Some of Us Are Brave: Interviews and Conversations with Sistas on Life, Art and Struggle, Volume 1

by Thandisizwe Chimurenga, Wakefield: Daraja Press, 2023

Reviewed by Njoki Wamai

Some of Us Are Brave: Interviews and Conversations with Sistas on Life, Art and Struggle, Volume 1 is an important feminist anthology on remarkable black women’s achievements, from the 19th century to date, in the USA. It curates and archives the lives of trail-blazing women who contributed to black women’s emancipation, despite the erasure of their efforts from women’s studies scholarship in academia. In this book, Thandisizwe Chimurenga draws from radio interviews that she hosted. She is a Los Angeles award-winning author, producer, journalist, and radio anchor who is part of the Free Speech Radio News (FSRN) as well as the Evening News in the Pacifica-Los Angeles Radio Network. The interviews preserved in this book were held between 2003 and 2011.

Chimurenga draws the title of this book from All the Women Are White, All the Blacks Are Men, But Some of Us Are Brave, co-edited in 1982 by Akasha Gloria Hull, Patricia Bell-Scott, and Barbara Smith. The work by Hull, Bell-Scott, and Smith was ground-breaking in its documentation of the resilience, struggles, and triumphs of black women in American society. Chimurenga’s book similarly makes visible, brave black women whose contributions have been overlooked in American history despite their contributions to the advancement of political freedoms and the arts in the USA. This anthology is a part of two volumes. Volume 1 focuses on pioneering women, their legacies, resilience, and contributions in the arts and liberation of black people in spite of racism and structural injustice. Volume 2 explores black women’s health and chronicles the resilience of black women (Chimurenga 2023). The two volumes challenge the erasure of black women’s agency in history while appreciating the transformative power of feminist struggles. This anthology seeks to correct their invisibility by providing evidence of black women’s agency and resistance to racism and patriarchy, captured across the chapters in the book. Despite the passing of Civil Rights Acts in the 1960s resulting from the civil rights movement, black communities continue to face racial discrimination in the USA.

Methodologically, Chimurenga uses life histories and in-depth interviews to centre women in the arts as co-producers of knowledge and culture. She argues that black women have been central to women’s liberation in the USA through their roles in advancing political freedoms, the arts, health rights, and the rights of persons who are Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transsexual, Queer, and Intersex (LGBTQI), using an intersectional lens. Academically, this book is a biographical interdisciplinary volume that would be classified in various genres including Africana Studies, Women Studies, Feminist Studies, Politics, and Political Science. Some of Us Are Brave: Interviews and Conversations with Sistas on Life, Art and Struggle, Volume 1 is a welcome addition to feminist literature. Its strength lies in the focus on reclaiming and re-centring pioneering black women’s experiences and legacies within feminist literature. This edited volume centres black women and black feminist thought in three ways.

First, by providing evidence about the pioneering role of black women in liberation efforts in the USA through oral histories and in-depth interviews with other black women who knew the pioneers. Liberation struggles and nationalist struggles in the USA have often credited white men despite women’s involvement in emancipatory practices since Harriet Tubman’s effort at liberating black people. The segment titled ‘The Shoulders on Which We Stand’ draws attention to and appreciates their legacies in the liberation of black people, through their path-breaking lives. The pioneers are clustered in several roles that include activists, writers, the exiled, and political liberators including feminist activist Aminata Umoja, democrat Ella Baker, communist activist Claudia Jones, and community activist Delois Blakely. The writers featured include science fiction writer Olivia Butler, Mississippi writer Beah Richards, journalist Charlotte Bass, legislator Karen Bass, journalist and media owner Ida B. Wells, and journalist Charlene Gaunt. The section also includes those who have been exiled: Ida B. Wells, Mabel Williams in Cuba, Kathleen Cleaver in Cuba, Assata Shakur in Cuba, and Charlotte O’Neal in Tanzania.

The second way the book contributes to centring black lives and their legacies is through reclamation of the intellectual contributions of black women in the arts. This theme is covered in the second section titled ‘Art for Our Sake’, which focuses on art and artists who create art that captures the conditions and experiences of black people. The artists include Adrienne Brown, Carol Maillard, Sweet Honey, Julie Dash, and Hollywood producer Ava DuVernay. Adrienne Maree Brown, author and editor of Octavia’s Brood, speaks about Octavia Butler’s science fiction stories within social justice movements. Adrienne Brown, like Octavia Butler, believes in the power of science fiction to reimagine black women’s lives in a world free of poverty, prisons, homophobia, and fatphobia. Octavia’s Brood builds an alternative world devoid of patriarchy, capitalism, and white supremacy. Ava DuVernay, an award-winning film producer, was the first woman nominated for the Academy Award for best picture in 2010. DuVernay is included in this section due to her focus on directing and marketing black and feminist films.

