of Colored Women. Alongside Cooper's essays and speeches (see, A Voice From the South), these women offered one of the first clear articulations of Black feminism. The organisation's motto was “lifting as we climb” and insisted that equality for Black women would also advance the entire African American community. 

Frances Watkins Harper via literaryladiesguide.com

Mary Church Terrell via blackpast.org

Anna Julia Cooper via nps.gov

Ida B. Wells via theguardian.com

In contrast to these women, the African Muslim women of the early to mid-19th century, from Egypt to Nigeria, were scholars, state-builders and educators of both men and women. Nana Asmau and Tut Bit al Tah are just two of hundreds of nearly forgotten Muslim scholars.

In her essay ‘Female Islamic Knowledge in Africa: A Forgotten Story’, Britta Frede says, "I have been able to identify fifteen female Islamic scholars writing in Mauritania since the eighteenth century. One of these scholars was Fātima Bint Muhammad Mahmūd Ibn 'Abd al-Fattāh al-Abyayriyya (d. before 1882, known as Tūt Bint al-Tāh). She was obviously an important Islamic scholar in the nineteenth-century Sufi community of Sheikh Sīdiyya. She was not only famous for her beautiful script, but, according to a local publication, ultimately authored around sixteen texts."

Aisha Balarabe Bawa states: 

"Nana Asmau was well known as an influential Islamic scholar. During the jihad, she was a teacher to both men and women. She acted as a role model and encouraged other women in the caliphate to pursue education and influence local communities.

Asmau’s main contribution was the formation of the Yan Taru organization in 1830, for the purpose of facilitating women's education. This organization consisted of a network of Muslim women who had been trained as teachers under Nana Asma’u and had worked with her to educate women and children in Islamic religious and literary education. These women and girls came from remote areas to attend her classes, and when they became well-educated, they returned to their towns to teach married women and those who were not able to attend the school. They were led by knowledgeable women called Jajis. The result of this massive women’s education campaign was the production of articulated scholarly women called, ‘the learned’. 

Prior to the formation of the Yan Taru, Asma’u began by teaching children and women of her household, then extended to her neighbourhood, and then to the community as a whole. Asma’u defined education as a women’s political space and used education as a tool for state-building.’ ‘Over fifty books were written by women, enough to demonstrate the existence of a group of highly intelligent, educated, articulated and determined women scholars.’ "

Contrast that with the fate of women after the British colonial conquest of the Sokoto Emirate 1903.

"...with the incorporation of Nigeria into the international economy as a supplier of raw materials, new patriarchal conceptions of the appropriate social role for women dictated by colonial administrators and missionaries changed the position of women socially, politically and economically. The introduction of western education also favoured only men. Schools were established to train men to serve as clerks, interpreters, etc, for the colonial administration. The schools that were established for the girls were geared towards making women good mothers, good housewives and epitomes of elegance and reticence."

The colonial conquest that swept across Africa and Asia—what the British termed ‘the Middle East’—all but erased and destroyed African and Asian Muslim female scholarship. The result of colonialism was generations of high illiteracy, loss of fundamental human rights, and ignorance of Islam and women's high status within it.

African and Asian women are slowly reclaiming what was once  taken from them, and as more understanding of the past comes to light, so does the realization that those pre-colonial societies had much more to offer them than previously believed. 

Malcolm X on a beach in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania (1964) via instagram

In his autobiography, Malcolm X states, “One thing that I became aware of in my travels recently through Africa and the Middle East, in every country that you go to, usually the degree of progress can never be separated from the woman.”

“If you are in a country that’s progressive, the woman is progressive. If you are in a country that reflects the consciousness toward the importance of education, it is because the woman is aware of the importance of education. 

But in every backward country you’ll find the women are backward, and in every country where education is not stressed it’s because the women don’t have education.”

Black feminism arose out of a need for Black female voices to advocate for themselves, because the status quo was either responding to Black men or White women in the fight for racial and sexual liberation. Although the roots of Black feminism in the United States can be traced to the mid-19th century, the Black feminist movement did not gain prominence until the 1970s. During the 1960s and ’70s—the period of the second wave of mainstream feminism—Black women were largely excluded from positions of leadership within women’s rights organizations, and their concerns tended to be marginalized.

“The most disrespected person in America is the Black woman. The most unprotected person in America is the Black woman. The most neglected person in America is the Black woman.”

