Difference between revisions of "Identity politics" - New World Encyclopedia

From New World Encyclopedia
 
(179 intermediate revisions by 3 users not shown)
Line 1: Line 1:
−
'''Identity politics''' refers to a belief that [[Social constructionism|socially constructed]] identities, especially in minority communties, are the basis for creating group solidarity and political action. It is especially applied by groups that identity as racial and gender minorities, but also includes immigrant status, [[social class]], or other identifying factors. Identity politics is an attempt to develop political agendas that are based upon these identities. The term is used in a variety of ways to describe phenomena as diverse as [[multiculturalism]], [[women's movements]], [[civil rights]], [[LGBT movements|lesbian and gay movements]], and regional [[separatist movements]].
+
{{Images OK}}{{Submitted}}{{Approved}}{{Copyedited}}
 +
[[File:Barbara Smith at NWSA 2017 (cropped).jpg|thumb|300px|Barbara Smith, a founding member of the Combahee River Collective, the first scholar to coin the term "identity politics"]]
 +
'''Identity politics''' refers to the idea that [[Social constructionism|socially constructed]] identities, especially in minority communities, are the basis for creating group solidarity and political action. It is especially applied to political action by groups that identify as racial and gender minorities, but also includes immigrant status, [[social class]], or other identifying factors. Identity politics is an attempt to develop political agendas that are based upon these identities. The term is used in a variety of ways to describe phenomena as diverse as [[multiculturalism]], [[women's movements]], [[civil rights]], [[LGBT movements|lesbian and gay movements]], and regional [[separatist movements]].
  
−
Many contemporary advocates of identity politics take an [[Intersectionality|intersectional perspective]], which accounts for the range of interacting systems of oppression that may affect their lives and come from their various identities. According to many who describe themselves as advocates of identity politics, it centers the lived experiences of those facing systemic oppression. Systemic oppression is the view that the problems minorities face are not understandable as simply racism, or sexism, but rather the belief that society is organized to serve the interests of the majority at the expense of minorities.  
+
Many contemporary advocates of identity politics take an [[Intersectionality|intersectional perspective]], which accounts for the range of interacting systems of oppression that may affect their lives and come from their various identities. According to many who describe themselves as advocates of identity politics, it centers the lived experiences of those facing what they term "systemic oppression." Systemic oppression is the view that the problems minorities face are not understandable as simply racism, or sexism, but rather the belief that society is organized to serve the interests of the majority at the expense of minorities.  
  
−
Identity politics typically is used to describe the efforts to create community and struggle against majority groups by people of specific race, ethnicity, sex, [[gender identity]], [[sexual orientation]], age, economic class, disability status, education, religion, language, profession, political party, veteran status, and geographic location. These identity labels are not mutually exclusive but are in many cases compounded into one when describing hyper-specific groups. An example is that of [[African-American]], [[homosexual]], [[women]], who constitute a particular hyper-specific identity class.<ref>{{Cite journal|url=https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/15295030903015062|doi=10.1080/15295030903015062|title="Queer Nation is Dead/Long Live Queer Nation": The Politics and Poetics of Social Movement and Media Representation|year=2009|last1=Gray|first1=Mary L.|journal=Critical Studies in Media Communication|volume=26|issue=3|pages=212–236|s2cid=143122754}}</ref> Those who take an intersectional perspective, such as [[Kimberlé Crenshaw]], criticise narrower forms of identity politics which over-emphasise inter-group differences and ignore intra-group differences and forms of oppression.
+
Identity politics typically is used to describe the efforts to create community and struggle against majority groups by people of specific race, ethnicity, sex, [[gender identity]], [[sexual orientation]], age, economic class, disability status, education, religion, language, profession, political party, veteran status, and geographic location. These identity labels are not mutually exclusive but are in many cases compounded when describing hyper-specific groups.  
 +
{{toc}}
 +
Identity politics has critics from both liberal and Marxist perspectives. Liberals see it as [[Political particularism|particularist]], in contrast to the [[universalism]] of [[Liberalism|liberal]] perspectives. Marxists argue that it detracts attention from non-identity based structures of oppression and exploitation. Those who take an intersectional perspective, such as [[Kimberlé Crenshaw]], criticize narrower forms of identity politics which over-emphasize inter-group differences and ignore intra-group differences and forms of oppression.
  
−
Critics of identity politics have seen it as [[Political particularism|particularist]], in contrast to the [[universalism]] of [[Liberalism|liberal]] perspectives, or argue that it detracts attention from non-identity based structures of oppression and exploitation. A leftist critique of identity politics, such as that of Nancy Fraser,<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Fraser|first=Nancy|title=From Redistribution to Recognition? Dilemmas of Justice in a ‘Post-Socialist’ Age|url=https://www.academia.edu/8569335/From_Redistribution_to_Recognition_Dilemmas_of_Justice_in_a_Post_Socialist_Age|journal=}}</ref> points out that political mobilization based on identitarian affirmation leads to surface redistribution that does not challenge the status quo. Instead, Fraser argued, identitarian deconstruction, rather than affirmation, is more conducive to a leftist politics of economic redistribution. Other critiques, such as that of Kurzwelly, Rapport and Spiegel,<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Kurzwelly|first=Jonatan|last2=Rapport|first2=Nigel|last3=Spiegel|first3=Andrew|date=2020|title=Encountering, explaining and refuting essentialism|url=https://www.researchgate.net/publication/343029871_Encountering_explaining_and_refuting_essentialism|journal=Anthropology Southern Africa|volume=43(2)|pages=65–81}}</ref> point out that identity politics often leads to reproduction and [[Reification (fallacy)|reification]] of [[Essentialism|essentialist]] notions of identity, notions which are inherently erroneous.
+
== Terminology ==
 +
The term ''identity politics'' may have been used in political discourse since at least the 1970s.<ref>Howard J. Wiarda, ''Political Culture, Political Science, and Identity Politics: An Uneasy Alliance'' (Abingdon-on-Thames, UK: Routledge, 2014, ISBN 978-1472442284). "There are disputes regarding the origins of the term 'identity politics' .... Almost all authors, even while disagreeing over who was the first to use the term, agree that its original usage goes back to the 1970s and even the 1960s."</ref>  
  
−
== Terminology ==
+
During the late 1970s, increasing numbers of women—namely Jewish women, women of color, and lesbians—criticized the assumption of a common "woman's experience" irrespective of unique differences in race, ethnicity, class, sexuality, and culture.<ref>Martha A. Ackelsberg, "Identity Politics, Political Identities: Thoughts toward a Multicultural Politics," ''Frontiers: A Journal of Women Studies'' 16(1), 1996, 87–100.</ref> The first known written appearance of the term is found in the April 1977 statement of the [[Black feminist]] [[Socialism|socialist]] group, [[Combahee River Collective]].<ref>Zillah R. Eisenstein (ed.), ''Capitalist Patriarchy and the Case for Socialist Feminism'' (New York, NY: Monthly Review Press, 1979, ISBN 0853454760).</ref> edited by Barbara Smith, a founding member of the Collective, credited with coining the term.<ref>Barbara Smith (ed.), ''Home Girls: A Black Feminist Anthology'' (New York, NY: Kitchen Table: Women of Color Press, 1983, ISBN 0913175021), xxxi-xxxii.</ref> The collective group of women saw identity politics as an analysis that introduced opportunity for Black women to be actively involved in politics, while simultaneously acting as a tool to authenticate Black women's personal experiences.<ref>Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor, ''How we Get Free: Black feminism and the Combahee River Collective'' (Chicago, IL: Haymarket Books, 2017, ISBN 978-1642591040).</ref> It took on widespread usage in the early 1980s. It has gained currency with the emergence of social justice activism.
−
During the late 1970s, increasing numbers of women—namely Jewish women, women of color, and lesbians—criticized the assumption of a common "woman's experience" irrespective of unique differences in race, ethnicity, class, sexuality, and culture.<ref>>Martha A. Ackelsberg, [https://www.jstor.org/stable/3346926 "Identity Politics, Political Identities: Thoughts toward a Multicultural Politics,"] ''Frontiers: A Journal of Women Studies'' 16(1), 1996, 87–100.</ref> The term "identity politics" was coined by the [[Combahee River Collective]] in 1977.<ref>Barbara Smith, ed., ''Home Girls: A Black Feminist Anthology'' (New York, NY: Kitchen Table: Women of Color Press, 1983, ISBN 0913175021), xxxi-xxxii.</ref> The collective group of women saw identity politics as an analysis that introduced opportunity for Black women to be actively involved in politics, while simultaneously acting as a tool to authenticate Black women's personal experiences.<ref>Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor, ''How we get free : Black feminism and the Combahee River Collective'' (Chicago, Il: Haymarket Books, 2017, ISBN 978-1608468553).</ref> It took on widespread usage in the early 1980s. It has gained currency with the emergence of social justice activism.
 
  
−
In academic usage, the term ''identity politics'' refers to a wide range of political activities and theoretical analyses based on the subjective experience of injustice shared by different, marginalized social groups. In this context, identity politics aims to both create solidarity around these socially constructed identities and to create greater self-determination and political freedom for marginalized peoples through understanding particular [[paradigm]]s and lifestyle factors, and challenging the socially constructed characterizations and limitations, instead of organizing solely around ''[[status quo]]'' belief systems or traditional party affiliations.<ref name="Stanford"/> ''Identity'' is used "as a tool to frame political claims, promote political ideologies, or stimulate and orient social and political action, usually in a larger context of inequality or injustice and with the aim of asserting group distinctiveness and belonging and gaining power and recognition."<ref>Vasiliki Neofotistos, [http://www.oxfordbibliographies.com/view/document/obo-9780199766567/obo-9780199766567-0106.xml "Identity Politics,"] ''Oxford Bibliographies'', Oxford University Press, 2013. Retrieved February 22, 2022.</ref>
+
In academic usage, the term ''identity politics'' refers to a wide range of political activities and theoretical analyses based on the subjective experience of injustice shared by different, marginalized social groups. In this context, identity politics aims to both create solidarity around these socially constructed identities and to create greater self-determination and political freedom for marginalized peoples through understanding particular [[paradigm]]s and lifestyle factors. It seeks to challenge the socially constructed characterizations and limitations, instead of organizing solely around ''[[status quo]]'' belief systems or traditional party affiliations.<ref>[http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/identity-politics/ "Identity politics"], ''Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy'', July 11, 2020. Retrieved March 28, 2022.</ref> ''Identity'' is used "as a tool to frame political claims, promote political ideologies, or stimulate and orient social and political action, usually in a larger context of inequality or injustice and with the aim of asserting group distinctiveness and belonging and gaining power and recognition."<ref>Vasiliki Neofotistos, [http://www.oxfordbibliographies.com/view/document/obo-9780199766567/obo-9780199766567-0106.xml "Identity Politics,"] ''Oxford Bibliographies'', Oxford University Press, 2013. Retrieved February 22, 2022.</ref>
  
 
== History ==
 
== History ==
−
 
+
=== 1960s Liberalism ===
−
The term ''identity politics'' may have been used in political discourse since at least the 1970s.<ref>Howard J. Wiarda, ''Political Culture, Political Science, and Identity Politics: An Uneasy Alliance'' (Abingdon-on-Thames, UK: Routledge, 2016 (2014), ISBN 978-1317078852) "There are disputes regarding the origins of the term 'identity politics' .... Almost all authors, even while disagreeing over who was the first to use the term, agree that its original usage goes back to the 1970s and even the 1960s."</ref> The first known written appearance of the term is found in the April 1977 statement of the [[Black feminist]] [[Socialism|socialist]] group, [[Combahee River Collective]].<ref>Zillah R. Eisenstein, [https://www.google.com/books/edition/Capitalist_Patriarchy_and_the_Case_for_S/4SqXDwAAQBAJ Capitalist Pat Zillah R. Eisenstein Patriarchy and the Case for Socialist Feminism]'', ed.  (New York, NY: Monthly Review Press, 1979)</ref> who have been credited with coining the term.
+
==== Civil Rights Era ====
−
 
+
Liberalism implicitly accepted that the statement in the [[Declaration of Independence]] that "all men are created equal" could serve as the basis for creating a more inclusive, just society. Based on these ideas liberals had fought to correct what they saw as flaws in the political society that led to discrimination against women, people of color and homosexuals. The [[African-American Civil Right Movement (1955-1968)|civil rights movement]] conducted campaigns like the [[Rosa Parks|Montgomery bus boycott]], the [[Birmingham campaign]], and numerous others to force desegregation and create economic opportunity for blacks. President  [[John F. Kennedy]] spoke of creating an "equal chance" for all Americans.<ref>Amy Chua, ''Political Tribes: Group Instinct and the Fate of Nations'' (New York, NY: Penguin Press, 2019, ISBN 978-0399562877), 178.</ref>These efforts would lead to passage of the [[Civil Rights Act of 1964]] which would outlaw discrimination based on race, color, religion, sex, and national origin. Sexual orientation and gender identity would be added later. The next year the [[Voter Rights Act of 1965]] was passed, prohibiting states from passing laws and creating rules that would unfairly hinder minority voters from casting their votes. In 1964, President [[Lyndon Baines Johnson]] and Congress passes the [[Great Society]] legislation as part of his war on poverty. These were all part of the liberal efforts to promote equal opportunity for all Americans.
−
 
 
  
 
====Gay rights movement====
 
====Gay rights movement====
−
In 1969 a riot broke out at the Stonewall Inn of the Greenwich Village area of Manhattan in New York City. This is largely considered the initiation of the gay liberation movement. Gay liberation built on the feminist notion that the personal is the political. Annual marches to commemorate the anniversary of Stonewall would later become the Gay Pride parade. While there were always different groups within different interests within the movement, as with the feminist movement, much of the focus was on equal rights, cultural acceptance, and removing barriers to employment.
+
In 1969 a [[riot]] broke out at the Stonewall Inn of the Greenwich Village area of Manhattan in New York City. This is largely considered the initiation of the [[gay rights movement|gay liberation movement]]. Gay liberation built on the feminist notion that the personal is the political. Annual marches to commemorate the anniversary of Stonewall would later become the Gay Pride parade. While there were always different groups within different interests within the movement, as with the feminist movement, much of the focus was on equal rights, cultural acceptance, and removing barriers to employment.
−
 
 
−
The [[gay liberation]] movement of the late 1960s through the mid-1980s urged [[lesbian]]s and [[gay men]] to engage in radical [[direct action]], and to counter societal shame with [[gay pride]].<ref name=HoffmanIntro>{{cite book|last=Hoffman|first= Amy |title=An Army of Ex-Lovers: My life at the Gay Community News |year=2007 |publisher=University of Massachusetts Press |isbn=978-1558496217 |pages=xi–xiii}}</ref> In the [[feminism|feminist]] spirit of the personal being political, the most basic form of activism was an emphasis on [[coming out]] to family, friends and colleagues, and living life as an openly lesbian or [[gay]] person.<ref name=HoffmanIntro/> While the 1970s were the peak of "gay liberation" in New York City and other urban areas in the United States, "gay liberation" was the term still used instead of "gay pride" in more oppressive areas into the mid-1980s, with some organizations opting for the more inclusive, "lesbian and gay liberation".<ref name=HoffmanIntro/><ref name=Hoffman2007>{{cite book|last=Hoffman|first= Amy |title=An Army of Ex-Lovers: My life at the Gay Community News |year=2007 |publisher=University of Massachusetts Press |isbn=978-1558496217 }}</ref> While women and [[transgender]] activists had lobbied for more inclusive names from the beginning of the movement, the [[initialism]] [[LGBT]], or "[[Queer]]" as a counterculture shorthand for [[LGBT]], did not gain much acceptance as an umbrella term until much later in the 1980s, and in some areas not until the '90s or even '00s.<ref name=HoffmanIntro/><ref name=Hoffman2007/><ref name=Hollibaugh>{{cite web|author1=phoenix|title=Gay Rights Are Not Queer Liberation|url=http://www.autostraddle.com/gay-rights-are-not-queer-liberation-the-nation-interviews-amber-hollibaugh-140431/|website=autostraddle.com|date=29 June 2012|access-date=1 March 2015|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150402122449/http://www.autostraddle.com/gay-rights-are-not-queer-liberation-the-nation-interviews-amber-hollibaugh-140431/|archive-date=2 April 2015|url-status=dead|df=dmy-all}}</ref>
 