The third contribution the book makes is in appraising the role of exiled black women in the liberation efforts of black people and indeed in the liberation of the USA. The section titled ‘Sistas on the Run’ includes the inspiring journalist and entrepreneur Ida B. Wells narrated by Ruby Dee; Mabel Williams, a Radio Free founder and revolutionary who was exiled in Cuba; and Kathleen Cleaver, exiled in Cuba with her husband who is a Black Panther Party member. Assata Shakura, a member of the Black Panther Party still exiled in Cuba, and Charlotte O’Neal, another Black Panther member who is still exiled in Tanzania, are also included in this section. This is probably the first book to discuss Sisters on the Run together. While some, like Assata Shakur, might be known widely, little is known about other sisters in exile. This is an important contribution of this book. By bringing them in proximity to each other, albeit in book chapters, the edited volume invites other scholars to explore themes like black women in exile and makes visible those whose efforts towards the liberation of black people from racist regimes came at the cost of loss of their homes. These contributions demonstrate the resilience of black women in the context of enduring racism in the USA; racism that endures despite the efforts made by different states, cultural institutions, and campaigns such as the Black Lives Matter movement.

This edited volume makes theoretical contributions that further advance Black Feminist theory and Womanist theory by Alice Walker by continuing to ask the question posed by Sojourner Truth, ‘Ain’t I a Woman?’ Black Feminist theorists like hooks (1981), Walker (1982), Lorde (2007), and Hills (2000) have examined the double impact of racism and sexism on black women in the USA. The intersectional analysis of the discrimination of black women and black womanhood due to race and sex has revealed slow progress in black women’s position despite second-wave feminism. The interviews exemplify these concerns. The volume advances hooks’ (1981) and Hills’ (2000) ideas on black feminism as a distinct form of feminism that centres black women’s solidarity and healing as a collective in the context of racism, sexist oppression, and patriarchy.

One of the limitations of the edited volume is the lack of nuance in the analysis of the pioneers as complex characters with human flaws. However, this is understandable since these were transcribed interviews from a radio show that was meant to celebrate these hidden figures. A future book or future interviews should provide more nuance to these pioneering feminists. Additionally, a reference list or an annexure section with the original works of some of the scholars and activists discussed in the volume would have been helpful for readers. Some of the pioneering women discussed in the interviews wrote renowned texts and poems that are still widely referred to, such as Octavia Butler’s science fiction text called the ‘Parable of the Sower’; Beah Richard’s important poem, ‘A Black Woman Speaks on White Womanhood, White Supremacy and Peace’; and Ida B. Well’s excerpts from the journalistic reports of the infamous lynchings. Brief details of texts that are now out of print would make the information available to current generations of feminist scholars, so that they may better appreciate the context in which these stalwarts dared to write, act, or lead activist and revolutionary movements.

In conclusion, the chapters in this edited volume provide a record of feminist intellectual histories drawn from pioneering African American women whose intellectual contributions have been neglected. Black civil rights scholarship and popular media has often centred famous black men in liberation efforts such as Martin Luther King and Malcolm X. Rosa Parks is one of the few women who have been acknowledged and appreciated. This volume provides evidence of women who have contributed equally to the liberation of black people. The author’s writing style is simple, and the book is an easy read for scholars and readers interested in women’s movements, black histories, and pioneering feminists in the USA. The book is a rich source of data for feminist scholars. This volume is a must read for anyone seeking to understand the transformative role of black feminist thought from the pioneers. The book written by activists, academics, feminists, community organisers, actors, producers, visual artists, and writers fulfils its objective of centring invisible black women’s legacies in the arts and activism.

References

Chimurenga, Thandisizwe (2023) Some of us are Brave (Vol 2): Interviews and Conversations With Sistas on Life, Art and Struggle, 2003–2016, Wakefield: Daraja Press.
Hills, Collins (2000) Black Feminist Thought: Knowledge, Consciousness, and the Politics of Empowerment (2nd ed.). New York: Routledge.
hooks, bell (1981) Ain’t I a Woman: Black Women and Feminism, Boston, MA: South End Press.
Lorde, Audre (2007) Sister Outsider: Essays and Speeches (2nd ed.), Crossing Press.
Walker, Alice (1982) The Color Purple, New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich.