Building Equity-Based Summers (BEBS) Podcast
In this monthly podcast we talk about topics that help library staff and communities build services that are equitable. Learn more about the project on our site: https://equitybasedsummers.org
Building Equity-Based Summers (BEBS) Podcast
Episode #13: Intersectionality Requires a Lot of People and Organizations
In our second episode on intersectionality, we discuss Jane Koston's article, "Intersectionality Wars" and consider Kimberlé Crenshaw's suggestion that intersectionality can be a tool for advocacy.
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Building Equity-Based Summers is funded in part through the Institute of Museum and Library Services..
Hi again everyone. This is Linda Braun, one of the co-hosts of the Building Equity-Based Summers BEBS podcast and one of the team working on the BEBS project. I'm here for episode 13 with Lakeisha Kimbrough, my colleague and co-host and co-facilitator in All Things BEBS. We're continuing the conversation with Kim and Ivan that we started last month about intersectionality. We jump right in with Lakeisha talking about the intersectionality wars the intersectionality wars.
Speaker 2:Jane Poston, I think is how you pronounce her last name wrote an article called the Intersectionality Wars and I'm not sure of Jane's pronouns so I may misgender, but she in that article talked with kimberly crenshaw about intersectionality and this was kind of at the height of politically you know, folks like pushing back on on it um, and crenshaw said in that article that the purpose of intersectionality understanding it is to create space for more advocacy.
Speaker 2:So if we understand intersectionality, that part of the purpose for doing so is to create space for more advocacy. And then the author, jane, says that intersectionality is intended to ask a lot of individuals and of movements. And I'm curious, linda ivan kim, when you hear that, when you hear um intersectionality as a way to create space for advocacy and that it's intended to ask a lot of us as individuals and movements, how might we think about that in terms of libraries really supporting and programming, leaning, leaning into that with communities, sharing power with communities, and maybe does that offer space to not feel the overwhelm that we've talked about, because it's not all on me. I don't have to understand everybody's lived experiences. I can lean into the power that is the intersectionality of my team in my library of the folks in my community. So I'm going to shush because you probably forgot what I asked and said now. But yeah, curious, linda Ivan Kim thoughts on that.
Speaker 3:Can you repeat the question?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I love it.
Speaker 2:So I was just thinking about Kimberly Crenshaw saying that intersectionality understanding it is creating space for advocacy, creating space for advocacy, and then thinking about Jane Koston saying that intersectionality is intended to ask a lot of individuals and movements.
Speaker 2:And if we think about and hold in part that intersectionality can create space for advocacy and that it is simultaneously asking a lot or potentially asks a lot of us, and that may that a lot may look different for different people, different teams, right, how might we use those understandings if we subscribe to that, even for just a moment, to support perhaps our library staff who are programming, who are with community in doing those things and leaning into, oh, then I can really honor perhaps the wholeness of myself, the wholeness of my team, the wholeness of my community, because now the onus isn't just on me, right, like I get to say, oh, I don't have that lived experience. There might be someone on my team or in my community who's willing to share that lived experience to help us develop this more. I'm also curious from leader like a leadership space, does that maybe open up opportunity for library leaders to then support the innate power and then do that in community?
Speaker 1:I love that idea Intersectionality as a form of advocacy and I think I understand it, particularly as you talked through it a little bit, lakeisha. I have to think about it some more.
Speaker 2:I'm still sitting with that, linda, so I don't really know, which is part of why I'm bringing it to you all, yeah.
Speaker 1:I think it's really interesting. So is that? So I just have questions. I don't have answers. I think, hearing that phrase, if we were to say that to library staff, they'd be like, just like right, we're trying to figure it out and we have the pleasure and privilege of being in relationships with each other so we can ask these questions. So I'm just I'm wondering so does that mean that acknowledging, taking on I don't know what the right words are intersectionality of yourself and of others, like you were talking about your team, right? So if you understand the intersectionality of team members, you're able to advocate for what they can do and to help them do that better is that it, or is it something that I'm not?