  
−
== 1960s ==
+
The [[gay liberation]] movement of the late 1960s through the mid-1980s urged [[lesbian]]s and [[gay]] men to engage in radical [[direct action]], and to counter societal shame with [[gay pride]]. In the [[feminism|feminist]] spirit of the personal being political, the most basic form of activism was an emphasis on [[coming out]] to [[family]], friends, and colleagues, and living life as an openly lesbian or gay person. While the 1970s were the peak of "gay liberation" in New York City and other urban areas in the United States, "gay liberation" was the term still used instead of "gay pride" in more oppressive areas into the mid-1980s, with some organizations opting for the more inclusive, "lesbian and gay liberation."<ref>Amy Hoffman, ''An Army of Ex-Lovers: My life at the Gay Community News'' (Amherst, MA: University of Massachusetts Press, 2007, ISBN 978-1558496217), xi–xiii.</ref> While women and [[transgender]] activists had lobbied for more inclusive names from the beginning of the movement, the [[initialism]] [[LGBT]], or "[[Queer]]" as a counterculture shorthand for LGBT, did not gain much acceptance as an umbrella term until much later in the 1980s, and in some areas not until the 1990s or even 2000s.<ref> Amber Hollibaugh, [http://www.autostraddle.com/gay-rights-are-not-queer-liberation-the-nation-interviews-amber-hollibaugh-140431/ "Gay Rights Are Not Queer Liberation,"] ''Autostraddle'', June 29, 2012. Retrieved March 10, 2022.</ref>
−
Liberalism accepted the notion that truth is possible and that science is the method to arrive at it. Based on these ideas liberals had fought to correct what they saw as flaws in the political society that led to discrimination against women, people of color and homosexuals. The [[African-American Civil Right Movement (1955-1968)|civil rights movement]] conducted campaigns like the [[Rosa Parks|[Montgomery bus boycott]], the [[Birmingham campaign]], and numerous others to force desegregation and create economic opportunity for blacks. President  [[John F. Kennedy]] spoke of creating an "equal chance" for all Americans.<ref>Amy Chua, ''Political Tribes: Group Instinct and the Fate of Nations'' (New York, NY: Penguin Press, 2018, ISBN 978-0399562853), 178.</ref>These efforts would lead to passage of the [[Civil Rights Act of 1964]] which would outlaw discrimination based on race, color, religion, sex, and national origin.  Sexual orientation and gender identity would be added later. The next year the [[Voter Rights Act of 1965]] was passed, prohibiting states from passing laws and creating rules that would unfairly hinder minority voters from casting their votes. In 1964, President [[Lyndon Baines Johnson]] and Congress passes the [[Great Society]] legislation as part of his war on poverty. These were all part of the liberal efforts to promote equal opportunity for all Americans.
 
  
−
===Postmodernism and identity politics===
+
==Postmodernism and identity politics==
 
The 1960s and 1970s also saw the rise of postmodernism in the academy. [[Deconstruction]] and the power/knowledge theories of [[Michel Foucault]] became highly influential. They argued that the [[Enlightenment]] and [[Science|scientific]] knowledge that emerged from it produced knowledge that supported the ruling class. [[Jacques Derrida]] argued that Western discourses were [[phallocentric]], by which he meant both theocratic and patriarchal. Foucault argued that knowledge was produced by discursive practices that propped up existing power structures. The result of postmodern ideas was an attack on the universalist assumptions of the [[Enlightenment]] and liberalism.  
 
The 1960s and 1970s also saw the rise of postmodernism in the academy. [[Deconstruction]] and the power/knowledge theories of [[Michel Foucault]] became highly influential. They argued that the [[Enlightenment]] and [[Science|scientific]] knowledge that emerged from it produced knowledge that supported the ruling class. [[Jacques Derrida]] argued that Western discourses were [[phallocentric]], by which he meant both theocratic and patriarchal. Foucault argued that knowledge was produced by discursive practices that propped up existing power structures. The result of postmodern ideas was an attack on the universalist assumptions of the [[Enlightenment]] and liberalism.  
  
−
The postmodern critique argued that these universal ideals were grounded in discourses that were designed to prop up the power of the establishment, who are predominantly white, male and heterosexual. These ideas were taken up by the theorists of race, feminism and gender studies. They would come to be grounded in the new [[Critical theory]].  
+
The postmodern critique argued that these universal ideals were grounded in discourses that were designed to prop up the power of the establishment, who are predominantly white, male and heterosexual. Postmodernism argues that discourses serve the interests of the ruling majority. In the 1990s and after, these ideas were taken up by the theorists of race, feminism and gender studies. They would come to be grounded in the new postmodern [[Critical theory]].
−
 
 
−
====Social Construction of Identity====
 
−
One of the key concepts that flows from Postmodern identity politics is [[social constructionism]]. If it is not people who make discourses, but discourses which make people, then it is not only the pretense of universal values that is dismissed. It is also the individual subject. The discourses of reason, logic, evidence, and norms is exposed as nothing other than white, male, heteronormative culture making individual subjects. If you are not in that group, what is left is a collection of minority groups. It is group identity that becomes the locus of resistance and the defining feature of what we generally think of as individual subjects. The social construction of (group) identity would serve as the basis for a shift in the approach of identity politics from inclusion to fighting for diversity.
 
  
 
Civil rights, feminism and gay liberation and anti-colonial movements would all undergo major shifts based on the idea that social action now meant fighting for one's identity. They adopted the view that political struggle now meant that society must affirm their marginalized and excluded identities.  
 
Civil rights, feminism and gay liberation and anti-colonial movements would all undergo major shifts based on the idea that social action now meant fighting for one's identity. They adopted the view that political struggle now meant that society must affirm their marginalized and excluded identities.  
−
The rise of this new identity politics meant that critical and social theory itself must undergo a transformation, or fragmentation as the dominant theory was white, male and heteronormative. Each category - women, gay men and lesbians, people of color, and various previously excluded groups - would develop its own version of theory based on its own sense of identity. These would be sometimes allied, sometimes competing. Diversity would require not only different attempts to understand social phenomena, but also of their very theoretical discourse itself.
+
The rise of this new identity politics meant that critical and social theory itself must undergo a transformation, or fragmentation as the dominant theory was white, male and heteronormative. Each category - women, gay men and lesbians, people of color, and various previously excluded groups - would develop its own version of theory based on its own sense of identity. These would be sometimes allied, sometimes competing. Diversity would require not only different attempts to understand social phenomena, but also of their very theoretical discourse itself.
−
 
 
−
====Critical Race Theory====
 
−
Critical race theory began in the 1980s as Critical legal studies at Harvard Law School. It has roots in [[critical theory]]. Critical race theory rejects the older liberal notion of inclusion and creating greater opportunities for blacks and other minorities. It repudiates liberal approach to a rights-based remedies (expanding access to education and economic opportunities) on the critical theoretical grounds that social structures systematically oppress blacks and only permit remedies that do not change the dominant structure and that dovetail with white interests. Critical race theory attempts to disrupt the socially constructed system by rejecting objectivity as racist, offering narratives of oppression based on identity. Rather than a color-blind society, it seeks to foreground racial identity as the basis for critique and political organizing.
 
−
 
 
−
====Intersectionality and Third-wave feminism====
 
−
Second-wave feminism emerged in the 1960s and 1970s within liberal politics to advocate for greater rights and freedoms for women.  Third-wave feminism to a different tack. Within the postmodern setting, it focused on creating greater consciousness of gender identity and how it has been shaped by society. Gender identity became a method for constructing an authentic gender identity and exposing the social construction of gender. Together with Critical race theory, it also lead to the development of an important concept of contemporary identity politics, [[Intersectionality|intersectionality]]. Intersectionality developed in the early 1990s in part as a result of third-wave feminism and in part as a response to it. Black feminists, influenced by the rise of Critical race theory, argued that the experience of black women could not be fully understood or described by oppression as understood by feminism, nor that of black males.
 
−
 
 
−
 
 
−
Intersectionality represented an important step in the development of identity politics. It began with Kimberlé Williams Crenshaw famous essay, "Mapping the Margin." It was a key text in the rejection of liberal inclusiveness in favor of a more radical identity politics. The liberal approach was grounded in a universalism. Crenshaw insisted on foregrounding identity, famously describing the difference between the statement, "I am Black," versus "I am a person who happens to be Black." The former grounds the person's subjectivity in their social identity, while the latter treats that social identity as an accidental feature grounded in the person's universal claim to personhood.<ref>Kimberlé Williams Crenshaw, "Mapping the Margins: Intersectionality, Identity Politics, and Violence against Women of Color," ''Stanford Law Review 43(6) (1991): 1297.</ref>
 
−
 
 
−
====Feminism and Gender Theory====
 
−
The emergence of gender theory in the 1980s and 1990s also had a profound impact on feminism. Gender theory, like Critical race theory and intersectionality relied heavily on postmodern discourse analysis. It also help precipitate a major shift in feminism away from the focus on equal access and improving the economic lives of women to the ways in which the discourse of modernity excluded and oppressed women. The notion of [[standpoint theory]] was introduced into feminist scholarship by Nancy Hartsock in 1983 in ''The Feminist Standpoint: Developing Ground for a Specifically Feminist Historical Materialism''.
 
−
 
 
−
Standpoint theory seeks to create a unique space for knowledge based on social position, or standpoint. It rejects the goal of liberal feminism for greater choice, arguing that the terms of that choice is already determined by white, male, heternormative discourse. Standpoint theory argues that each group has its own unique standpoint, and needs its own unique discourse that is not defined by the terms of the discourse set by others.
 
−
 
 
−
====Queer theory====
 
−
Queer theory was a development of the gay rights and gay liberation movements of the 1970 and 1980s. Queer theory emerged in the 1990s with the works of theorists like Judith Butler, Eve Kosofsky Sedgewick and Gayle Rubin. Grounded in postmodern theory, Queer theory has an explicitly political agenda. It seeks to "blur boundaries" and disrupt notions of what is normative in order to "create a space" for the marginalized and excluded. The term "queer" is meant to refer to all marginalized groups.
 
−
 
 
−
{{See also|LGBT social movements|Queer nationalism|Political lesbianism|Bisexual politics}}
 
−
During this period in the United States, identity politics were largely seen in these communities in the definitions espoused by writers such as self-identified, "black, dyke, feminist, poet, mother" [[Audre Lorde]]'s [[Audre Lorde#Personal identity|view]], that [[lived experience]] matters, defines us, and is the only thing that grants authority to speak on these topics; that, "If I didn't define myself for myself, I would be crunched into other people's fantasies for me and eaten alive."<ref name=Zami>{{Cite book|title=Zami: A New Spelling of My Name|last=Lorde|first=Audre|publisher=Crossing Press|year=1982|isbn=978-0-89594-123-7|location=New York|title-link=Zami: A New Spelling of My Name}}</ref><ref name=Kemp>Kemp, Yakini B. (2004). "Writing Power: Identity Complexities and the Exotic Erotic in Audre Lorde's writing". ''Studies in the Literary Imagination''. '''37''': 22–36.</ref><ref name=Leonard>Leonard, Keith D. (28 September 2012). [https://muse.jhu.edu/article/486572 ""Which Me Will Survive": Rethinking Identity, Reclaiming Audre Lorde"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20161220052903/https://muse.jhu.edu/article/486572 |date=20 December 2016 }}. ''Callaloo''. '''35''' (3): 758–77. {{doi|10.1353/cal.2012.0100}}. {{ISSN|1080-6512}}.</ref>
 
−
 
 
−
By the 2000s, in some areas of [[postmodernism|postmodern]] [[queer studies]] (notably those around [[gender]]) the idea of "identity politics" began to shift away from that of naming and claiming lived experience, and authority arising from lived experience, to one emphasizing choice and performance.<ref name=4-encylopedia>{{cite encyclopedia|title=Queer Theory and the Social Construction of Sexuality|encyclopedia=Homosexuality|publisher=Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy|access-date=15 November 2011|url=http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/homosexuality/#QueTheSocConSex|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20111209062102/http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/homosexuality/#QueTheSocConSex|archive-date=9 December 2011|url-status=live|df=dmy-all}}</ref> Some who draw on the work of authors like [[Judith Butler]] particularly stress this concept of remaking and unmaking performative identities.<ref name=ButlerPerformative>{{Cite journal|title = Performative Acts and Gender Constitution: An Essay in Phenomenology and Feminist Theory|last = Butler|first = Judith|date = 1988 |journal = Theatre Journal |volume=40 |issue=4 |pages=519–531|doi = 10.2307/3207893|jstor = 3207893}}</ref> Writers in the field of [[Queer theory]] have at times taken this to the extent as to now argue that "queer", despite generations of specific use to describe a "non-heterosexual" sexual orientation,<ref name="oed">{{cite encyclopedia  | year =2014 | title = queer | encyclopedia = Oxford English Dictionary | publisher = Oxford University Press}}</ref> no longer needs to refer to any specific sexual orientation at all; that it is now only about "disrupting the mainstream", with author [[David M. Halperin]] arguing that straight people may now also self-identify as "queer".<ref name=Halperin>{{cite book |author=Halperin, David M. |title=One Hundred Years of Homosexuality: And Other Essays on Greek Love |publisher=Routledge |location=New York |year=1990 |isbn=978-0-415-90097-3 |title-link=One Hundred Years of Homosexuality }}</ref> However, many LGBT people believe this concept of "[[queer heterosexuality]]" is an oxymoron and offensive form of [[cultural appropriation]] which not only robs gays and lesbians of their identities, but makes invisible and irrelevant the actual, lived experience of oppression that causes them to be marginalized in the first place.<ref name="appropriation">{{cite news |last=Mortimer |first=Dora |date=9 February 2016 |title= Can Straight People Be Queer? - An increasing number of young celebrities are labeling themselves 'queer.' But what does this mean for the queer community? |url= https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/avy9vz/can-straight-people-be-queer-435 |website=[[Vice Media]]}}</ref><ref name=4-encylopedia/> "It desexualizes identity, when the issue is precisely about a sexual identity."<ref name=Jagose>[[Annamarie Jagose|Jagose, Annamarie]], 1996. ''Queer Theory: An Introduction''. New York: New York University Press.</ref>
 
−
 
 
−
Some supporters of identity politics take stances based on [[Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak]]'s work (namely, "Can the Subaltern Speak?") and have described some forms of identity politics as [[strategic essentialism]], a form which has sought to work with [[Hegemony|hegemonic]] discourses to reform the understanding of "universal" goals.<ref name=Spivak>{{Cite book|title=Other Asias|last=Spivak|first=Gayatri Chakrovotry|publisher=Blackwell Publishing|year=2008|isbn=978-1405102070|location=Malden, M.A.|pages=260}}</ref><ref name=Abraham>{{Cite journal|last=Abraham|first=Susan|year=2009|title=Strategic Essentialism in Nationalist Discourses: Sketching a Feminist Agenda in the Study of Religion|url=https://muse.jhu.edu/article/266799|journal=Journal of Feminist Studies in Religion|volume=25|issue=1|pages=156–161|via=Project Muse|doi=10.2979/fsr.2009.25.1.156|s2cid=143105193|access-date=17 December 2017|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171018190808/https://muse.jhu.edu/article/266799|archive-date=18 October 2017|url-status=live|df=dmy-all}}</ref><ref name=Ritze>G. Ritze/J. M. Ryan eds., ''The Concise Encyclopedia of Sociology'' (2010) p. 193</ref>
 
  
 
====Post-colonialism====
 
====Post-colonialism====
−
One of the key tenets of modern identity politics comes from post-colonialism, although it is shared by all the other post-modern critical approaches. It is the concept of "otherness" or "othering." Post-modernism argues that discourses serve the interests of the ruling majority. In his 1978 book, ''Orientalism'', Egyptian literary critic Edward Said, using Michel Foucault's postmodern theory of discourse argued that that the West not only created the East as the exotic other, but in the process had created themselves as the norm by which the other could be measured. The result for the other is that they were excluded not only from the discourse of the West, but also from themselves. They needed to reclaim themselves on their own terms. This view of otherness was explicitly political and a call for a politics of identity which runs through all the postmodern discourses of marginalized groups.
+
One of the key tenets of modern identity politics comes from post-colonialism, although it is shared by all the other postmodern critical approaches. It is the concept of "otherness" or "othering." In his book, ''Orientalism'', Egyptian literary critic [[Edward Said]], using [[Michel Foucault]]'s postmodern theory of discourse argued that that the West not only created the East as the exotic other, but in the process had created themselves as the norm by which the other could be measured. The result for the other is that they were excluded not only from the discourse of the West, but also from themselves. They needed to reclaim themselves on their own terms.<ref>Edward Said, ''Orientalism'' (Vintage, 1979, ISBN 978-0394740676).</ref> This view of otherness was explicitly political and a call for a politics of identity which runs through all the postmodern discourses of marginalized groups.
  
