Last week, I was watching a sex scene involving
three nude men in the film Short Bus and said to my friend,
who is white, "Wow, white folks have called us colored but they have a
variety of skin tones as well."
He nodded, and said "Yes, you do have a point" and we continued
to watch the film. Of course there are different skin hues and tones
amongst white folks, but it is the kind of the thing that is really
apparent when watching folks, nude, on a screen.
I struggle with the notion of being inclusive. As you may have noticed, I don't
use the term woman of color on my blog, at least not on a regular
basis. I usually write Black, Latina and Asian.
Back in January, Latoya put me on to a thread on My Ecdysis
about women of color and radical women of color on the internet.
So, today, I was on on The My Ecdysis blog, as I am starting a site
about Black feminism, so I was looking for the names of folks who
may be interested in contributing. I noticed that Nadia responded
to a comment that I wrote, (where I mentioned the phrase, Black
Asian and Latina women). Her comment, in part, was that using
Black, Asian and Latina, erases Arab and Native Women.
She is right.
But I was also like, this is getting to be a little much. Then I was like, damn,
I might have to use women of color, or perhaps even non-white
women, in order to talk about Black, Asian, Latina, Native and Arab
women.
It was then that I saw the usefulness of the term Woman of Color.
The jury is out.
I am thinking about what it means to be inclusive.
I am thinking about the ways in which our language not only reflects but
also shapes our reality and the futures that we envision.