Speaker 1:or is it that you, if you understand people or could be, that's not necessarily an or it's an and and if you understand people's intersections, you can speak with and about I hate that, for like, not about them but you can think about who they are in different ways and advocate for them.
Speaker 2:I don't know, I'm very like up in the air here yeah, I wonder if it's some of both of those things, linda and I also, as you were talking, I'm wondering because, again, I don't know, I'm just like, oh, I have to sit with that, like what does that mean? Where is that landing? What do I think about that? And I'm loving being able to explore that with the three of you all as a general concept. But then maybe how it does relate to the library field, right, and the work that libraries are doing to be more equitable in programming. But it does make me wonder, linda, what you were sharing.
Speaker 2:If thinking about intersectionality as creating space for advocacy, I wonder if it can also mean, if I remember, that people aren't coming back to something we talked about. I think, linda, you said, like we put people in these boxes, right. That maybe if we stop compartmentalizing people in our minds and allow for the remembrance that people bring very messy lived experiences, very beautiful lived experiences, and those experiences are very different based on the intersections of who they are, based on what their childhood socioeconomic status was, if it's different than what it is now. But how did that impact how they show up now? How does their racialized identity impact their relationship to finances, to their relationship to finances, to their relationship to place, to their relationship with food security, to like all these things, if I can remember and even remember and hold that. You know, as a Black woman who has a bunch of other identities, other Black women who share similar identities didn't have the same experiences I've had, so we're going to see things differently. So there's no such thing as a monolith anywhere.
Speaker 2:So I'm wondering if it can also mean intersectionality, as advocacy means that I, and that intersectionality asks a lot of us. It asks me to remember and hold that and then in doing that maybe I'm working better to hold my humanity and the humanity of others. Like, if I can do that, then I could really advocate for equitable practices in the community. I can really support the creation of brave space for people to do those things. I don't know, ivan Kim thoughts. Linda, you have thoughts too.
Speaker 1:I don't know One thing I'm going to add and then Kim go is because you and I have recently talked. Lakeisha and we've talked about this more than once is like in the educational system in the United States, we are not taught to make connections between things that happen, yeah, and so, as you were just talking, I was thinking about that and I was thinking what are the connections or intersections, also in terms of the world we live in, that got us to where we are today, and then we advocate for a better experience, right? So if we can understand what the intersections are and the connections in history, we can then advocate for a better world. I'm repeating, kim go.
Speaker 4:So, so, okay, so we talked, we talked a little bit the glitch in the matrix, we talked a little bit about something, lakeisha, you mentioned, that Linda had mentioned, about putting people in boxes. And I think what's happening sometimes when we're we're putting people in boxes is we're stereotyping, right, it's just, it's just the word. We have looked at someone we have, we have, we have come to a conclusion and and we are, you know, sort of pushing stereotyping onto people, right, so what? I what? I wonder what I'm thinking with the idea that internationality can be used as a tool for advocacy. I wonder if folks, folks, really understand the fact that that intersectionality is something that affects every single one of us, right, yeah, I wonder if that acceptance right, sort of once we've done the mental work of what that means, because maybe someone might think like I don't sit in any intersections, I'm, I'm just some white guy, right, or something like that. Right, just sort of the picture that you have in your mind of someone who is just a singular thing. Once someone sits with the fact that you know they might have a chronic pain, but they don't think about that as like a disability because you know they, they don't, whatever, right, like they're. They're not using a mobility aid or something like that.
Speaker 4:Um, I wonder if sort of once, once we all have sort of sat down and done the work on our own intersections and the fact that everyone has them, if that could be a tool to help dismantle and break down this constant stereotyping, which ties very close into the biases that come. Once we have made those stereotypes right, once we realize that all Latinx people aren't the same, right, all Black people aren't the same. Everyone has other experiences that have turned them into who they are right, whether they grew up in a city, whether they grew up in a really rural area, whether they did have some sort of chronic pain or some sort of medical issue. Or you know family members who were incarcerated. Then you find out they were wrongly incarcerated 10 years later. Right, like, once we really sit, really get there, right, once we really really get there and understand that intersections are what make people who they are. Those experiences are what really make people who they are. Therefore, you're not going to find two people who are the same. Two people might have lived in the same household and come out very, very different people.