−
==Criticism==
+
====Social Construction of Identity====
 +
In the 1990s and early 2000s, a new generation of scholars applied the theories of postmodernism to race, gender and other marginalized groups. They created new theories about society, like [[Intersectionality]], [[Standpoint theory|standpoint theory]] and the social construction of identity. Identity politics depends heavily on these new theories that arose largely from race and gender studies programs. According to postmodern [[social constructionism]], it is not people who make discourses, but discourses which make people. As truth and universal values have been critiqued as reflecting the values of the dominant class and culture, the discourses of reason, logic, evidence, and norms is rejected as white, male, heteronormative culture making individual subjects that conform to the norm. For postmodern race and gender theorists, group identity becomes the locus of resistance and the defining feature of what is generally understood as individual subjectivity. The social construction of (group) identity would serve as the basis for a shift in the approach of identity politics from equality of opportunity to fighting for diversity, inclusion and equity.
  
 +
Standpoint theory was introduced into feminist scholarship by Nancy Hartsock in 1983.<ref>Nancy C.M. Hartsock, "The Feminist Standpoint: Developing Ground for a Specifically Feminist Historical Materialism," In Sandra Harding and Merrill B. Hintikka (eds.), ''Discovering Reality: Feminist Perspectives on Epistemology, Metaphysics, Methodology, and Philosophy of Science'' Synthese Library, vol 161 (Springer, Dordrecht, 1983, ISBN 978-9027715388).</ref> It is based on the view that people occupying the same location in the social grid have roughly the same experience of power, and that one's position within the power grid will determine what one can know. While originating in a Marxist context, within the postmodern context, it is now a key element of identity politics. What a person is capable of knowing is said to be based on their group. Those who are part of the majority are said to be privileged, not capable of knowing the experience of minorities or their own privilege. Those that are part of a racial, gender or other minority group are said to be able to see not only their own experience but also understand the experience of majority. Standpoint theory emphasizes lived, personal, and subjective knowledge over the objective knowledge that is the basis for the majority's social position and power.
  
 +
====Third-wave feminism, Critical race theory, and Intersectionality====
 +
Second-wave feminism emerged in the 1960s and 1970s within liberal politics to advocate for greater rights and freedoms for women. Third-wave feminism was in part a reaction to that and to the sense that feminism had not included women of color. In 1988, Deborah K. King coined the term [[Multiple jeopardy|multiple jeopardy]] to express how factors of oppression are all interconnected. King suggested that the identities of gender, class, and race each have an individual prejudicial connotation, which has an incremental effect on the inequity of which one experiences.<ref>Deborah K. King, [https://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/10.1086/494491 "Multiple Jeopardy, Multiple Consciousness: The Context of a Black Feminist Ideology,"] ''Journal of Women in Culture and Society'' 14(1) 10-01, 1988, 42–72. Retrieved March 10, 2022.</ref>
  
−
The term ''identity politics'' has been applied retroactively to varying movements that long predate its coinage. Historian [[Arthur Schlesinger Jr.]] discussed identity politics extensively in his 1991 book ''[[The Disuniting of America]]''. Schlesinger, a strong supporter of liberal conceptions of [[civil rights]], argues that a [[liberal democracy]] requires a common basis for culture and society to function. Rather than seeing civil society as already fractured along lines of power and powerlessness (according to race, ethnicity, sexuality, etc.), Schlesinger suggests that basing politics on group marginalization is itself what fractures the civil polity, and that identity politics therefore works against creating real opportunities for ending marginalization. Schlesinger believes that "movements for civil rights should aim toward full acceptance and integration of marginalized groups into the mainstream culture, rather than … perpetuating that marginalization through affirmations of difference."<ref>M.A. Chaudhary & Gautam Chaudhary, Global Encyclopaedia of Political Geography, New Delhi, 2009, {{ISBN|978-81-8220-233-7}}, p. 112</ref>
+
[[Intersectionality]] followed shortly afterward. It represented a significant step in the development of identity politics. It began with Kimberlé Williams Crenshaw famous essay, "Mapping the Margin: Intersectionality, Identity Politics, and Violence against Women of Color." It was a key text in the rejection of liberal inclusiveness in favor of a more radical identity politics. The liberal approach was grounded in a universalism. Crenshaw insisted on foregrounding identity, famously describing the difference between the statement, "I am Black," versus "I am a person who happens to be Black." The former grounds the person's subjectivity in their social identity, while the latter treats that social identity as an accidental feature grounded in the person's universal claim to personhood.<ref>Kimberlé Williams Crenshaw, "Mapping the Margins: Intersectionality, Identity Politics, and Violence against Women of Color," ''Stanford Law Review 43(6) (1991): 1297.</ref>
  
−
[[Brendan O'Neill (journalist)|Brendan O'Neill]] has suggested that identity politics causes (rather than simply recognizing and acting on) political schisms along lines of [[social identity]]. Thus, he contrasts the politics of [[gay liberation]] and identity politics by saying: "[[Peter Tatchell|[Peter] Tatchell]] also had, back in the day, … a commitment to the politics of liberation, which encouraged gays to come out and live and engage. Now, we have the politics of identity, which invites people to stay in, to look inward, to obsess over the body and the self, to surround themselves with a moral forcefield to protect their worldview—which has nothing to do with the world—from any questioning."<ref>{{cite web|last1=Brendan|first1=O'Neill|title=Identity politics has created an army of vicious, narcissistic cowards|url=https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/identity-politics-has-created-an-army-of-vicious-narcissistic-cowards|work=The Spectator|access-date=28 June 2015|date=19 February 2015|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150630173221/http://blogs.spectator.co.uk/coffeehouse/2015/02/identity-politics-has-created-an-army-of-vicious-narcissists/|archive-date=30 June 2015|url-status=live|df=dmy-all}}</ref>
+
Kimberlé Crenshaw was a student of Derek Bell, the law professor generally credited with the development of Critical legal studies at Harvard Law School in the 1980s. This developed into Critical Race Theory. Bell originally focused on largely economic issues. In the 1990s scholars like Crenshaw and Patricia Hill Collins applied postmodern [[critical theory]] to the field. From their backgrounds in feminism as well as racial studies, they created concepts like [[intersectionality]] to describe how racial and gender minorities experience marginalization and oppression within the dominant culture. Intersectionality developed as a result of third-wave feminism and in part as a response to it. Black feminists, influenced by the rise of [[Critical race theory]], argued that the experience of black women could not be fully understood or described by oppression as understood by feminism, nor that of black males.
  
−
In these and other ways, a political perspective oriented to one's own well being can be recast as causing the divisions that it insists upon making visible. Similarly in the United Kingdom, author [[Owen Jones (writer)|Owen Jones]] argues that identity politics often marginalize the [[working class]], saying:
+
This postmodern critical race theory rejects the older liberal notion of creating greater opportunities for blacks and other minorities and focuses on cultural issues and identity politics. It repudiates liberal approach to a rights-based remedies (expanding access to education and economic opportunities) on the critical theoretical grounds that social structures systematically oppress blacks and only permit remedies that do not change the dominant structure and that serve white interests. Critical race theory attempts to disrupt the socially constructed system, rejecting objectivity as racist and offering narratives of oppression based on identity. Rather than a color-blind society, it seeks to foreground racial identity as the basis for critique and political organizing.
−
{{quote|In the 1950s and 1960s, left-wing intellectuals who were both inspired and informed by a powerful labour movement wrote hundreds of books and articles on working-class issues. Such work would help shape the views of politicians at the very top of the Labour Party. Today, progressive intellectuals are far more interested in issues of identity. ... Of course, the struggles for the emancipation of women, gays, and ethnic minorities are exceptionally important causes. New Labour has co-opted them, passing genuinely progressive legislation on gay equality and women's rights, for example. But it is an agenda that has happily co-existed with the sidelining of the working class in politics, allowing New Labour to protect its radical flank while pressing ahead with Thatcherite policies.|Owen Jones|''[[Chavs: The Demonization of the Working Class]]''<ref>{{cite book|last1=Jones|first1=Owen|title=Chavs: The Demonization of the Working Class|url=https://archive.org/details/chavsdemonizatio00jone_371|url-access=limited|date=2012|publisher=Verso|location=London|isbn=978-1-84467-864-8|page=[https://archive.org/details/chavsdemonizatio00jone_371/page/n142 255]|edition=updated}}</ref>}}
 
  
−
===Critiques and criticisms of identity politics===
+
====Gender theory and Queer theory====
−
[[File:Anti-capitalism color— Restored.png|right|thumb|The [[Industrial Workers of the World]] poster "[[Pyramid of Capitalist System]]" (1911)]] Critics argue that groups based on a particular shared identity (e.g. race, or gender identity) can divert energy and attention from more fundamental issues, similar to the history of [[divide and rule]] strategies. [[Chris Hedges]] has criticized identity politics as one of the factors making up a form of "corporate capitalism" that only masquerades as a political platform, and which he believes "will never halt the rising social inequality, unchecked militarism, evisceration of civil liberties and omnipotence of the organs of security and surveillance."<ref name=HedgesTD>{{cite news |last=Hedges |first=Chris |date=5 February 2018 |title=The Bankruptcy of the American Left |url=https://www.truthdig.com/articles/bankruptcy-american-left/ |work=Truthdig |access-date=9 February 2018 |author-link=Chris Hedges |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180209135923/https://www.truthdig.com/articles/bankruptcy-american-left/ |archive-date=9 February 2018 |url-status=dead |df=dmy-all }}</ref> Sociologist [[Charles Derber]] asserts that the American left is "largely an identity-politics party" and that it "offers no broad critique of the political economy of capitalism. It focuses on reforms for Blacks and women and so forth. But it doesn’t offer a contextual analysis within capitalism." Both he and [[David North (socialist)|David North]] of the [[Socialist Equality Party (United States)|Socialist Equality Party]] posit that these fragmented and isolated identity movements which permeate the left have allowed for a far-right resurgence.<ref name=HedgesTD/> [[Cornel West]] asserted that discourse on racial, gender and sexual orientation identity was "crucial" and "indispensable," but emphasized that it "must be connected to a moral integrity and deep political solidarity that hones in on a financialized form of predatory capitalism. A capitalism that is killing the planet, poor people, working people here and abroad."<ref>{{cite news |date=December 3, 2020 |title=Cornel West: "Bernie Was Crushed by Neoliberalism" |url=https://jacobinmag.com/2020/12/cornel-west-interview-bernie-black-lives-matter |work=[[Jacobin (magazine)|Jacobin]] |access-date=December 7, 2020}}</ref>
+
The emergence of gender theory in the 1980s and 1990s also had a profound impact on feminism. Gender theory, like Critical race theory and intersectionality relied heavily on postmodern discourse analysis. It also help precipitate a major shift in feminism away from the focus on equal access and improving the economic lives of women to the ways in which the discourse of modernity excluded and oppressed women.
  
−
Critiques of identity politics have also been expressed by writers such as [[Eric Hobsbawm]],<ref>Hobsbawm, Eric (2 May 1996). "[http://banmarchive.org.uk/articles/1996%20annual%20lecture.htm Identity Politics and the Left] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170918013136/http://banmarchive.org.uk/articles/1996%20annual%20lecture.htm |date=18 September 2017 }}". 1996 Trust Lecture. Barry Amiel&nbsp;& Norman Melburn Trust. amielandmelburn.org.uk. Retrieved 4 September 2017.</ref> [[Todd Gitlin]],<ref>[https://www.pbs.org/thinktank/transcript235.html PBS.org] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170804215455/http://www.pbs.org/thinktank/transcript235.html |date=4 August 2017 }}, Thinktank transcript 235</ref> [[Michael Tomasky]], [[Richard Rorty]], [[Michael Parenti]],<ref>{{citation|last=Parenti|first=Michael|title=Blackshirts and Reds: Rational Fascism and the Overthrow of Communism|year=1997|publisher=[[City Lights Bookstore|City Lights Books]]|location=San Francisco|isbn=978-0872863293|page=151|author-link=Michael Parenti|quote="Seizing upon anything but class, U.S. leftists today have developed an array of identity groups centering around ethnic, gender, cultural, and life-style issues. These groups treat their respective grievances as something apart from class struggle, and have almost nothing to say about the increasingly harsh politico-economic class injustices perpetrated against us all."}}</ref> [[Jodi Dean]]<ref>{{cite book|last=Dean|first=Jodi|author-link=Jodi Dean|date=2012|title=The Communist Horizon|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=kBghOq42S3YC&pg=PA53|publisher=Verso|page=53|isbn=978-1844679546}}</ref> and [[Sean Wilentz]].<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.ppionline.org/ppi_ci.cfm?knlgAreaID=115&subsecID=172&contentID=2049|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100116130524/http://www.ppionline.org/ppi_ci.cfm?knlgAreaID=115&subsecID=172&contentID=2049 |archive-date=16 January 2010 |last=Sleeper |first=Jim |title=In Defense of Civic Culture |date=1 January 1993|publisher=[[Progressive Policy Institute]]. ppionline.org |access-date=4 September 2017}}</ref> As a Marxist, Hobsbawm criticized nationalisms and the principle of national self-determination adopted in many countries after 1919, since in his view national governments are often merely an expression of a ruling class or power, and their proliferation was a source of the wars of the 20th century. Hence, Hobsbawm argues that identity politics, such as [[queer nationalism]], [[Islamism]], [[Cornish nationalism]] or [[Ulster loyalism]] are just other versions of [[bourgeois nationalism]]. The view that identity politics (rooted in challenging racism, sexism, and the like) obscures class inequality is widespread in the United States and other Western nations. This framing ignores how class-based politics are identity politics themselves, according to [[Jeff Sparrow]].<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/nov/18/class-and-identity-politics-are-not-mutually-exclusive-the-left-should-use-this-to-its-benefit|title=Class and identity politics are not mutually exclusive. The left should use this to its benefit {{!}} Jeff Sparrow|last=Sparrow|first=Jeff|date=17 November 2016|website=the Guardian|language=en|access-date=2018-07-17|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180718030629/https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/nov/18/class-and-identity-politics-are-not-mutually-exclusive-the-left-should-use-this-to-its-benefit|archive-date=18 July 2018|url-status=live|df=dmy-all}}</ref>
+
Queer theory emerged in the 1990s with the works of theorists like Judith Butler, Eve Kosofsky Sedgewick and Gayle Rubin. Grounded in postmodern theory, Queer theory has an explicitly political agenda grounded in identity politics. It seeks to "blur boundaries" and disrupt notions of what is normative in order to "create a space" for the marginalized and excluded. The term "queer" is meant to refer to all marginalized groups.
  
