Sisterhood as examined in Oyèrónké Oyewùmí’s Feminism, Sisterhood, and Other Foreign Relations is a term and idea introduced by white Western feminists “advocating an unconditional love and solidarity amongst all women” (4). It suggests that all women have a common bond that links them trans-culturally (5). This notion of a universal bond among all women proves to be quite challenging and imposing for some women especially those in non-western countries where the way of life and cultural practices are vastly different from western women. The article written by Oyewùmí examines Africa, a non-western country and the appropriateness of the use of white Western feminist idea of sisterhood within that culture.
European influence imposed on Africa during the Atlantic Slave Trade and European Colonization caused a political, economical and cultural shift in traditional African values, attitudes and beliefs to a dependency on Western Europe and North America viewpoints (2). Sisterhood under the Western umbrella of influences emerged from feminism which is referred to as “a historically recent European and American social movement founded to struggle for female equality” (1). It provides the illusion of having a common foundation upon which all women regardless of race, gender, class, location and situation can come together and build upon.
The principles upon which sisterhood is founded are mainly derived from a white Western feminist perspective and its fundamentals ignore cultural differences of non-western societies. The greatest flaw of sisterhood is the assumption that because it is so powerful and liberating for European and American women then it must be the same for other women globally. It does not take into consideration the difference in values, norms and traditions for women outside of European and American societies. In Africa there are relationships that are much greater than the notion of sisterhood and they should not be pacified.
In many European and American families it appears to be much easier to relate and connect with a sister rather than a mother and women in western family structure often despised their mother-daughter relationship since they viewed the role of a mother as governed by patriarchal rules. It was a mechanism that white Western feminists used to escape male control. These women found a greater sense of commonality among sisters who shared similar if not exact feelings and experiences. Oyewùmí explains that in Africa, there is great esteem and solidarity for the other female relation, motherhood, which resides within the same western nuclear family model from which sisterhood was derived (5). Motherhood is deemed as “absolutely natural” to Africans and it is seen as the natural process that binds “women together in the collective experience of mothering children and consequently the nurturing of community” (5). It is this bond created by nature that causes African women to relate more to each other as mothers rather than sisters.
The word sister in Africa has no particular bearing within the African family structure and literally means mother’s children. The African family structure is centered around the mother, defining all family members and their positions relative to the her and unlike sisterhood, which focus on a social cohesion that associates gendered individuals with a biological female body the African view of motherhood eliminates gender biases as it does not focus on gender which is usually linked to a particular sex. Motherhood is also extended beyond its biological links into an idea of co-mothering, a social practice that expresses “the relationship amongst women who have married into the same family, even when they are married to different brothers” (13). Women of this family lineage are connected to each other through a collective bond of two clans (13). It is marriage that brings together two groups of people rather than two individuals. The grounds that African women use to establish relationships, loyalties and commonality between each other are of a different formation and structure from white Western feminists, therefore the experiences of African women are different to the experiences of western women, even western African American women who share the same race.
It is difficult to take one group of individuals, use their experiences as a collective and impose it on another set of individuals or even a group. The experience and oppression that one group may encounter is not representative of another group and therefore cannot be seen as a universal oppression. The assumption of a universal experience produces hierarchical relationships where an individual or group’s experience is ranked higher than another and is then imposed as the standard to which everything else must be compared. This leads to a proposal of ‘sisterarchy’ rather than sisterhood, where women are linked together in unequal relationships due to differing experiences (3). Even within western culture there is rejection of the idea of sisterhood as sisterarchy emerges as the dominant relationship.
White Western feminist experiences have always been deemed the standard by which many women’s struggles and fights were defined resulting in other cultures within Western society being incorporated into, and hidden behind their experiences. Chandra Mohanty’s Cartographies of Struggle, defines feminism “in terms of middle-class, white experiences, and in terms of internal racism, classism and homophobia” (7). The experiences of non-white groups within western society were invisible and unspoken of until individuals and groups began to speak out about the difference in their struggles as compared to white feminism. The situations and experiences of non-white groups were vastly different and issues such as race, class and gender played a vital and defining role in the way these groups confronted and addressed women’s issues. The overlapping or intersecting of such issues also affected the way in which their struggles differed and many women because of these issues sought to define their own meaning of feminism, rejecting white Western feminism and its idea of sisterhood as the norm.
In It’s Not an Oxymoron, Susan Muaddi Darraj points out that white Western feminism does not relate to her life as an Arab woman living in a Western society (307). She further goes on to elaborate on her experiences as an Arab woman and how they differ from that of a white woman. She uses housework as an example in which white women view it as oppressive but for her as a representative of Arab women, it did not hold to be true. Many other lobbying groups such as the Asian Women’s Movement, Black Feminist Movement, Chicana Feminist Movement and Lesbian Movement used this misrepresentation of their struggles and experiences as the platform for their movements. As groups with a collective goal they formed separate movements that represented in quintessence their spirit, who they were, what they stood for and the fundamental nature of their collective experiences. Within these groups women found a commonality that was not experienced in the same way by any other group. A Black feminist is not able to relate directly to an Arab feminist’s experience as being stereotyped as a terrorist. Likewise an Arab feminist is not able to directly relate to a Black feminist in terms of slavery and white oppression. The two groups may be able to find a common ground which they can share with each other about discrimination but their fundamentals and experiences are never the same and thus one experience cannot be considered more important than another.
Imposing one group’s experiences onto another expecting that group to adapt and fit into that experience is very unrealistic, demeaning and degrading. One group’s standard will never be that of another and it is even more hypocritical to assume that all women have the same experiences and as such one ideology is sufficient for all, regardless of the society they represent. Women of varying cultural backgrounds within the western society reject the idea of sisterhood as being powerful and universal. They have risen above the views and beliefs imposed on them to unearth their own method of defining their relationships based on their individual experiences.
Based on the diverse culture, norms and way of life for women globally it can be concluded that the white Western feminist concept of sisterhood is not intercultural and therefore cannot be transcultural. “There is a pretense to a homogeneity of experience covered by the word sisterhood that does not in fact exist” (Lorde in Garcia 1). Women in western and non-western societies must be allowed the freedom to discover and define their relations and experiences and form a common bond based on those experiences. Sisterhood should not imposed on women who traditionally do not fit into western values and true sisterhood should be representative of allowing women the freedom to define and follow the path that best reflects them.
Works Cited
Mohanty, Chandra Tapade. “Introduction: Cartographies of Struggle: Third World Women and the Politics of Feminism.” Third World Women and the Politics of Feminism. Ed. Chandra Talpade Mohanty, Ann Russo, and Lourdes Torres. Bloomington: Indiana UP, 1991. 1-47.
Darraj, Susan Muaddi. “It’s Not an Oxymoron: The Search for an Arab Feminism.” Colonize This!: Young Women of Color on Today’s Feminism. Ed. Daisy Hernández and Bushra Rehman. New York: Seal, 2002. 295-311.
García, Alma M. “Introduction.” Chicana Feminist Thought: The Basic Historical Writings. Ed. Alma M. García. New York: Routledge, 1997. 1-16.
Oyewùmí, Oyèrónké. “Introduction: Feminism, Sisterhood, and Other Foreign Relations.” African Women and Feminism: Reflecting on the Politics of Sisterhood. Ed. Oyèrónké Oyewùmí. Trenton, NJ: Africa World, 2003. 1-24.
By Krystle DeSantos
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