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Grace DePaull
Dr. Malatino
Intersectional Lit Analysis
February 12, 2019
Zami​ from the Black Feminist Critique
Amidst the invisibility of Black lesbian writers in the literary world, Barbara Smith

proposes the necessity to create a Black feminist critic that can dutifully embody her own

self-identity and approach and critique literature that personifies the inequalities that mirror her

life. At the forefront of Black women’s literature exists the shared experiences of Black women

and Black lesbians whose construction of self-identity is influenced by the patriarchal,

heteronormative, and white society that is a prevalent threat to the visibility of such personas.

This particular society is empirical evidence of systematic oppression that demands Black

women to recede into the shadows of non-existence to the public sphere. Black lesbians share the

common struggle of navigating the intersectionality of gender, race, and sexuality, and the

literature that is produced by Black lesbians is a direct translation of the effects of such

oppressive institutions. According to Smith, Black women’s writing is comprised of the

juxtaposition of racial and sexual politics and the Black and female identity, and only does a

Black feminist herself have the capability to analyze the literature at hand in a way that does not

demolish the works in the process. Rather, she will create an environment for Black lesbian

writers to survive in, as well as conjure a similar audience from the depths of social, political,

and economic invisibility. Smith justifies her advocacy for the necessity of a Black feminist

critic by stating that Black women manifest the same approaches in literature because of the

“...direct result of the specific political, social and economic experience they have been obliged
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to share” (Smith 22). Therefore in accordance to Smith’s proposition, the necessary existence of

the Black feminist critique will allow for the ignition of the longstanding inability for the Black

lesbian identity to be visible and such literature to be consumed. Smith further enforces this

belief through the idea that what defines the essence of Black women’s writing is the inextricable

elements of sexual and racial politics and Black and female identity.

As expressed by Smith’s Black feminist perspective, “Black, lesbian, mother, warrior,

poet,”Audre Lorde, composes her biomythography, ​Zami: A New Spelling of My Name​, to reflect

the cohesion of sexual and racial politics and Black and female identity, aligning the two forces

poetically with the very characteristics of what propels Black women’s writing. In chapter

twenty-three of ​Zami, ​Lorde writes:

“I remember how being young and Black and gay and lonely felt. A lot of it was

fine, feeling I had the truth and the light and the key, but a lot of it was purely

hell… During the fifties in the Village, I didn’t know the few other Black women

who were visibly gay at all well… We recognized ourselves as exotic

sister-outsiders who might gain little from banding together. Perhaps our strength

might lay in our fewness, our rarity” (Lorde 176-177).

Nearing the end of her novel, Lorde pens this particular reflection as a way of thinking critically

of her identity and how it has been construed as an effect of the racial and sexual politics she has

endured. Lorde addresses the varying political spheres in the United States in the 1950s as a

determinant of how her own self-identity was created, alongside the identities of other Black

lesbians with whom she interacts with, whether intimately, as companions, or just from the
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in-passing, sideways glances that indicate a sameness amongst themselves. Her reflection

transpires from her excursions to the various lesbian bars of New York City. While observing the

politics of race and sexuality in play at various lesbian scenes, from the outskirts, Lorde realizes

that the ways in which she identifies herself have fabricated from the external forces of society’s

reaction to not only her sexuality but also her race. Being a Black lesbian, Lorde must navigate

the multiple components of intersectionality which dictates the perception of her own belonging

in society. Lorde recognizes how the varying oppressive institutions in the United States has

impacted her in more than one area of her identity. Not only does Lorde express the

complications of being attracted to the same sex in an oppressive, heteronormative society, but

she is also ostracized from the lesbian community under the regard that she is Black. Falling into

the minuscule community of Black lesbians, Lorde’s identity is weighed and sculpted under the

pressure of how her race and sexuality are regarded. Lorde considers Black lesbians as the

“exotic sister-outsiders” and under this inference, she finds that the suppression and

disenfranchisement of Black lesbians through society’s dismantling of their agency is an

occurrence in nearly all political, social, and economic situations. Referring back to Smith’s

demonstration of the duality of racial and sexual politics and the Black and female identities,

Audre Lorde’s reflective moment on Black lesbian identity in the United States in the 1950s

mirrors the recurring elements seen in Black women’s literature. Black female identities are

fabricated and limited by the experiences of alienation in society and such characteristics submit

these individuals to inevitable documentation of these impactful experiences through literature.

Zami​ is the culmination of the perfectly placed pieces of Audre Lorde’s identity as a

Black lesbian writer, as she gathers remnants of the influential women from which her existence
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has become a conglomerate of. With each chapter and each introduction of a female figure in

Lorde’s life, racial and sexual politics are demanding factors in how her identity is crafted. These

elements are prominent within Black women’s literary work as they are woven so intricately

together that one cannot supply the reader with full knowledge of a Black lesbian’s essential

being without the other. Unfortunately, in a society that makes the conscious effort to deny the

natural rights to groups of minorities, the construction of identity becomes a reflection of one’s

self through the lens of another.

Zami, a Carriacou name for women who work together as friends and lovers, as it is,

represents the identity of women who participate in intimate experiences and relationships as

they endure the same challenges, oppressiveness, and discoveries of their own self-identities. As

Smith concludes, the Black feminist critical perspective must highlight the intricacies regarding

racial and sexual politics from the point of view of the Black woman because “The near

non-existence of Black lesbian literature… has everything to do with the politics of our lives,

[and] the total suppression of identity that all Black women, lesbian or not must face” (Smith

25). ​Zami​ by Audre Lorde represents the creation of a Black lesbian, whose identity resides in

the personal encounters of various women as she navigates the racial tensions that are woven

into instances that address her sexual identity. These struggles craft Lorde’s individuality as she

discovers the world’s resistance to the Black woman’s mere existence.

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Works Cited

Lorde, Audre. ​Zami: A New Spelling of My Name​. Crossing Press, 1982.

Smith, Barbara. “Toward A Black Feminist Criticism.” ​The Radical Teacher, ​No. 7, pp. 20-27.

University of Illinois Press, 1978.