−
=== Intersectional critiques ===
+
By the 2000s, in some areas of [[postmodernism|postmodern]] [[queer studies]] (notably those around [[gender]]) the idea of "identity politics" began to shift away from that of naming and claiming lived experience, and authority arising from lived experience, to one emphasizing choice and performance.<ref>[http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/homosexuality/#QueTheSocConSex Queer Theory and the Social Construction of Sexuality, in "Homosexuality,"] ''Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy''. Retrieved March 28, 2022.</ref> [[Judith Butler]], who does not identity as postmodern, and those influenced by her particularly stress this concept of remaking and unmaking performative identities.<ref>Judith Butler, "Performative Acts and Gender Constitution: An Essay in Phenomenology and Feminist Theory," ''Theatre Journal'' 40(4) (1988): 519–531.</ref> Writers in the field of [[Queer theory]] have at times taken this to the extent as to now argue that "queer," despite generations of specific use to describe a "non-heterosexual" sexual orientation,<ref>"queer," ''Oxford English Dictionary'', Oxford University Press.</ref> no longer needs to refer to any specific sexual orientation at all; that it is now only about "disrupting the mainstream," with author [[David M. Halperin]] arguing that straight people may now also self-identify as "queer."<ref>David M. Halperin, ''One Hundred Years of Homosexuality: And Other Essays on Greek Love'' (New York, NY: Routledge, 1990, ISBN 978-0415900973).</ref> However, many LGBT people believe this concept of "[[queer heterosexuality]]" is an oxymoron and offensive form of [[cultural appropriation]] which not only robs gays and lesbians of their identities, but makes invisible and irrelevant the actual, lived experience of oppression that causes them to be marginalized in the first place.<ref>Dora Mortimer, [https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/avy9vz/can-straight-people-be-queer-435"Can Straight People Be Queer? - An increasing number of young celebrities are labeling themselves 'queer.' But what does this mean for the queer community?"] ''Vice Media'', February 9, 2016. Retrieved March 15, 2022.</ref> "It desexualizes identity, when the issue is precisely about a sexual identity."<ref>Annamarie Jagose, ''Queer Theory: An Introduction'' {New York, NY: New York University Press, 1997, ISBN 9780814742341).</ref>
−
In her journal article ''Mapping the Margins: Intersectionality, Identity Politics and Violence against Women of Color,'' [[Kimberle Crenshaw]] treats identity politics as a process that brings people together based on a shared aspect of their identity. Crenshaw applauds identity politics for bringing African Americans (and other non-white people), gays and lesbians, and other oppressed groups together in community and progress.<ref name=":0">{{Cite journal|last=Crenshaw|first=Kimberle|author-link=Kimberle Crenshaw|date=1 January 1991|title=Mapping the Margins: Intersectionality, Identity Politics, and Violence against Women of Color|jstor=1229039|journal=Stanford Law Review|volume=43|issue=6|pages=1241–99|doi=10.2307/1229039|citeseerx=10.1.1.695.5934}}</ref> But she critiques it because "it frequently conflates or ignores intragroup differences."<ref name=":0" />&nbsp;Crenshaw argues that for Black women, at least two aspects of their identity are the subject of oppression: their race and their sex.<ref>{{Cite book|title=Demarginalizing the Intersection of Race and Sex: A Black Feminist Critique of Antidiscrimination Doctrine, Feminist Theory and Antiracist Politics|last=Crenshaw|first=Kimberle|publisher=University of Chicago Legal Forum|year=1989|pages=139–68|url=https://philpapers.org/archive/CREDTI.pdf?source=post_page---------------------------}}</ref> Thus, although identity politics are useful, we must be aware of the role of&nbsp;[[intersectionality]]. Nira Yuval-Davis supports Crenshaw's critiques&nbsp;in ''Intersectionality and Feminist Politics''&nbsp;and explains that "Identities are individual and collective narratives that answer the question 'who am/are I/we?"&nbsp;<ref name=":1">{{Cite journal|last=Yuval-Davis|first=Nira|date=1 August 2006|title=Intersectionality and Feminist Politics|url=http://ejw.sagepub.com/content/13/3/193|journal=European Journal of Women's Studies|language=en|volume=13|issue=3|pages=193–209|doi=10.1177/1350506806065752|s2cid=145319810|issn=1350-5068|access-date=11 April 2016|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20161103075104/http://ejw.sagepub.com/content/13/3/193|archive-date=3 November 2016|url-status=live|df=dmy-all}}</ref>
 
  
−
In ''Mapping the Margins'', Crenshaw illustrates her point using the&nbsp;[[Clarence Thomas Supreme Court nomination|Clarence Thomas]]/[[Anita Hill]] controversy. Anita Hill [[Clarence Thomas Supreme Court nomination#Anita Hill testimony|accused]] US Supreme Court Justice nominee Clarence Thomas of sexual harassment; Thomas would be the second African American judge on the Supreme Court. Crenshaw argues that Hill was then deemed anti-Black in the movement against racism, and although she came forward on the feminist issue of sexual harassment, she was excluded because when considering feminism, it is the narrative of white middle-class women that prevails.<ref name=":0" /> Crenshaw concludes that acknowledging intersecting categories when groups unite on the basis of identity politics is better than ignoring categories altogether.<ref name=":0"/>
+
== Non-U.S. Examples ==
 +
The United States strives to assimilate ethnic minorities. While there are ethnic neighborhoods, they do not maintain political sovereignty over a region of the country. In other western countries such regional control by minority populations does exist. In such regions, identity politics plays a role in either the fight against discrimination, or even autonomy. In Canada and Spain, identity politics has been used to promote [[Separatism|separatist]] movements, like the Quebecois and the Basque.  
  
−
== Examples ==
+
In Africa, Asia, and eastern Europe, identity politics has supported violent nationalist and ethnic conflicts. However, it also can refer to majority groups as well. In Europe, where assimilation is less successful, identity politics can also support the idea that the [[silent majority]] needs to be protected from [[globalization]] and [[immigration]].<ref>Abnul Noury and Gerard Roland, "Identity Politics and Populism in Europe," ''Annual Review of Political Science'' 23 (2020): 421–439.</ref>
−
{{Main category|Identity politics}}
 
−
In the United States, identity politics is usually ascribed to these oppressed minority groups who are fighting discrimination. In Canada and Spain, identity politics has been used to describe [[Separatism|separatist]] movements; in Africa, Asia, and eastern Europe, it has described violent nationalist and ethnic conflicts. Overall, in Europe, identity politics are exclusionary and based on the idea that the [[silent majority]] needs to be protected from [[globalization]] and [[immigration]].<ref>{{cite journal|doi=10.1146/annurev-polisci-050718-033542|doi-access=free|title=Identity Politics and Populism in Europe|year=2020|last1=Noury|first1=Abdul|last2=Roland|first2=Gerard|journal=Annual Review of Political Science|volume=23|pages=421–439}}</ref>
 
  
−
=== Racial and ethnocultural ===
+
==== Arab identity politics ====
−
{{Further|Ethnocultural politics in the United States}}
+
Arab identity politics concerns the identity-based politics derived from the racial or ethnocultural consciousness of [[Arab people]]. In the [[Regionalism (international relations)|regionalism]] of the [[Middle East]], it has particular meaning in relation to the national and cultural identities of non-Arab countries, such as [[Turkey]], [[Iran]], and [[North Africa]]n countries: "Iranian and Arab identity politics thwarted, perverted, and dismembered communitarian thinking for long periods in the twentieth century and the same applies to other forms of psycho-nationalism in Turkey."<ref>Arshin Adib-Moghaddam, [https://www.jstage.jst.go.jp/article/merev/7/0/7_Vol.7_E-Art01/_pdf/-char/ja Psycho-nationalism: Global Thought, Iranian Imaginations] ''JETRO-IDE ME-Review'' Vol.7 (2019-2020). Retrieved March 28, 2022. </ref><ref>Elizabeth Monier, [https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/13569775.2014.968474 "The ''Arabness'' of Middle East regionalism: the Arab Spring and competition for discursive hegemony between Egypt, Iran and Turkey],  ''Contemporary Politics'' 20(4) (2014): 421-434. Retrieved March 28, 2022.</ref> In their 2010 ''Being Arab: Arabism and the Politics of Recognition'', [[Christopher Wise]] and [[Paul James (academic)|Paul James]] challenged the view that, in the post-[[War in Afghanistan (2001–present)|Afghanistan]] and [[Iraq War|Iraq]] invasion era, Arab identity-driven politics were ending. Refuting the view that had "drawn many analysts to conclude that the era of Arab identity politics has passed", Wise and James examined its development as a viable alternative to [[Islamic fundamentalism]] in the Arab world.<ref>Christopher Wise and Paul James (eds.), ''Being Arab: Arabism and the Politics of Recognition'' (Victoria, Australia: Arena Publications, 2010).</ref>
−
 
 
−
Ethnic, religious and racial identity politics dominated American politics in the 19th century, during the [[Second Party System]] (1830s–1850s)<ref>Daniel Walker Howe, "[https://academic.oup.com/jah/article-abstract/77/4/1216/850758 The Evangelical Movement and Political Culture in the North During the Second Party System]," ''Journal of American History'' (1991) 77#4 pp: 1216-1239.</ref> as well as the [[Third Party System]] (1850s–1890s).<ref>Jon Gjerde, ''The Minds of the West: Ethnocultural Evolution in the Rural Middle West, 1830-1917'' (1999).</ref> Racial identity has been the central theme in Southern politics since slavery was abolished.<ref>Harold D. Woodman, "[https://www.jstor.org/stable/2211941 Class, Race, Politics, and the Modernization of the Postbellum South]." ''Journal of Southern History'' 63.1 (1997): 3-22.</ref>
 
−
 
 
−
Similar patterns appear in the 21st century are commonly referenced in popular culture,<ref>{{Cite news |url=https://www.newsweek.com/2019/11/15/literary-influences-superstar-musician-david-bowie-1468145.html |title=The Literary Influences of Superstar Musician David Bowie|author=John O'Connell|quote=As the husband of a Muslim woman from Somalia, [[David Bowie|Bowie]] couldn't help but be highly attuned to racial identity politics.|date=31 October 2019|work=[[Newsweek]]}}</ref> and are increasingly analyzed in media and social commentary as an interconnected part of politics and society.<ref>{{Cite news |url=https://time.com/5444761/donald-trump-midterms-race-candidates/ |title=How President Trump Put Race at the Center of the Midterms|author=Tessa Berenson|quote=Some Republicans worry that Trump’s focus on racial identity politics so close to the election is undercutting their message to swing voters on subjects like the economy and health care.|date=6 November 2018|work=[[TIME]]}}</ref><ref>{{Cite news |url=https://www.smh.com.au/national/opponents-on-the-left-pouring-gasoline-on-donald-trump-s-fires-20190818-p52i92.html |title=Opponents on the left pouring gasoline on Donald Trump's fires|author-link=James Kirchick|author=James Kirchick|quote=Trump’s game isn’t difficult to discern. He is practicing the same resentment-based, racial-identity politics that has fuelled his political rise since the earlier part of this decade, when he began expressing doubts that the first black American president was actually born in the United States.|date=19 August 2019|work=[[The Sydney Morning Herald]]}}</ref> Both a majority and minority group phenomenon, racial identity politics can develop as a reaction to the historical legacy of race-based oppression of a people<ref>{{cite book|author1=Tamar Mayor|title=Gender Ironies of Nationalism: Sexing the Nation|date=2012|publisher=[[Routledge]]|isbn=978-0415162555|page=331|quote=For example, where a legacy of oppression based on race exists, an identity politics of race can be formed in opposition to that form of oppression, and can help to provide an occasion for racial pride and resistance to that oppression.}}</ref> as well as a general group identity issue, as "racial identity politics utilizes racial consciousness or the group's collective memory and experiences as the essential framework for interpreting the actions and interests of all other social groups."<ref>{{cite book|author1=James Jennings|title=Blacks, Latinos, and Asians in Urban America: Status and Prospects for Politics and Activism|date=1994|publisher=[[Praeger Publishing]]|isbn=978-0275949341|page=35|chapter=Building Coalitions}}</ref></blockquote>
 
−
 
 
−
[[Carol M. Swain]] has argued that non-white ethnic pride and an "emphasis on racial identity politics" is fomenting the rise of [[white nationalism]].<ref>{{cite book|author1=Carol M. Swain|author-link1=Carol M. Swain|title=The New White Nationalism in America: Its Challenge to Integration|date=2004|publisher=[[Cambridge University Press]]|isbn=978-0521545587|page=xvi|chapter=Preface|quote=The continued emphasis on racial identity politics and the fostering of an ethnic group pride on the part of nonwhite minority groups.}}</ref> Anthropologist [[Michael Messner]] has suggested that the [[Million Man March]] was an example of racial identity politics in the United States.<ref>{{cite book|author1=Michael A. Messner|author-link1=Michael Messner|title=Politics of Masculinities: Men in Movements|date=1997|publisher=[[SAGE Publications]]|isbn=978-0803955776|page=[https://archive.org/details/politicsofmascul00mess/page/79 79-80]|chapter=Racial and sexual identity politics|chapter-url=https://archive.org/details/politicsofmascul00mess/page/79}}</ref>
 
−
 
 
−
==== Black women identity politics ====
 
−
''See also: [[Black feminism]], [[Combahee River Collective]], and [[Black women in American politics]]''
 
−
 
 
−
Black women identity politics concerns the identity-based politics derived from the lived experiences of struggles and oppression of Black women.
 
−
 
 
−
In 1977, the [[Combahee River Collective]] (CRC) Statement argued that black women struggled with facing their oppression, and with their coinage of the term identity politics, it gave black women the tools and comprehension to confront the oppression one was facing. The CRC also suggested that "the personal is political".<ref>{{Cite book|url=https://www.worldcat.org/oclc/975027867|title=How we get free : Black feminism and the Combahee River Collective|others=Taylor, Keeanga-Yamahtta.|isbn=978-1-64259-104-0|location=Chicago, Illinois|oclc=975027867}}</ref> This expression explains the outlook that black women have for politics, as they are constructed by the lived experiences of racial inequalities, and the oppression based on their identities. As mentioned earlier K. Crenshaw, claims that black women oppression is illustrated in two different directions; race and sex.<ref>{{Citation|last=Crenshaw|first=Kimberle|title=Demarginalizing the Intersection of Race and Sex: A Black Feminist Critique of Antidiscrimination Doctrine, Feminist Theory, and Antiracist Politics [1989]|date=2018-02-19|url=http://dx.doi.org/10.4324/9780429500480-5|work=Feminist Legal Theory|pages=57–80|publisher=Routledge|isbn=978-0-429-50048-0|access-date=2020-10-09}}</ref> In 1991, Nancie Caraway explained that the politics of black women had to be comprehended in the understanding that the oppression they face are all interconnected, presenting a compound of oppression ([[Intersectionality]]).<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Caraway|first=Nancie E.|date=1991|title=The Challenge and Theory of Feminist Identity Politics: Working on Racism|url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/3346851?origin=crossref|journal=Frontiers: A Journal of Women Studies|volume=12|issue=2|pages=109|doi=10.2307/3346851}}</ref>
 
  
−
In 1988, Deborah K. King coined the term [[Multiple jeopardy]], theory that expands on how factors of oppression are all interconnected. King suggested that the identities of gender, class, and race each have an individual prejudicial connotation, which has an incremental effect on the inequity of which one experiences<ref>{{Cite journal|last=King|first=Deborah K.|date=1988-10-01|title=Multiple Jeopardy, Multiple Consciousness: The Context of a Black Feminist Ideology|url=https://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/10.1086/494491|journal=Signs: Journal of Women in Culture and Society|volume=14|issue=1|pages=42–72|doi=10.1086/494491|issn=0097-9740}}</ref>
+
According to [[Marc Lynch]], the post-[[Arab Spring]] era has seen increasing Arab identity politics, which is "marked by state-state rivalries as well as state-society conflicts". Lynch believes this is creating a new [[Arab Cold War]], no longer characterized by Sunni-Shia sectarian divides but by a reemergent [[Arab identity]] in the region.<ref>Marc Lynch, ''The Arab Uprisings Explained: New Contentious Politics in the Middle East'' (New York, NY: Columbia University Press, 2019, ISBN 978-0231158855), 119.</ref>[[Najla Said]] has explored her lifelong experience with Arab identity politics in her book ''Looking for Palestine''.<ref>Nijla Said, ''Looking for Palestine: Growing Up Confused in an Arab-American Family'' (Riverhead Books, 2014, ISBN 978-1594632754).</ref>
  
−
==== Arab identity politics ====
+
===== Muslim Identity politics =====
−
{{See also|Arab identity|Arab nationalism}}
+
Muslim identity has some overlap, and some important differences from Arab identity. Many Muslims are Arab, but there are large blocks that are Persian, Asian, European and North American. Since the 1970s, the interaction of religion and politics has been associated with the rise of Islamist movements in the Middle East. Salwa Ismail posits that the Muslim identity is related to social dimensions such as gender, class, and lifestyles ([[Intersectionality]]), thus, different Muslims occupy different social positions in relation to the processes of globalization. Not all uniformly engage in the construction of Muslim identity, and they do not all apply to a monolithic Muslim identity.
−
Arab identity politics concerns the identity-based politics derived from the racial or ethnocultural consciousness of [[Arab people]]. In the [[Regionalism (international relations)|regionalism]] of the [[Middle East]], it has particular meaning in relation to the national and cultural identities of non-Arab countries, such as Turkey, Iran and North African countries .<ref>{{cite book|author1=Arshin Adib-Moghaddam|title=Middle East Review (IDE-JETRO)|date=2010|publisher=[[Institute of Developing Economies]]|location=[[Japan External Trade Organization]]|isbn=978-0980415810|edition=Volume 7|chapter=The myth of "National Identity": Psycho-nationalism in Iran and the Arab world|quote=Iranian and Arab identity politics thwarted, perverted, and dismembered communitarian thinking for long periods in the twentieth century and the same applies to other forms of psycho-nationalism in Turkey}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|author1=Elizabeth Monier|title=[[Contemporary Politics (journal)|''Contemporary Politics'']]|chapter=The Arabness of Middle East regionalism: the Arab Spring and competition for discursive hegemony between Egypt, Iran and Turkey|date=2014|publisher=[[Taylor & Francis]]|edition=Volume 20, No. 4|pages=421–434|quote=To explore the role played by Arab identity politics in regionalism with regard to the status of non-Arab states, this article presents a study of the competing hegemonic regional discourses employed by Turkey, Iran and Egypt}}</ref> In their 2010 ''Being Arab: Arabism and the Politics of Recognition'', academics [[Christopher Wise]] and [[Paul James (academic)|Paul James]] challenged the view that, in the post-[[War in Afghanistan (2001–present)|Afghanistan]] and [[Iraq War|Iraq]] invasion era, Arab identity-driven politics were ending. Refuting the view that had "drawn many analysts to conclude that the era of Arab identity politics has passed", Wise and James examined its development as a viable alternative to [[Islamic fundamentalism]] in the Arab world.<ref>{{cite book|author1=Christopher Wise|author2=Paul James|author-link1=Christopher Wise|author-link2=Paul James (academic)|title=Being Arab: Arabism and the Politics of Recognition|date=2010|publisher=[[Arena (Australian publishing co-operative)|Arena Publications]]|isbn=978-0980415810}}</ref>
 
−
 
 
−
According to [[Marc Lynch]], the post-[[Arab Spring]] era has seen increasing Arab identity politics, which is "marked by state-state rivalries as well as state-society conflicts". Lynch believes this is creating a new [[Arab Cold War]], no longer characterized by Sunni-Shia sectarian divides but by a reemergent [[Arab identity]] in the region.<ref>{{cite book|last1=Lynch|first1=Mark|author-link=Marc Lynch|title=The Arab Uprisings Explained: New Contentious Politics in the Middle East|date=2019|publisher=[[Columbia University Press]]|isbn=978-0231158855|page=119}}</ref> [[Najla Said]] has explored her lifelong experience with Arab identity politics in her book ''Looking for Palestine''.<ref>{{cite news|url=https://www.salon.com/2013/07/28/najla_said_my_arab_american_story_is_not_typical_in_any_way/|title=Najla Said: "My Arab-American story is not typical in any way"|work=[[Salon (website)]]|date=28 July 2013}}</ref>
 
  
 
==== Māori identity politics ====
 
==== Māori identity politics ====
−
{{See also|Māori identity|Māori nationalism}}
+
The [[Māori]] are indigenous Polynesian peoples native to [[New Zealand]]. Due to somewhat competing tribe-based versus pan-Māori concepts, there is both an internal and external utilization of Māori identity politics in New Zealand.<ref>Augie Fleras and Roger Maaka, ''The Politics of Indigeneity: Challenging the State in Canada and Aotearoa New Zealand'' (Dunedin, NZ: Otago University Press, 2005, ISBN 978-1877276538), 67. "The tensions created by the intersection of tribe as identity, versus tribe as organisation, are central to Maori identity politics."</ref> Projected outwards, Māori identity politics has been a disrupting force in the [[politics of New Zealand]] and post-colonial conceptions of nationhood.<ref>Tatiana Tökölyová, ''Journal of Nationalism, Memory & Language Politics'' 11(1), (Prague, Czechia: Walter de Gruyter University of International and Public Relations, 11(1) (2005): 67. "Transnationalism in the Pacific Region as a Concept of State Identity" "Maori identity politics have disrupted the colonially-inspired constructions of the New Zealand nation and state from a base of indigeneity.</ref> Its development has also been explored as causing parallel ethnic identity developments in non-Māori populations.<ref>Hal B. Levine, ''Constructing Collective Identity: A comparative analysis of New Zealand Jews, Maori, and urban Papua New Guineans'' (Pieterlen and Bern, Switzerland: Peter Lang, 1997, ISBN 978-3631319444), 11. "The material on biculturalism particularly shows how ethnicity interdigitates with identity politics for Maori and stimulates parallel developments among non-Maori New Zealanders.</ref> [[Alison Jones]], in her co-written ''Tuai: A Traveller in Two Worlds'', suggests that a form of Māori identity politics, directly oppositional to [[Pākehā]] (white New Zealanders), has helped provide a "basis for internal collaboration and a politics of strength".<ref>Te Kawehau Hoskins and Alison Jones (eds.), ''Critical Conversations in Kaupapa Maori'' (Wellington, NZ: Huia Publishers, 2005, ISBN 978-1775503286), 475. "As Jones and Jenkins (2008) point out, an oppositional Māori identity politics has been the 'basis for internal collaboration and a politics of strength.'"</ref>
−
Due to somewhat competing tribe-based versus pan-Māori concepts, there is both an internal and external utilization of Māori identity politics in New Zealand.<ref>{{cite book|author1=Roger Maaka|author2=Augie Fleras|title=The Politics of Indigeneity: Challenging the State in Canada and Aotearoa New Zealand|date=2005|publisher=[[Otago University Press]]|isbn=978-1877276538|page=67|quote=The tensions created by the intersection of tribe as identity, versus tribe as organisation, are central to Maori identity politics.}}</ref> Projected outwards, Māori identity politics has been a disrupting force in the [[politics of New Zealand]] and post-colonial conceptions of nationhood.<ref>{{cite book|author1=Tatiana Tökölyová|title=Journal of Nationalism, Memory & Language Politics|date=2005|publisher=[[Walter de Gruyter]]|location=[[University of International and Public Relations Prague]]|page=67|edition=Volume 11, Edition 1|chapter=Transnationalism in the Pacific Region as a Concept of State Identity|quote=Maori identity politics have disrupted the colonially-inspired constructions of the New Zealand nation and state from a base of indigeneity.}}</ref> Its development has also been explored as causing parallel ethnic identity developments in non-Māori populations.<ref>{{cite book|author1=Hal B. Levine|title=Constructing collective identity: a comparative analysis of New Zealand Jews, Maori, and urban Papua New Guineans|date=1997|publisher=[[Peter Lang (publisher)|Peter Lang]]|isbn=978-3631319444|page=11|quote=The material on biculturalism particularly shows how ethnicity interdigitates with identity politics for Maori and stimulates parallel developments among non-Maori New Zealanders.}}</ref> Academic [[Alison Jones]], in her co-written ''Tuai: A Traveller in Two Worlds'', suggests that a form of Māori identity politics, directly oppositional to [[Pākehā]] (white New Zealanders), has helped provide a "basis for internal collaboration and a politics of strength".<ref>{{cite book|editor1=Te Kawehau Hoskins|editor2=Alison Jones|title=Critical Conversations in Kaupapa Maori|date=2005|publisher=[[Huia Publishers]]|isbn=978-1775503286|quote=As Jones and Jenkins (2008) point out, an oppositional Māori identity politics has been the 'basis for internal collaboration and a politics of strength' (p.475).}}</ref>
 
  
−
A 2009, [[Ministry of Social Development (New Zealand)|Ministry of Social Development]] journal identified Māori identity politics, and societal reactions to it, as the most prominent factor behind significant changes in self-identification from the 2006 New Zealand census.<ref>{{cite journal|author1=Tahu Kukutai|author2=Robert Didham|title=Social Policy Journal of New Zealand|date=2009|publisher=[[Ministry of Social Development (New Zealand)]]|edition=In Search of Ethnic New Zealanders: National Naming in the 2006 Census|quote=Māori identity politics and Treaty settlements, as well as their reactions – the latter included challenges to historical settlements and so-called “race-based” funding.}}</ref>
+
A 2009, [[Ministry of Social Development (New Zealand)|Ministry of Social Development]] journal identified Māori identity politics, and societal reactions to it, as the most prominent factor behind significant changes in self-identification from the 2006 New Zealand census.<ref>Tahu Kukutai and Robert Didham, "Social Policy Journal of New Zealand," ''Ministry of Social Development (New Zealand)'' In Search of Ethnic New Zealanders: National Naming in the 2006 Census, 2009. "Māori identity politics and Treaty settlements, as well as their reactions – the latter included challenges to historical settlements and so-called “race-based” funding."</ref>
  
−
==== White identity politics ====
+
==Criticism==
−
{{See also|White identity|White nationalism|White backlash|Ethnocultural politics in the United States}}
+
The term ''identity politics'' has been applied retroactively to varying movements that long predate its coinage. Historian [[Arthur Schlesinger Jr.]] discussed identity politics extensively in his book ''The Disuniting of America''.  Schlesinger, a strong supporter of liberal conceptions of [[civil rights]], argues that a [[liberal democracy]] requires a common basis for culture and society to function. Rather than seeing civil society as already fractured along lines of power and powerlessness (according to race, ethnicity, sexuality, etc.), Schlesinger suggests that basing politics on group marginalization is itself what fractures the civil polity, and that identity politics therefore works against creating real opportunities for ending marginalization. Schlesinger believes that "movements for civil rights should aim toward full acceptance and integration of marginalized groups into the mainstream culture, rather than … perpetuating that marginalization through affirmations of difference."<ref> Arthur Meier Schlesinger, ''The Disuniting of America: Reflections on a Multicultural Society'' (W. W. Norton & Company, 1998, ISBN 0393318540). </ref>
−
White identity politics concerns the manifestation of the ethnocultural identity of [[white people]] in various national political settings such as the United States or Australia.
 
  
−
In 1998, political scientists [[Jeffrey Kaplan (academic)|Jeffrey Kaplan]] and Leonard Weinberg predicted that, by the late 20th-century, a "Euro-American radical right" would promote a trans-national white identity politics, which would invoke populist grievance narratives and encourage hostility against non-white peoples and [[multiculturalism]].<ref>{{cite book|author1=Jeffrey Kaplan|author-link1=Jeffrey Kaplan (academic)|author2=Leonard Weinberg|title=The Emergence of a Euro-American Radical Right|date=1998|publisher=[[Rutgers University Press]]|isbn=978-0813525648|page=18}}</ref> In the United States, mainstream news has identified [[Donald Trump]]'s presidency as a signal of increasing and widespread utilization of white identity politics within the Republican Party and political landscape.<ref>{{Cite news |url=https://apnews.com/c13df86fa32d4938b4d15f205531719a |title=Trump's America: Where politics dictate definition of racism|author1=Claire Galofaro|author2=Bill Barrow|quote=Bremner’s show carries just one current of the heated national debate on race that has been fanned by Trump’s unrepentant use of white identity politics|date=August 6, 2019|publisher=[[Associated Press]]}}</ref> Political journalists such as [[Michael Scherer]] and [[David Smith (journalist)|David Smith]] have reported on its development since the mid-2010s.<ref>{{Cite news |url=https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2019/dec/07/kamala-harris-democratic-primary-whitewash-2020-debates |title=After Kamala: activists fear Democratic primary whitewash|author-link=David Smith (journalist)|author=David Smith|quote=Donald Trump’s Republican party has leaned into white identity politics.|date=December 8, 2019|work=[[The Guardian]]}}</ref><ref>{{Cite news |url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/white-identity-politics-drives-trump-and-the-republican-party-under-him/2019/07/16/a5ff5710-a733-11e9-a3a6-ab670962db05_story.html |title=White identity politics drives Trump, and the Republican Party under him|author-link=Michael Scherer|author=Michael Scherer|quote=Trump’s combustible formula of white identity politics already has reshaped the Republican Party, sidelining, silencing or converting nearly anyone who dares to challenge the racial insensitivity of his utterances.|date=July 16, 2019|work=[[The Washington Post]]}}</ref>
+
[[Brendan O'Neill (journalist)|Brendan O'Neill]] has suggested that identity politics causes (rather than simply recognizing and acting on) political schisms along lines of [[social identity]]. Thus, he contrasts the politics of [[gay liberation]] and identity politics by saying: "[[Peter Tatchell|[Peter] Tatchell]] also had, back in the day, … a commitment to the politics of liberation, which encouraged gays to come out and live and engage. Now, we have the politics of identity, which invites people to stay in, to look inward, to obsess over the body and the self, to surround themselves with a moral forcefield to protect their worldview—which has nothing to do with the world—from any questioning."<ref>Brendan O'Neill, [https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/identity-politics-has-created-an-army-of-vicious-narcissistic-cowards "Identity politics has created an army of vicious, narcissistic cowards,"] ''The Spectator'', February 19, 2015. Retrieved March 11, 2022.</ref>
  
−
[[Ron Brownstein]] believes that President Trump uses "White Identity Politics" to bolster his base and that this will ultimately limit his ability to reach out to non-[[White American]] voters for the [[2020 United States presidential election]].<ref>{{Cite news |url=https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2019/08/trump-2020-democrats-racism/596155/ |title=The Limits of Trump's White Identity Politics|author-link=Ron Brownstein|author=Ron Brownstein|date=August 15, 2019|work=[[The Atlantic]]}}</ref> A four-year [[Reuters]] and [[Ipsos]] analysis concurred that "Trump's brand of white identity politics may be less effective in the 2020 election campaign."<ref>{{cite news |url=https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-election-race-poll/for-trump-appeals-to-white-fears-about-race-may-be-a-tougher-sell-in-2020-reuters-ipsos-poll-idUSKCN1V90TX |title=For Trump, appeals to white fears about race may be a tougher sell in 2020: Reuters/Ipsos poll|author=Chris Kahn|date=August 19, 2019|work=[[Reuters]]}}</ref> Alternatively, examining the same poll, [[David Smith (journalist)|David Smith]] has written that "Trump’s embrace of white identity politics may work to his advantage" in 2020.<ref>{{Cite news |url=https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2019/jul/21/trump-race-charlottesville-democrats-ilhan-omar-2020 |title='It's a political civil war': Trump's racist tirades set tone for 2020 |author-link=David Smith (journalist)|author=David Smith|quote=Intentionally or not, Trump’s embrace of white identity politics may work to his advantage next year... A Reuters/Ipsos poll showed his net approval among Republicans rose by five points to 72%.|date=December 8, 2019|work=[[The Guardian]]}}</ref> During the [[2020 Democratic Party presidential primaries|Democratic primaries]], presidential candidate [[Pete Buttigieg]] publicly warned that the president and his administration were using white identity politics, which he said was the most divisive form of identity politics.<ref>{{cite news|author1=Maureen Groppe|title=Pete Buttigieg says Donald Trump's white 'identity politics' contributing to a 'crisis of belonging'  |url=https://eu.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/elections/2019/05/12/pete-buttigieg-says-donald-trump-divides-white-identity-politics/1151265001/|newspaper=[[USA Today]] |date=May 13, 2019}}
+
In these and other ways, a political perspective oriented to one's own well being can be recast as causing the divisions that it insists upon making visible. Similarly in the United Kingdom, author [[Owen Jones (writer)|Owen Jones]] argues that identity politics often marginalize the [[working class]], saying:
−
* {{cite news|title=Pete Buttigieg warns Democrats about lure of identity politics  |url=https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2019/may/12/pete-buttigieg-human-rights-campaign-trump|newspaper=[[The Guardian]] |date=May 12, 2019}}</ref> Columnist [[Reihan Salam]] writes that he is not convinced that Trump uses "white identity politics" given the fact that he still has significant support from liberal and moderate Republicans – who are more favorable toward immigration and the legalization of undocumented immigrants – but believes that it could become a bigger issue as whites become a minority and assert their rights like other minority groups.<ref name=Salam>{{Cite news|first=Reihan  |last= Salam |title=Reihan Salam: Is 'white nationalism' rising?  |newspaper=[[Dallas Morning News]]|date= Sep 25, 2015 }}</ref> Salam also states that an increase in "white identity" politics is far from certain given the very high rates of [[Interracial marriage in the United States|intermarriage]] and the historical example of the once Anglo-Protestant cultural majority embracing a more inclusive white cultural majority which included Jews, Italians, Poles, Arabs, and Irish.<ref name=Salam />
 
  
−
Columnist [[Ross Douthat]] has argued that it has been important to American politics since the [[Richard Nixon]]-era of the Republican Party,<ref>{{Cite news |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2019/09/10/opinion/racism-republicans-trump.html |title=Can the Right Escape Racism?|author-link=Ross Douthat|author=Ross Douthat|date=September 10, 2019|work=[[The New York Times]]}}</ref> and historian [[Nell Irvin Painter]] has analyzed [[Eric Kaufmann]]'s thesis that the phenomenon is caused by immigration-derived [[racial diversity]], which reduces the white majority, and an "anti-majority adversary culture".<ref>{{cite magazine |url=https://www.foreignaffairs.com/reviews/review-essay/2019-10-15/what-white-america |title= What Is White America? The Identity Politics of the Majority |author-link=Nell Irvin Painter|author=Nell Irvin Painter|date=November 1, 2019|magazine=[[Foreign Affairs]]}}</ref> Writing in ''[[Vox Media|Vox]]'', political commentator [[Ezra Klein]] believes that demographic change has fueled the emergence of white identity politics.<ref>{{Cite news |url=https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2019/7/16/20695031/trump-ocasio-cortez-omar-pressley-tlaib-pelosi-squad |title=Trump vs. "the Squad"|author-link=Ezra Klein|author=Ezra Klein|quote=The other views American politics through the lens of demographic change and the white identity politics it triggers.|date=July 16, 2019|publisher=[[Vox Media]]}}</ref>
+
<Blockquote> In the 1950s and 1960s, left-wing intellectuals who were both inspired and informed by a powerful labour movement wrote hundreds of books and articles on working-class issues. Such work would help shape the views of politicians at the very top of the Labour Party. Today, progressive intellectuals are far more interested in issues of identity. ... Of course, the struggles for the emancipation of women, gays, and ethnic minorities are exceptionally important causes. New Labour has co-opted them, passing genuinely progressive legislation on gay equality and women's rights, for example. But it is an agenda that has happily co-existed with the sidelining of the working class in politics, allowing New Labour to protect its radical flank while pressing ahead with Thatcherite policies.<ref>Owen Jones, ''Chavs: The Demonization of the Working Class'' (London, England: Verso, 2021, ISBN 978-1844678648), 255.</ref></blockquote>
  
−
=== Gender ===
+
A leftist critique of identity politics, such as that of Nancy Fraser,<ref>Nancy Fraser, [https://www.academia.edu/8569335/From_Redistribution_to_Recognition_Dilemmas_of_Justice_in_a_Post_Socialist_Age|journal=, "From Redistribution to Recognition? Dilemmas of Justice in a ‘Post-Socialist’ Age,"] ''Academia.edu''. Retrieved March 10, 2022.</ref> argues that political mobilization based on identitarian affirmation leads to surface redistribution that does not challenge the status quo. Instead, Fraser argued, identitarian deconstruction, rather than affirmation, is more conducive to a leftist politics of economic redistribution. Other critiques, such as that of Kurzwelly, Rapport and Spiegel,<ref>Jonatan Kurzwelly, Nigel Rapport, and Andrew Spiegel, [https://www.researchgate.net/publication/343029871_Encountering_explaining_and_refuting_essentialism "Encountering, explaining and refuting essentialism,"] ''Anthropology Southern Africa'' 43(2), 2020: 65–81. Retrieved March 10, 2022.</ref> point out that identity politics often leads to reproduction and [[Reification (fallacy)|reification]] of [[Essentialism|essentialist]] notions of identity, notions which they argue are inherently erroneous.
−
Gender identity politics is an approach that views politics, both in practice and as an academic discipline, as having a gendered nature and that gender is an identity that influences how people think.<ref>Celis, K.  Kantola, J. Waylen, G. Weldon, S. [https://www.oxfordhandbooks.com/view/10.1093/oxfordhb/9780199751457.001.0001/oxfordhb-9780199751457-e-34?print=pdf 'Introduction: Gender and Politics: A Gendered World, a Gendered Discipline'], The Oxford Handbook of Gender and Politics, 2013</ref> Politics has become increasingly gender political as formal structures and informal 'rules of the game have become gendered. How institutions affect men and women differently are starting to be analysed in more depth as gender will affect institutional innovation.<ref>[Mona L. Krook, Fiona Mckay] [https://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/uea/reader.action?docID=665680] [Gender, Politics ans Institutions] [2011 Palgrave Macmillan]</ref>
 
  
−
==See also==
+
=== Intersectional critiques ===
−
{{div col|colwidth=15em}}
+
In her journal article ''Mapping the Margins: Intersectionality, Identity Politics and Violence against Women of Color,'' [[Kimberle Crenshaw]] treats identity politics as a process that brings people together based on a shared aspect of their identity. Crenshaw applauds identity politics for bringing African Americans (and other non-white people), gays and lesbians, and other oppressed groups together in community and progress. But she critiques it because "it frequently conflates or ignores intragroup differences."<ref>Kimberle Crenshaw, "Mapping the Margins: Intersectionality, Identity Politics, and Violence against Women of Color," ''Stanford Law Review'' 43(6), January 1, 1991, 1241–99.</ref> Crenshaw argues that for Black women, at least two aspects of their identity are the subject of oppression: their race and their sex.<ref>Kimberle Crenshaw, "Demarginalizing the Intersection of Race and Sex: A Black Feminist Critique of Antidiscrimination Doctrine, Feminist Theory and Antiracist Politics," University of Chicago Legal Forum, 1989 no. 1, 139–167.</ref> From the viewpoint of intersectionality, identity politics are useful, but incomplete. Intersectionality further breaks identities into subgroups; [[African-American]], [[homosexual]], [[women]], would constitute a particular hyper-specific identity class.<ref>Mary L. Gray, [https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/15295030903015062 "Queer Nation is Dead/Long Live Queer Nation": The Politics and Poetics of Social Movement and Media Representation] ''Critical Studies in Media Communication'' 26(3) (2009): 212–236. Retrieved March 10, 2022.</ref>
−
* [[Adversarial process]]
 
−
* [[Affirmative action]]
 
−
* [[Auto-segregation]]
 
−
* [[Blue-collar worker]]
 
−
* [[White-collar worker]]
 
−
* [[Client politics]]
 
−
* [[Conflict theory]]
 
−
* [[Conviction politics]]
 
−
* [[Culture war]]
 
−
* [[Diaspora politics]]
 
−
* [[Divide and rule]]
 
−
* [[Diversity (politics)]]
 
−
* [[Endogamy]]
 
−
* [[Ethnic interest group]]
 
−
* [[False consciousness]]
 
−
* [[Group polarization]]
 
−
* [[Group rights]]
 
−
* [[Identity (social science)]]
 
−
* [[Identitarianism]]
 
−
* [[Interest group liberalism]]
 
−
* [[Marx's theory of alienation#Alienation of the worker from other workers|Marx's theory of alienation]]
 
−
* [[Minority influence]]
 
−
* [[Nationalism]]
 
−
* [[New social movements]]
 
−
* [[Objectification]]
 
−
* [[Opposition to immigration]]
 
−
* [[Political consciousness]]
 
−
* [[Political correctness]]
 
−
* [[Queer theory]]
 
−
* [[Racialism]]
 
−
* [[Sectarianism]]
 
−
* [[Separatism]]
 
−
* [[Social conflict theory]]
 
−
* [[Standpoint theory]]
 
−
* [[Toxic masculinity]]
 
−
* [[Tribalism]]
 
−
* [[Voting bloc]]
 
−
{{div col end}}
 
  
−
== Further reading ==
+
==Notes==
 +
<references/>
  
−
* Christopher T. Stout. 2020. ''[https://www.google.com/books/edition/The_Case_for_Identity_Politics/PGnaDwAAQBAJ The Case for Identity Politics: Polarization, Demographic Change, and Racial Appeals]''. University of Virginia Press.
+
== References ==
  
−
== References ==
+
* Ackelsberg, Martha A. "Identity Politics, Political Identities: Thoughts toward a Multicultural Politics," Frontiers: A Journal of Women Studies 16(1) (1996): 87–100.
−
{{Reflist}}
+
* Butler, Judith Butler. "Performative Acts and Gender Constitution: An Essay in Phenomenology and Feminist Theory," Theatre Journal 40(4) (1988): 519–531.
 +
* Chua, Amy. ''Political Tribes: Group Instinct and the Fate of Nations''. New York, NY: Penguin Press, 2019. ISBN 978-0399562877
 +
* Crenshaw, Kimberlé Williams, "Mapping the Margins: Intersectionality, Identity Politics, and Violence against Women of Color," Stanford Law Review 43(6) (1991): 1297.
 +
* Eisenstein, Zillah R. (ed.). ''Capitalist Patriarchy and the Case for Socialist Feminism''. New York, NY: Monthly Review Press, 1979. ISBN 0853454760
 +
* Fleras, Augie, and Roger Maaka. ''The Politics of Indigeneity: Challenging the State in Canada and Aotearoa New Zealand''. Dunedin, NZ: Otago University Press, 2005. ISBN 978-1877276538
 +
* Halperin, David M. ''One Hundred Years of Homosexuality: And Other Essays on Greek Love''. New York, NY: Routledge, 1990. ISBN 978-0415900973
 +
* Harding, Sandra, and Merrill B. Hintikka (eds.). ''Discovering Reality: Feminist Perspectives on Epistemology, Metaphysics, Methodology, and Philosophy of Science'' Synthese Library, vol 161. Springer, Dordrecht, 1983. ISBN 978-9027715388
 +
* Hoffman, Amy. ''An Army of Ex-Lovers: My life at the Gay Community News''. Amherst, MA: University of Massachusetts Press, 2007. ISBN 978-1558496217
 +
* Hollibaugh, Amber. [https://www.autostraddle.com/gay-rights-are-not-queer-liberation-the-nation-interviews-amber-hollibaugh-140431/ "Gay Rights Are Not Queer Liberation,"] ''Autostraddle'', June 29, 2012. Retrieved June 30, 2022.
 +
* Hoskins, Te Kawehau, and Alison Jones (eds.). ''Critical Conversations in Kaupapa Maori''. Wellington, NZ: Huia Publishers, 2005. ISBN 978-1775503286
 +
* Jagose, Annamarie. ''Queer Theory: An Introduction''. New York, NY: New York University Press, 1997. ISBN 9780814742341
 +
* Jones, Owen. ''Chavs: The Demonization of the Working Class''. London, England: Verso, 2021. ISBN 978-1844678648
 +
* King, Deborah K. "Multiple Jeopardy, Multiple Consciousness: The Context of a Black Feminist Ideology," Journal of Women in Culture and Society 14(1) 10-01 (1988): 42–72.
 +
* Levine, Hal B. ''Constructing Collective Identity: A comparative analysis of New Zealand Jews, Maori, and urban Papua New Guineans''. Pieterlen and Bern, Switzerland: Peter Lang, 1997. ISBN 978-3631319444
 +
* Lynch, Marc. ''The Arab Uprisings Explained: New Contentious Politics in the Middle East''. New York, NY: Columbia University Press, 2019. ISBN 978-0231158855
 +
* Mortimer, Dora. "Can Straight People Be Queer? - An increasing number of young celebrities are labeling themselves 'queer.' But what does this mean for the queer community?" ''Vice Media'', February 9, 2016.
 +
* Noury, Abnul, and Gerard Roland, "Identity Politics and Populism in Europe," ''Annual Review of Political Science'' 23 (2020): 421–439.
 +
* Said, Edward. ''Orientalism''. Vintage, 1979. ISBN 978-0394740676
 +
* Said, Nijla. ''Looking for Palestine: Growing Up Confused in an Arab-American Family''. Riverhead Books, 2014. ISBN 978-1594632754
 +
* Schlesinger, Arthur Meier. ''The Disuniting of America: Reflections on a Multicultural Society''. W. W. Norton & Company, 1998. ISBN 0393318540
 +
* Smith, Barbara (ed.). ''Home Girls: A Black Feminist Anthology''. New York, NY: Kitchen Table: Women of Color Press, 1983. ISBN 0913175021
 +
* Stout, Christopher T. ''The Case for Identity Politics: Polarization, Demographic Change, and Racial Appeals''. Charlottesville, VA: University of Virginia Press, 2020. ISBN 978-0813944982
 +
* Taylor, Keeanga-Yamahtta. ''How we get free : Black feminism and the Combahee River Collective'' Chicago, IL: Haymarket Books, 2017. ISBN 978-1642591040
 +
* Wiarda, Howard J. ''Political Culture, Political Science, and Identity Politics: An Uneasy Alliance''. Abingdon-on-Thames, UK: Routledge, 2014. ISBN 978-1472442284
 +
* Wise, Christopher, and Paul James (eds.). ''Being Arab: Arabism and the Politics of Recognition''. Victoria, Australia: Arena Publications, 2010.
  
 
==External links==
 
==External links==
−
{{Commons category}}
+
All links retrieved June 30, 2022.
−
{{wikiquote}}
+
 
−
*[https://web.archive.org/web/20161206100016/http://belfercenter.ksg.harvard.edu/project/57/religion_in_international_affairs.html Initiative on Religion in International Affairs] at Harvard
+
*[http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/identity-politics/ Identity politics] ''Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy''
−
*[http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/identity-politics/ "Identity politics"], ''[[Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy]]'', 16 July 2002
+
*Joan Mandel. [https://userpages.umbc.edu/~korenman/wmst/identity_pol.html How Political is the Personal?: Identity Politics, Feminism and Social Change]
−
*Joan Mandel. [https://userpages.umbc.edu/~korenman/wmst/identity_pol.html "How Political Is the Personal?: Identity Politics, Feminism and Social Change"], [[University of Maryland, Baltimore County]]
+
*Roger Lancaster. [https://jacobin.com/2017/08/identity-politics-gay-rights-neoliberalism-stonewall-feminism-race Identity Politics Can Only Get Us So Far] ''Jacobin'', August 3, 2017.
−
*[https://www.seattleweekly.com/news/a-marxist-critiques-identity-politics/ "A Marxist Critiques Identity Politics"]. ''[[Seattle Weekly]]''. 25 April 2017.
+
*Sheri Berman. [https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/jul/14/identity-politics-right-left-trump-racism Why identity politics benefits the right more than the left] ''The Guardian'', July 14, 2018.
−
*[https://www.jacobinmag.com/2017/08/identity-politics-gay-rights-neoliberalism-stonewall-feminism-race "Identity Politics Can Only Get Us So Far"]. ''[[Jacobin (magazine)|Jacobin]]''. 3 August 2017.
 
−
*[https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/jul/14/identity-politics-right-left-trump-racism "Why identity politics benefits the right more than the left"]. ''[[The Guardian]]''. 14 July 2018.
 
  
 
{{credit|1003760073}}
 
{{credit|1003760073}}

Latest revision as of 14:15, 4 February 2023

Barbara Smith, a founding member of the Combahee River Collective, the first scholar to coin the term "identity politics"

Identity politics refers to the idea that socially constructed identities, especially in minority communities, are the basis for creating group solidarity and political action. It is especially applied to political action by groups that identify as racial and gender minorities, but also includes immigrant status, social class, or other identifying factors. Identity politics is an attempt to develop political agendas that are based upon these identities. The term is used in a variety of ways to describe phenomena as diverse as multiculturalism, women's movements, civil rights, lesbian and gay movements, and regional separatist movements.