Speaker 4:I wonder if that could be a step in breaking down some of these stereotypes, breaking down some of these biases and then building true and authentic relationships. Right, not the. There's a lot of relationships that can be built there's. There's a lot of good and a lot of work that can be done, and I, and sometimes that that that's fighting right against some of these, these, we, we know, I think, as a, as a people, as a country, I, I like to hope that we really, we really have realized and accepted that implicit bias is a thing Like I, I I feel that right, like holistically, not sort of the the random folks who were like no, um, that we've accepted that our mind moves too fast for us to keep up and our mind is making decisions that we, we as people, might not agree with.
Speaker 4:Um, and I think, and I wonder if sort of the idea of the deep dive into that intersectionality of people, of humans, of experiences, I wonder if that might be a next step right, once we we've accepted this right and you said as implicit this bias, and I wonder if that is the next step on our road to understanding, acceptance relationships.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's beautiful, kim, it's really beautiful, and I love just kind of how we're thinking about and questioning and wondering and being curious around. What could intersectionality as advocacy mean? And it can mean a lot of things, right, like we're not here to say it only means one thing I don't know what Kimberly Crenshaw thought about when she said that she has her own, like take on that right. And so there are many things that can mean. And, yeah, just thinking about the beauty and, kim, as you were sharing, I was thinking, ooh, that's part of the lot that it asks us.
Speaker 2:Because it does ask us, then, if we're thinking about it that way, to pause and to slow down and to unlearn some things and to relearn some things and to actually pause and remember things that we just intrinsically know as humans, that have been tried, that have tried to be smushed out of us because of systems of oppression and the way they operate, and that can be scary of oppression in the way they operate, and that can be scary because we don't know what's going to come next. Right, what happens? When I learn this about myself, I'm kind of exposed. Even if I haven't told anybody I'm on this learning journey, I may feel exposed. Somebody's going to know, y'all are going to see that I'm doing this thing. Yeah, oh, oh. That's just beautiful, ivan. I'm curious if you have thoughts kind of sort of so like.
Speaker 3:For me, I think intersectionality in terms of advocacy right I don't know if this ties to, because my brain went to a lot of different places, um, but I'm not sure if this exactly ties into it, but it reminds me very much in terms of like. Intersectionality is also a way to see how we're all interconnected. It's not just about division. That's beautiful, because it reminds me of this human factors concept of universal design, and if you're not universal design, it just means design for the person most in need and everyone else's needs are automatically met absolutely and like walking in the library, right.
Speaker 3:One of the things that I constantly try to push for is dyslexic, friendly font. If we can make that the shelf and label thing, everyone can read it, there's no way you can debate that. It doesn't right. The only way you can mess that up is if you put black font on black background color. Right, that's the only way. So, in thinking about that, when I take that into account, the human factors, universal design concept, it's like, well, no, that's intersectionality, because someone somewhere found out that, oh, we all have the shared experience of vision. If you can see, then, the people that have the least ability to see, and without being completely blind, this is something we can design for and help everyone, not just this one specific case of a thing. Yeah, that's kind of where my brain went. Um, that's all I have, lakeisha no-transcript.
Speaker 1:Which I always think are weird, and I think what we should be doing in those is actually an intersectionality finder, right, and so for leadership or whatever don't learn about I don't even even know what those what's on those things but don't learn about some abstract leadership thing.
Speaker 1:No, no, I'm good talking to people and instead find out about you and your own intersections and then bring those to a group, right. So you whether it's a leadership training or something else start with you, which we always say, and then seriously look at how you intersect with other people, right, and how that brings you together and how that supports bringing whatever together. And I keep thinking about what if we did that, what if that took over leadership training, because we always hear about leadership training is that you don't really get the power you need in a lot of instances. And even, kim, you mentioned the leading from wherever you are, whatever that phrase is, leading from the middle or something like that. I think that if we actually started talking in library schools and in leadership training that maybe, if we started with people's intersections and how they intersect with their communities and the others they're working with, that might actually I'm loving how this wondering and just being curious has brought all of these things forward.
