I Am Your Sister Collected and Unpublished Writings of Audre Lorde

by Byrd, Rudolph P.; Cole, Johnnetta Betsch; Guy-Sheftall, Beverly

• ISBN13: 9780195341485
• ISBN10: 0195341481
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2009-04-21
• Publisher: Oxford University Press

Summary

Audre Lorde was not only a famous poet; she was also one of the most important radical black feminists of the past century. Her writings and speeches grappled with an impressive broad list of topics, including sexuality, race, gender, class, disease, the arts, parenting, and resistance, and they have served as a transformative and important foundation for theorists and activists in considering questions of power and social justice. Lorde embraced difference, and at each turn she emphasized the importance of using it to build shared strength among marginalized communities. I Am Your Sister is a collection of Lorde's non-fiction prose, written between 1976 and 1990, and it introduces new perspectives on the depth and range of Lorde's intellectual interests and her commitments to progressive social change. Presented here, for the first time in print, is a major body of Lorde's speeches and essays, along with the complete text of A Burst of Light and Lorde's landmark prose works Sister Outsider and The Cancer Journals. Together, these writings reveal Lorde's commitment to a radical course of thought and action, situating her works within the women's, gay and lesbian, and African American Civil Rights movements. They also place her within a continuum of black feminists, from Sojourner Truth, to Anna Julia Cooper, Amy Jacques Garvey, Lorraine Hansberry, and Patricia Hill Collins. I Am Your Sister concludes with personal reflections from Alice Walker, Gloria Joseph, Johnnetta Betsch Cole, Beverly Guy-Sheftall, and bell hooks on Lorde's political and social commitments and the indelibility of her writings for all who are committed to a more equitable society.

Author Biography

Rudolph P. Byrd is the Goodrich C. White Professor of American Studies in the Graduate Institute of the Liberal Arts and the Department of African American Studies, and is the Founding Director of the James Weldon Johnson Institute for Advanced Interdisciplinary Studies at Emory University.
Johnnetta Betsch Cole is President Emerita of Spelman College and Bennett College for Women, and Professor Emerita of Emory University. She is currently Director of the Smithsonian Institution's National Museum of African Art.
Beverly Guy-Sheftall is Founding Director of the Women's Research and Resource Center and Anna Julia Cooper Professor of Women's Studies at Spelman College. She is also an adjunct professor at Emory University's Institute for Women's Studies.

Table of Contents

Credits	p. xiii
Introduction. Create Your Own Fire: Audre Lorde and the Tradition of Black Radical Thought	p. 3
From Sister Outsider and a Burst of Light
The Transformation of Silence into Language and Action	p. 39
Sexism: An American Disease in Blackface	p. 44
Sadomasochism: Not About Condemnation: An Interview with Audre Lorde	p. 50
I Am Your Sister: Black Women Organizing Across Sexualities	p. 57
Apartheid U.S.A.	p. 64
Turning the Beat Around: Lesbian Parenting 1986	p. 73
A Burst of Light: Living with Cancer	p. 81
My Words Will Be There
Eva's Man by Gayl Jones: A Review	p. 153
Self-Definition and My Poetry	p. 156
Introduction: Movement in Black by Pat Parker	p. 158
My Words Will Be There	p. 160
Foreword to the English Edition of Farbe bekennen: Afro-deutsche Frauen auf den Spuren ihrer Geschichte	p. 169
Preface to a New Edition of Need: A Chorale for Black Woman Voices	p. 177
Poet as Teacher-Human as Poet-Teacher as Human	p. 182
Poetry Makes Something Happen	p. 184
My Mother's Mortar	p. 188
Difference and Survival
Difference and Survival: An Address at Hunter College	p. 201
The First Black Feminist Retreat: July 6, 1977	p. 205
When Will the Ignorance End? Keynote Speech at the National Third World Gay and Lesbian Conference, October 13, 1979	p. 207
An Address Delivered as Part of the "Litany of Commitment" at the March on Washington, August 27, 1983	p. 212
Commencement Address: Oberlin College, May 29, 1989	p. 213
There Is No Hierarchy of Oppression	p. 219
What Is at Stake in Lesbian and Gay Publishing Today: The Bill Whitehead Award Ceremony, 1990	p. 221
Is Your Hair Still Political?	p. 224
Reflections
Audre Lorde: My Shero, My Teacher, My Sister Friend	p. 231
Audre's Voice	p. 238
Lorde: The Imagination of Justice	p. 242
Remembering Audre Lorde	p. 249
Epilogue. Bearing Witness: The Legacy of Audre Lorde	p. 253
Contributors	p. 261
Selected Bibliography	p. 265
Chronology	p. 267
Index	p. 269
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