Many contemporary advocates of identity politics take an intersectional perspective, which accounts for the range of interacting systems of oppression that may affect their lives and come from their various identities. According to many who describe themselves as advocates of identity politics, it centers the lived experiences of those facing what they term "systemic oppression." Systemic oppression is the view that the problems minorities face are not understandable as simply racism, or sexism, but rather the belief that society is organized to serve the interests of the majority at the expense of minorities.

Identity politics typically is used to describe the efforts to create community and struggle against majority groups by people of specific race, ethnicity, sex, gender identity, sexual orientation, age, economic class, disability status, education, religion, language, profession, political party, veteran status, and geographic location. These identity labels are not mutually exclusive but are in many cases compounded when describing hyper-specific groups.

Identity politics has critics from both liberal and Marxist perspectives. Liberals see it as particularist, in contrast to the universalism of liberal perspectives. Marxists argue that it detracts attention from non-identity based structures of oppression and exploitation. Those who take an intersectional perspective, such as Kimberlé Crenshaw, criticize narrower forms of identity politics which over-emphasize inter-group differences and ignore intra-group differences and forms of oppression.

Terminology

The term identity politics may have been used in political discourse since at least the 1970s.[1]

During the late 1970s, increasing numbers of women—namely Jewish women, women of color, and lesbians—criticized the assumption of a common "woman's experience" irrespective of unique differences in race, ethnicity, class, sexuality, and culture.[2] The first known written appearance of the term is found in the April 1977 statement of the Black feminist socialist group, Combahee River Collective.[3] edited by Barbara Smith, a founding member of the Collective, credited with coining the term.[4] The collective group of women saw identity politics as an analysis that introduced opportunity for Black women to be actively involved in politics, while simultaneously acting as a tool to authenticate Black women's personal experiences.[5] It took on widespread usage in the early 1980s. It has gained currency with the emergence of social justice activism.

In academic usage, the term identity politics refers to a wide range of political activities and theoretical analyses based on the subjective experience of injustice shared by different, marginalized social groups. In this context, identity politics aims to both create solidarity around these socially constructed identities and to create greater self-determination and political freedom for marginalized peoples through understanding particular paradigms and lifestyle factors. It seeks to challenge the socially constructed characterizations and limitations, instead of organizing solely around status quo belief systems or traditional party affiliations.[6] Identity is used "as a tool to frame political claims, promote political ideologies, or stimulate and orient social and political action, usually in a larger context of inequality or injustice and with the aim of asserting group distinctiveness and belonging and gaining power and recognition."[7]

History

1960s Liberalism

Civil Rights Era

Liberalism implicitly accepted that the statement in the Declaration of Independence that "all men are created equal" could serve as the basis for creating a more inclusive, just society. Based on these ideas liberals had fought to correct what they saw as flaws in the political society that led to discrimination against women, people of color and homosexuals. The civil rights movement conducted campaigns like the Montgomery bus boycott, the Birmingham campaign, and numerous others to force desegregation and create economic opportunity for blacks. President John F. Kennedy spoke of creating an "equal chance" for all Americans.[8]These efforts would lead to passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 which would outlaw discrimination based on race, color, religion, sex, and national origin. Sexual orientation and gender identity would be added later. The next year the Voter Rights Act of 1965 was passed, prohibiting states from passing laws and creating rules that would unfairly hinder minority voters from casting their votes. In 1964, President Lyndon Baines Johnson and Congress passes the Great Society legislation as part of his war on poverty. These were all part of the liberal efforts to promote equal opportunity for all Americans.

Gay rights movement

In 1969 a riot broke out at the Stonewall Inn of the Greenwich Village area of Manhattan in New York City. This is largely considered the initiation of the gay liberation movement. Gay liberation built on the feminist notion that the personal is the political. Annual marches to commemorate the anniversary of Stonewall would later become the Gay Pride parade. While there were always different groups within different interests within the movement, as with the feminist movement, much of the focus was on equal rights, cultural acceptance, and removing barriers to employment.

The gay liberation movement of the late 1960s through the mid-1980s urged lesbians and gay men to engage in radical direct action, and to counter societal shame with gay pride. In the feminist spirit of the personal being political, the most basic form of activism was an emphasis on coming out to family, friends, and colleagues, and living life as an openly lesbian or gay person. While the 1970s were the peak of "gay liberation" in New York City and other urban areas in the United States, "gay liberation" was the term still used instead of "gay pride" in more oppressive areas into the mid-1980s, with some organizations opting for the more inclusive, "lesbian and gay liberation."[9] While women and transgender activists had lobbied for more inclusive names from the beginning of the movement, the initialism LGBT, or "Queer" as a counterculture shorthand for LGBT, did not gain much acceptance as an umbrella term until much later in the 1980s, and in some areas not until the 1990s or even 2000s.[10]

Postmodernism and identity politics

The 1960s and 1970s also saw the rise of postmodernism in the academy. Deconstruction and the power/knowledge theories of Michel Foucault became highly influential. They argued that the Enlightenment and scientific knowledge that emerged from it produced knowledge that supported the ruling class. Jacques Derrida argued that Western discourses were phallocentric, by which he meant both theocratic and patriarchal. Foucault argued that knowledge was produced by discursive practices that propped up existing power structures. The result of postmodern ideas was an attack on the universalist assumptions of the Enlightenment and liberalism.

The postmodern critique argued that these universal ideals were grounded in discourses that were designed to prop up the power of the establishment, who are predominantly white, male and heterosexual. Postmodernism argues that discourses serve the interests of the ruling majority. In the 1990s and after, these ideas were taken up by the theorists of race, feminism and gender studies. They would come to be grounded in the new postmodern Critical theory.

Civil rights, feminism and gay liberation and anti-colonial movements would all undergo major shifts based on the idea that social action now meant fighting for one's identity. They adopted the view that political struggle now meant that society must affirm their marginalized and excluded identities. The rise of this new identity politics meant that critical and social theory itself must undergo a transformation, or fragmentation as the dominant theory was white, male and heteronormative. Each category - women, gay men and lesbians, people of color, and various previously excluded groups - would develop its own version of theory based on its own sense of identity. These would be sometimes allied, sometimes competing. Diversity would require not only different attempts to understand social phenomena, but also of their very theoretical discourse itself.

Post-colonialism

One of the key tenets of modern identity politics comes from post-colonialism, although it is shared by all the other postmodern critical approaches. It is the concept of "otherness" or "othering." In his book, Orientalism, Egyptian literary critic Edward Said, using Michel Foucault's postmodern theory of discourse argued that that the West not only created the East as the exotic other, but in the process had created themselves as the norm by which the other could be measured. The result for the other is that they were excluded not only from the discourse of the West, but also from themselves. They needed to reclaim themselves on their own terms.[11] This view of otherness was explicitly political and a call for a politics of identity which runs through all the postmodern discourses of marginalized groups.

Social Construction of Identity

In the 1990s and early 2000s, a new generation of scholars applied the theories of postmodernism to race, gender and other marginalized groups. They created new theories about society, like Intersectionality, standpoint theory and the social construction of identity. Identity politics depends heavily on these new theories that arose largely from race and gender studies programs. According to postmodern social constructionism, it is not people who make discourses, but discourses which make people. As truth and universal values have been critiqued as reflecting the values of the dominant class and culture, the discourses of reason, logic, evidence, and norms is rejected as white, male, heteronormative culture making individual subjects that conform to the norm. For postmodern race and gender theorists, group identity becomes the locus of resistance and the defining feature of what is generally understood as individual subjectivity. The social construction of (group) identity would serve as the basis for a shift in the approach of identity politics from equality of opportunity to fighting for diversity, inclusion and equity.

Standpoint theory was introduced into feminist scholarship by Nancy Hartsock in 1983.[12] It is based on the view that people occupying the same location in the social grid have roughly the same experience of power, and that one's position within the power grid will determine what one can know. While originating in a Marxist context, within the postmodern context, it is now a key element of identity politics. What a person is capable of knowing is said to be based on their group. Those who are part of the majority are said to be privileged, not capable of knowing the experience of minorities or their own privilege. Those that are part of a racial, gender or other minority group are said to be able to see not only their own experience but also understand the experience of majority. Standpoint theory emphasizes lived, personal, and subjective knowledge over the objective knowledge that is the basis for the majority's social position and power.

Third-wave feminism, Critical race theory, and Intersectionality

Second-wave feminism emerged in the 1960s and 1970s within liberal politics to advocate for greater rights and freedoms for women. Third-wave feminism was in part a reaction to that and to the sense that feminism had not included women of color. In 1988, Deborah K. King coined the term multiple jeopardy to express how factors of oppression are all interconnected. King suggested that the identities of gender, class, and race each have an individual prejudicial connotation, which has an incremental effect on the inequity of which one experiences.[13]

Intersectionality followed shortly afterward. It represented a significant step in the development of identity politics. It began with Kimberlé Williams Crenshaw famous essay, "Mapping the Margin: Intersectionality, Identity Politics, and Violence against Women of Color." It was a key text in the rejection of liberal inclusiveness in favor of a more radical identity politics. The liberal approach was grounded in a universalism. Crenshaw insisted on foregrounding identity, famously describing the difference between the statement, "I am Black," versus "I am a person who happens to be Black." The former grounds the person's subjectivity in their social identity, while the latter treats that social identity as an accidental feature grounded in the person's universal claim to personhood.[14]

Kimberlé Crenshaw was a student of Derek Bell, the law professor generally credited with the development of Critical legal studies at Harvard Law School in the 1980s. This developed into Critical Race Theory. Bell originally focused on largely economic issues. In the 1990s scholars like Crenshaw and Patricia Hill Collins applied postmodern critical theory to the field. From their backgrounds in feminism as well as racial studies, they created concepts like intersectionality to describe how racial and gender minorities experience marginalization and oppression within the dominant culture. Intersectionality developed as a result of third-wave feminism and in part as a response to it. Black feminists, influenced by the rise of Critical race theory, argued that the experience of black women could not be fully understood or described by oppression as understood by feminism, nor that of black males.

This postmodern critical race theory rejects the older liberal notion of creating greater opportunities for blacks and other minorities and focuses on cultural issues and identity politics. It repudiates liberal approach to a rights-based remedies (expanding access to education and economic opportunities) on the critical theoretical grounds that social structures systematically oppress blacks and only permit remedies that do not change the dominant structure and that serve white interests. Critical race theory attempts to disrupt the socially constructed system, rejecting objectivity as racist and offering narratives of oppression based on identity. Rather than a color-blind society, it seeks to foreground racial identity as the basis for critique and political organizing.

Gender theory and Queer theory

The emergence of gender theory in the 1980s and 1990s also had a profound impact on feminism. Gender theory, like Critical race theory and intersectionality relied heavily on postmodern discourse analysis. It also help precipitate a major shift in feminism away from the focus on equal access and improving the economic lives of women to the ways in which the discourse of modernity excluded and oppressed women.

Queer theory emerged in the 1990s with the works of theorists like Judith Butler, Eve Kosofsky Sedgewick and Gayle Rubin. Grounded in postmodern theory, Queer theory has an explicitly political agenda grounded in identity politics. It seeks to "blur boundaries" and disrupt notions of what is normative in order to "create a space" for the marginalized and excluded. The term "queer" is meant to refer to all marginalized groups.

By the 2000s, in some areas of postmodern queer studies (notably those around gender) the idea of "identity politics" began to shift away from that of naming and claiming lived experience, and authority arising from lived experience, to one emphasizing choice and performance.[15] Judith Butler, who does not identity as postmodern, and those influenced by her particularly stress this concept of remaking and unmaking performative identities.[16] Writers in the field of Queer theory have at times taken this to the extent as to now argue that "queer," despite generations of specific use to describe a "non-heterosexual" sexual orientation,[17] no longer needs to refer to any specific sexual orientation at all; that it is now only about "disrupting the mainstream," with author David M. Halperin arguing that straight people may now also self-identify as "queer."[18] However, many LGBT people believe this concept of "queer heterosexuality" is an oxymoron and offensive form of cultural appropriation which not only robs gays and lesbians of their identities, but makes invisible and irrelevant the actual, lived experience of oppression that causes them to be marginalized in the first place.[19] "It desexualizes identity, when the issue is precisely about a sexual identity."[20]

Non-U.S. Examples

The United States strives to assimilate ethnic minorities. While there are ethnic neighborhoods, they do not maintain political sovereignty over a region of the country. In other western countries such regional control by minority populations does exist. In such regions, identity politics plays a role in either the fight against discrimination, or even autonomy. In Canada and Spain, identity politics has been used to promote separatist movements, like the Quebecois and the Basque.

In Africa, Asia, and eastern Europe, identity politics has supported violent nationalist and ethnic conflicts. However, it also can refer to majority groups as well. In Europe, where assimilation is less successful, identity politics can also support the idea that the silent majority needs to be protected from globalization and immigration.[21]

Arab identity politics

Arab identity politics concerns the identity-based politics derived from the racial or ethnocultural consciousness of Arab people. In the regionalism of the Middle East, it has particular meaning in relation to the national and cultural identities of non-Arab countries, such as Turkey, Iran, and North African countries: "Iranian and Arab identity politics thwarted, perverted, and dismembered communitarian thinking for long periods in the twentieth century and the same applies to other forms of psycho-nationalism in Turkey."[22][23] In their 2010 Being Arab: Arabism and the Politics of Recognition, Christopher Wise and Paul James challenged the view that, in the post-Afghanistan and Iraq invasion era, Arab identity-driven politics were ending. Refuting the view that had "drawn many analysts to conclude that the era of Arab identity politics has passed", Wise and James examined its development as a viable alternative to Islamic fundamentalism in the Arab world.[24]

According to Marc Lynch, the post-Arab Spring era has seen increasing Arab identity politics, which is "marked by state-state rivalries as well as state-society conflicts". Lynch believes this is creating a new Arab Cold War, no longer characterized by Sunni-Shia sectarian divides but by a reemergent Arab identity in the region.[25]Najla Said has explored her lifelong experience with Arab identity politics in her book Looking for Palestine.[26]

Muslim Identity politics

Muslim identity has some overlap, and some important differences from Arab identity. Many Muslims are Arab, but there are large blocks that are Persian, Asian, European and North American. Since the 1970s, the interaction of religion and politics has been associated with the rise of Islamist movements in the Middle East. Salwa Ismail posits that the Muslim identity is related to social dimensions such as gender, class, and lifestyles (Intersectionality), thus, different Muslims occupy different social positions in relation to the processes of globalization. Not all uniformly engage in the construction of Muslim identity, and they do not all apply to a monolithic Muslim identity.

Māori identity politics

The Māori are indigenous Polynesian peoples native to New Zealand. Due to somewhat competing tribe-based versus pan-Māori concepts, there is both an internal and external utilization of Māori identity politics in New Zealand.[27] Projected outwards, Māori identity politics has been a disrupting force in the politics of New Zealand and post-colonial conceptions of nationhood.[28] Its development has also been explored as causing parallel ethnic identity developments in non-Māori populations.[29] Alison Jones, in her co-written Tuai: A Traveller in Two Worlds, suggests that a form of Māori identity politics, directly oppositional to Pākehā (white New Zealanders), has helped provide a "basis for internal collaboration and a politics of strength".[30]

A 2009, Ministry of Social Development journal identified Māori identity politics, and societal reactions to it, as the most prominent factor behind significant changes in self-identification from the 2006 New Zealand census.[31]

Criticism

The term identity politics has been applied retroactively to varying movements that long predate its coinage. Historian Arthur Schlesinger Jr. discussed identity politics extensively in his book The Disuniting of America. Schlesinger, a strong supporter of liberal conceptions of civil rights, argues that a liberal democracy requires a common basis for culture and society to function. Rather than seeing civil society as already fractured along lines of power and powerlessness (according to race, ethnicity, sexuality, etc.), Schlesinger suggests that basing politics on group marginalization is itself what fractures the civil polity, and that identity politics therefore works against creating real opportunities for ending marginalization. Schlesinger believes that "movements for civil rights should aim toward full acceptance and integration of marginalized groups into the mainstream culture, rather than … perpetuating that marginalization through affirmations of difference."[32]

Brendan O'Neill has suggested that identity politics causes (rather than simply recognizing and acting on) political schisms along lines of social identity. Thus, he contrasts the politics of gay liberation and identity politics by saying: "[Peter] Tatchell also had, back in the day, … a commitment to the politics of liberation, which encouraged gays to come out and live and engage. Now, we have the politics of identity, which invites people to stay in, to look inward, to obsess over the body and the self, to surround themselves with a moral forcefield to protect their worldview—which has nothing to do with the world—from any questioning."[33]

In these and other ways, a political perspective oriented to one's own well being can be recast as causing the divisions that it insists upon making visible. Similarly in the United Kingdom, author Owen Jones argues that identity politics often marginalize the working class, saying:

In the 1950s and 1960s, left-wing intellectuals who were both inspired and informed by a powerful labour movement wrote hundreds of books and articles on working-class issues. Such work would help shape the views of politicians at the very top of the Labour Party. Today, progressive intellectuals are far more interested in issues of identity. ... Of course, the struggles for the emancipation of women, gays, and ethnic minorities are exceptionally important causes. New Labour has co-opted them, passing genuinely progressive legislation on gay equality and women's rights, for example. But it is an agenda that has happily co-existed with the sidelining of the working class in politics, allowing New Labour to protect its radical flank while pressing ahead with Thatcherite policies.[34]

A leftist critique of identity politics, such as that of Nancy Fraser,[35] argues that political mobilization based on identitarian affirmation leads to surface redistribution that does not challenge the status quo. Instead, Fraser argued, identitarian deconstruction, rather than affirmation, is more conducive to a leftist politics of economic redistribution. Other critiques, such as that of Kurzwelly, Rapport and Spiegel,[36] point out that identity politics often leads to reproduction and reification of essentialist notions of identity, notions which they argue are inherently erroneous.