—Malcolm X

Second wave Black feminism emerged in the mid 20th century with the advent of the civil rights movement. Institutional racism, sexism and classism became the next fight for African American women. For African women and African women of the diaspora,  the fight against colonialism and imperialism was also underway. Throughout the 1950s through to the late seventies, these two battlefronts were waged by our grandmothers and mothers. 

​Despite important strides made by women in general in the 20th century—such as gaining the right to vote, engage in civil discourse, greater employment opportunities, medical autonomy and access to higher educational institutions—African women still face an uphill battle when it comes to basic human rights. For many African women, racism is not something that exists in the distance. We encounter racism in everyday situations; in workplaces, stores, schools, housing, and daily social interaction. Overlaying these persisting inequalities is a rhetoric of color blindness designed to render these social inequalities invisible. In a context where many believe that to talk of race fosters racism, equality allegedly lies in treating everyone the same. 

Kimberlé Crenshaw via Columbia Law School

Yet as Kimberlé Crenshaw points out in "Color Blindness, History, and the Law", “It is fairly obvious that treating different things the same can generate as much inequality as treating the same things differently”. Being Black and female continues to expose African women to certain common experiences. Black women’s similar work and family experiences as well as our participation in diverse expressions of African culture mean that, overall, Black women as a group live in a different world from that of people who are not Black and female. 

The term 'intersectionality' was coined in 1989 by Crenshaw, who is an African American scholar and activist. She created this term to help describe how gender and race intersect and create barriers for Black women. Crenshaw explained that when a Black woman experiences discrimination, it is not due solely to racism or sexism, but rather a combination of both.

In the Quran and the sunnah (way) of the Prophet Muhammad ﷺ, there are warnings to men regarding their interactions with women, such as the ayah, “Treat them (women) fairly.” [Quran, 4:19] and the Prophet’s ﷺ words, “Accept my strong advice regarding women: be excellent to them” (Bukhari). 

Unfortunately, when a woman does not have the protection, respect and care of the men in her life, she has to create those conditions for herself or perish into obscurity, grief and despair. This often leads to an imbalance and corruption of her essence as a woman and human being. The 1970s marked an increase in explicitly Black feminist organizing, due in part to tensions inflamed during the Women’s Liberation and Civil Rights Movements. 

It was author and activist Alice Walker who coined the term 'womanist'. A womanist is a person who can love women sexually or non-sexually. Unlike feminism, the job of a womanist is to fight against both racism and sexism.

And thus we move into the 3rd and  4th wave Black feminism. By this time, queer Black feminists were becoming more openly and visibly positioned within Black feminist groups. They also began creating their own organizations—such as the Salsa Soul Sisters, one of the first out and explicitly multi-cultural lesbian organizations—due in part to tensions with straight Black feminists as well as White gays and lesbians. 

Alice Walker via Colorado State University

The influential Combahee River Collective's statement, which was co-authored by Barbara Smith, expressed a radical, queer Black feminist platform still relevant to expressions of Black feminism today. Dr. Treva Lindsey stated, “One truth, especially within the context of black feminisms, is that queer black feminism has always been part of this. That queer black women, queer black folks have always been in these spaces."

In the Quranic chapter named 'The Women', there is an ayah (verse) that proclaims, “Men are the protectors and maintainers of women…” [Quran, An-Nisa 4:34]. But when a woman feels the sting of injustices simply because of her sex, when the obligation of men to stand up for women is ignored,  an unhealthy and imbalanced society emerges. 

Recent data suggests Black women are imprisoned at rates 1.2 to 3 times higher than White women in the U.S. and Canada. Black women in the Americas bear a heavier burden of maternal mortality than their peers, but according to a report by the United Nations, the gap between who lives and who dies is especially wide in the world’s richest nation—the United States.

The Black woman is a litmus test for the health of a nation, when she is protected, honoured and treated with fairness, that nation is one in which all people are protected. A man who lives up to being called a man will not feel threatened in his rights and instead become the best version of himself, the vicegerent of his flock. The woman, on the other hand, finds confidence in her humanity, intellect and value. Her natural disposition of compassion is celebrated rather than derided and her contributions to her societies and communities are acknowledged. 

"And among His signs is this: That He created mates for you from yourselves that you may find rest, peace of mind in them, and He ordained between you love and mercy. Lo, herein indeed are signs for people who reflect."

--Qur'an 30:2 1