Speaker 2:It's so beautiful.
Speaker 4:I find exercises like these really interesting, um, because I think, as we know, with regards to intersectionality and beyond, multiple things can be true at the same time and I, as someone who sits, you know, at many intersections, you know as a racialized Black person, as a woman, right, as someone who sort of sits in other spaces, sometimes it can be so exhausting to just like wake up, to just wake up and know that you have to walk out into the world and that sometimes the most basic things can be made really difficult. And I think what can happen, especially when you also sit in spaces like this where you know you do library work and you're a part of these programs and they, they talk and evaluate equity often and sort of what can be done and are there any tools or toys it can be so hard to to sit with, like the questions and the uncertainties because, again, sometimes just like the most basic thing can be so hard and you just like want someone to help something, help make something happen so that tomorrow's a little bit easier. Or you, you can, you can wake up with the assumption that tomorrow might be a little easier, you might stump your toes and usually wake up. So, who knows Right, um it and uh. Going through exercises like this kind of just this conversation, as well as the the like community of practice and other conversations that we do, um, I think really create an appreciation for the fact that sometimes you do have to slow down, um and evaluate and sit and think, um, and it can be hard, right, because we have to remember that when we talk about people at these intersections, we talk about people with disabilities or people who are in food deserts or people who are experiencing homelessness. Those are real people with real big, big problems that are going to happen tonight at dinnertime or tonight when it's time to go to bed and right, like they're just like real and big, and I think that can make us want to like rush and do the thing. And that's when you do, you're like, well, maybe I can do this program or maybe I can get this flyer, Maybe I can call this social worker to come in and do this. I get it. I can't be mad because, like, I have been on the receiving end as the person who needs something to happen, please.
Speaker 4:And I think, at the same time, I think something that we've talked about is, sometimes you have to sit and think through some of this stuff and sometimes we have to slow down so that we can hopefully speed up and continue the progress, and it's definitely one of those two things existing simultaneously. And sometimes I forget about the slow part. Sometimes I do, especially if it's just been like a bad day or like something really wild has happened. I forget about the slow part, like let's, let's, let's, let's, let's, let's, right, um. So I think I really appreciate um the reminder that sometimes, just by asking questions and thinking, movement is happening and momentum is happening. Um, it's not, it's not just like stagnant, right, just because we're not like, let's say, doing um, so I truly appreciate that and that's, that's a like, a big thank you for the reminder. And and right, two things are happening at once.
Speaker 1:It's, it's a yes and not a no, but yeah, and thinking of the questions is also moving forward, not even asking them right. So like, yeah, just hit me. As you just said that it was like oh, oh, I'm coming up with questions as a step.
Speaker 2:And the power and stasis, because sometimes that means we have to deal right and that there's actually growth happening there, even if it doesn't look like it or feel like it. And, kim, thank you for kind of that reminder that folks who are that, the things that we are experiencing there are real people living these experiences. And so it just brought me back to intersectionality as advocacy and that it asks a lot of us, because it does. As I'm continuing, I will be pondering this all day because it's going to be sitting with me and like moving through um is how, then? Or the need then to slow down so that we are ensuring that in our work, the people who are impacted by the very things that we're trying to shift and change and make better are actually giving voice to. You know what?
Speaker 2:That was really great that you thought of that program, but it really this is the reason that it didn't work for me or other folks that I know right. And then how do we let go of ego so we don't take that personally, so that we can see, oh, you know what? Because I haven't had that lived experience, or my lived experience included some of those things, but I had a very different result. Maybe that person has less community around them that's able to support than I had, even though I had a similar experience.
Speaker 1:Thanks again for another great conversation, lakeisha, kim and Ivan, and to all of our listeners thinking about intersectionality and the experiences we all have and the ways in which we can recognize intersections that people bring, to the practices that we are building, to the work we are doing, to the ways that intersections happen internally in libraries and externally in communities, the more able we are to build equitable services. So thanks for listening everyone. Thank you, lakeisha, ivan and Kim, and we will see you next month.