Intersectional critiques

In her journal article Mapping the Margins: Intersectionality, Identity Politics and Violence against Women of Color, Kimberle Crenshaw treats identity politics as a process that brings people together based on a shared aspect of their identity. Crenshaw applauds identity politics for bringing African Americans (and other non-white people), gays and lesbians, and other oppressed groups together in community and progress. But she critiques it because "it frequently conflates or ignores intragroup differences."[37] Crenshaw argues that for Black women, at least two aspects of their identity are the subject of oppression: their race and their sex.[38] From the viewpoint of intersectionality, identity politics are useful, but incomplete. Intersectionality further breaks identities into subgroups; African-American, homosexual, women, would constitute a particular hyper-specific identity class.[39]

Notes

  1. ↑ Howard J. Wiarda, Political Culture, Political Science, and Identity Politics: An Uneasy Alliance (Abingdon-on-Thames, UK: Routledge, 2014, ISBN 978-1472442284). "There are disputes regarding the origins of the term 'identity politics' .... Almost all authors, even while disagreeing over who was the first to use the term, agree that its original usage goes back to the 1970s and even the 1960s."
  2. ↑ Martha A. Ackelsberg, "Identity Politics, Political Identities: Thoughts toward a Multicultural Politics," Frontiers: A Journal of Women Studies 16(1), 1996, 87–100.
  3. ↑ Zillah R. Eisenstein (ed.), Capitalist Patriarchy and the Case for Socialist Feminism (New York, NY: Monthly Review Press, 1979, ISBN 0853454760).
  4. ↑ Barbara Smith (ed.), Home Girls: A Black Feminist Anthology (New York, NY: Kitchen Table: Women of Color Press, 1983, ISBN 0913175021), xxxi-xxxii.
  5. ↑ Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor, How we Get Free: Black feminism and the Combahee River Collective (Chicago, IL: Haymarket Books, 2017, ISBN 978-1642591040).
  6. ↑ "Identity politics", Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, July 11, 2020. Retrieved March 28, 2022.
  7. ↑ Vasiliki Neofotistos, "Identity Politics," Oxford Bibliographies, Oxford University Press, 2013. Retrieved February 22, 2022.
  8. ↑ Amy Chua, Political Tribes: Group Instinct and the Fate of Nations (New York, NY: Penguin Press, 2019, ISBN 978-0399562877), 178.
  9. ↑ Amy Hoffman, An Army of Ex-Lovers: My life at the Gay Community News (Amherst, MA: University of Massachusetts Press, 2007, ISBN 978-1558496217), xi–xiii.
  10. ↑ Amber Hollibaugh, "Gay Rights Are Not Queer Liberation," Autostraddle, June 29, 2012. Retrieved March 10, 2022.
  11. ↑ Edward Said, Orientalism (Vintage, 1979, ISBN 978-0394740676).
  12. ↑ Nancy C.M. Hartsock, "The Feminist Standpoint: Developing Ground for a Specifically Feminist Historical Materialism," In Sandra Harding and Merrill B. Hintikka (eds.), Discovering Reality: Feminist Perspectives on Epistemology, Metaphysics, Methodology, and Philosophy of Science Synthese Library, vol 161 (Springer, Dordrecht, 1983, ISBN 978-9027715388).
  13. ↑ Deborah K. King, "Multiple Jeopardy, Multiple Consciousness: The Context of a Black Feminist Ideology," Journal of Women in Culture and Society 14(1) 10-01, 1988, 42–72. Retrieved March 10, 2022.
  14. ↑ Kimberlé Williams Crenshaw, "Mapping the Margins: Intersectionality, Identity Politics, and Violence against Women of Color," Stanford Law Review 43(6) (1991): 1297.
  15. ↑ Queer Theory and the Social Construction of Sexuality, in "Homosexuality," Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Retrieved March 28, 2022.
  16. ↑ Judith Butler, "Performative Acts and Gender Constitution: An Essay in Phenomenology and Feminist Theory," Theatre Journal 40(4) (1988): 519–531.
  17. ↑ "queer," Oxford English Dictionary, Oxford University Press.
  18. ↑ David M. Halperin, One Hundred Years of Homosexuality: And Other Essays on Greek Love (New York, NY: Routledge, 1990, ISBN 978-0415900973).
  19. ↑ Dora Mortimer, "Can Straight People Be Queer? - An increasing number of young celebrities are labeling themselves 'queer.' But what does this mean for the queer community?" Vice Media, February 9, 2016. Retrieved March 15, 2022.
  20. ↑ Annamarie Jagose, Queer Theory: An Introduction {New York, NY: New York University Press, 1997, ISBN 9780814742341).
  21. ↑ Abnul Noury and Gerard Roland, "Identity Politics and Populism in Europe," Annual Review of Political Science 23 (2020): 421–439.
  22. ↑ Arshin Adib-Moghaddam, Psycho-nationalism: Global Thought, Iranian Imaginations JETRO-IDE ME-Review Vol.7 (2019-2020). Retrieved March 28, 2022.
  23. ↑ Elizabeth Monier, "The Arabness of Middle East regionalism: the Arab Spring and competition for discursive hegemony between Egypt, Iran and Turkey, Contemporary Politics 20(4) (2014): 421-434. Retrieved March 28, 2022.
  24. ↑ Christopher Wise and Paul James (eds.), Being Arab: Arabism and the Politics of Recognition (Victoria, Australia: Arena Publications, 2010).
  25. ↑ Marc Lynch, The Arab Uprisings Explained: New Contentious Politics in the Middle East (New York, NY: Columbia University Press, 2019, ISBN 978-0231158855), 119.
  26. ↑ Nijla Said, Looking for Palestine: Growing Up Confused in an Arab-American Family (Riverhead Books, 2014, ISBN 978-1594632754).
  27. ↑ Augie Fleras and Roger Maaka, The Politics of Indigeneity: Challenging the State in Canada and Aotearoa New Zealand (Dunedin, NZ: Otago University Press, 2005, ISBN 978-1877276538), 67. "The tensions created by the intersection of tribe as identity, versus tribe as organisation, are central to Maori identity politics."
  28. ↑ Tatiana Tökölyová, Journal of Nationalism, Memory & Language Politics 11(1), (Prague, Czechia: Walter de Gruyter University of International and Public Relations, 11(1) (2005): 67. "Transnationalism in the Pacific Region as a Concept of State Identity" "Maori identity politics have disrupted the colonially-inspired constructions of the New Zealand nation and state from a base of indigeneity.
  29. ↑ Hal B. Levine, Constructing Collective Identity: A comparative analysis of New Zealand Jews, Maori, and urban Papua New Guineans (Pieterlen and Bern, Switzerland: Peter Lang, 1997, ISBN 978-3631319444), 11. "The material on biculturalism particularly shows how ethnicity interdigitates with identity politics for Maori and stimulates parallel developments among non-Maori New Zealanders.
  30. ↑ Te Kawehau Hoskins and Alison Jones (eds.), Critical Conversations in Kaupapa Maori (Wellington, NZ: Huia Publishers, 2005, ISBN 978-1775503286), 475. "As Jones and Jenkins (2008) point out, an oppositional Māori identity politics has been the 'basis for internal collaboration and a politics of strength.'"
  31. ↑ Tahu Kukutai and Robert Didham, "Social Policy Journal of New Zealand," Ministry of Social Development (New Zealand) In Search of Ethnic New Zealanders: National Naming in the 2006 Census, 2009. "Māori identity politics and Treaty settlements, as well as their reactions – the latter included challenges to historical settlements and so-called “race-based” funding."
  32. ↑ Arthur Meier Schlesinger, The Disuniting of America: Reflections on a Multicultural Society (W. W. Norton & Company, 1998, ISBN 0393318540).
  33. ↑ Brendan O'Neill, "Identity politics has created an army of vicious, narcissistic cowards," The Spectator, February 19, 2015. Retrieved March 11, 2022.
  34. ↑ Owen Jones, Chavs: The Demonization of the Working Class (London, England: Verso, 2021, ISBN 978-1844678648), 255.
  35. ↑ Nancy Fraser, "From Redistribution to Recognition? Dilemmas of Justice in a ‘Post-Socialist’ Age," Academia.edu. Retrieved March 10, 2022.
  36. ↑ Jonatan Kurzwelly, Nigel Rapport, and Andrew Spiegel, "Encountering, explaining and refuting essentialism," Anthropology Southern Africa 43(2), 2020: 65–81. Retrieved March 10, 2022.
  37. ↑ Kimberle Crenshaw, "Mapping the Margins: Intersectionality, Identity Politics, and Violence against Women of Color," Stanford Law Review 43(6), January 1, 1991, 1241–99.
  38. ↑ Kimberle Crenshaw, "Demarginalizing the Intersection of Race and Sex: A Black Feminist Critique of Antidiscrimination Doctrine, Feminist Theory and Antiracist Politics," University of Chicago Legal Forum, 1989 no. 1, 139–167.
  39. ↑ Mary L. Gray, "Queer Nation is Dead/Long Live Queer Nation": The Politics and Poetics of Social Movement and Media Representation Critical Studies in Media Communication 26(3) (2009): 212–236. Retrieved March 10, 2022.

References
ISBN links support NWE through referral fees

  • Ackelsberg, Martha A. "Identity Politics, Political Identities: Thoughts toward a Multicultural Politics," Frontiers: A Journal of Women Studies 16(1) (1996): 87–100.
  • Butler, Judith Butler. "Performative Acts and Gender Constitution: An Essay in Phenomenology and Feminist Theory," Theatre Journal 40(4) (1988): 519–531.
  • Chua, Amy. Political Tribes: Group Instinct and the Fate of Nations. New York, NY: Penguin Press, 2019. ISBN 978-0399562877
  • Crenshaw, Kimberlé Williams, "Mapping the Margins: Intersectionality, Identity Politics, and Violence against Women of Color," Stanford Law Review 43(6) (1991): 1297.
  • Eisenstein, Zillah R. (ed.). Capitalist Patriarchy and the Case for Socialist Feminism. New York, NY: Monthly Review Press, 1979. ISBN 0853454760
  • Fleras, Augie, and Roger Maaka. The Politics of Indigeneity: Challenging the State in Canada and Aotearoa New Zealand. Dunedin, NZ: Otago University Press, 2005. ISBN 978-1877276538
  • Halperin, David M. One Hundred Years of Homosexuality: And Other Essays on Greek Love. New York, NY: Routledge, 1990. ISBN 978-0415900973
  • Harding, Sandra, and Merrill B. Hintikka (eds.). Discovering Reality: Feminist Perspectives on Epistemology, Metaphysics, Methodology, and Philosophy of Science Synthese Library, vol 161. Springer, Dordrecht, 1983. ISBN 978-9027715388
  • Hoffman, Amy. An Army of Ex-Lovers: My life at the Gay Community News. Amherst, MA: University of Massachusetts Press, 2007. ISBN 978-1558496217
  • Hollibaugh, Amber. "Gay Rights Are Not Queer Liberation," Autostraddle, June 29, 2012. Retrieved June 30, 2022.
  • Hoskins, Te Kawehau, and Alison Jones (eds.). Critical Conversations in Kaupapa Maori. Wellington, NZ: Huia Publishers, 2005. ISBN 978-1775503286
  • Jagose, Annamarie. Queer Theory: An Introduction. New York, NY: New York University Press, 1997. ISBN 9780814742341
  • Jones, Owen. Chavs: The Demonization of the Working Class. London, England: Verso, 2021. ISBN 978-1844678648
  • King, Deborah K. "Multiple Jeopardy, Multiple Consciousness: The Context of a Black Feminist Ideology," Journal of Women in Culture and Society 14(1) 10-01 (1988): 42–72.
  • Levine, Hal B. Constructing Collective Identity: A comparative analysis of New Zealand Jews, Maori, and urban Papua New Guineans. Pieterlen and Bern, Switzerland: Peter Lang, 1997. ISBN 978-3631319444
  • Lynch, Marc. The Arab Uprisings Explained: New Contentious Politics in the Middle East. New York, NY: Columbia University Press, 2019. ISBN 978-0231158855
  • Mortimer, Dora. "Can Straight People Be Queer? - An increasing number of young celebrities are labeling themselves 'queer.' But what does this mean for the queer community?" Vice Media, February 9, 2016.
  • Noury, Abnul, and Gerard Roland, "Identity Politics and Populism in Europe," Annual Review of Political Science 23 (2020): 421–439.
  • Said, Edward. Orientalism. Vintage, 1979. ISBN 978-0394740676
  • Said, Nijla. Looking for Palestine: Growing Up Confused in an Arab-American Family. Riverhead Books, 2014. ISBN 978-1594632754
  • Schlesinger, Arthur Meier. The Disuniting of America: Reflections on a Multicultural Society. W. W. Norton & Company, 1998. ISBN 0393318540
  • Smith, Barbara (ed.). Home Girls: A Black Feminist Anthology. New York, NY: Kitchen Table: Women of Color Press, 1983. ISBN 0913175021
  • Stout, Christopher T. The Case for Identity Politics: Polarization, Demographic Change, and Racial Appeals. Charlottesville, VA: University of Virginia Press, 2020. ISBN 978-0813944982
  • Taylor, Keeanga-Yamahtta. How we get free : Black feminism and the Combahee River Collective Chicago, IL: Haymarket Books, 2017. ISBN 978-1642591040
  • Wiarda, Howard J. Political Culture, Political Science, and Identity Politics: An Uneasy Alliance. Abingdon-on-Thames, UK: Routledge, 2014. ISBN 978-1472442284
  • Wise, Christopher, and Paul James (eds.). Being Arab: Arabism and the Politics of Recognition. Victoria, Australia: Arena Publications, 2010.

External links

All links retrieved June 30, 2022.

Credits

New World Encyclopedia writers and editors rewrote and completed the Wikipedia article in accordance with New World Encyclopedia standards. This article abides by terms of the Creative Commons CC-by-sa 3.0 License (CC-by-sa), which may be used and disseminated with proper attribution. Credit is due under the terms of this license that can reference both the New World Encyclopedia contributors and the selfless volunteer contributors of the Wikimedia Foundation. To cite this article click here for a list of acceptable citing formats.The history of earlier contributions by wikipedians is accessible to researchers here:

The history of this article since it was imported to New World Encyclopedia:

Note: Some restrictions may apply to use of individual images which are separately licensed.

Retrieved from https://www.newworldencyclopedia.org/p/index.php?title=Identity_politics&oldid=1099269

Content is available under Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License; additional terms may apply. See Terms of Use for details.
Copyright Logo
Powered by MediaWiki