Race, Ethnicity, Indigenous Peoples and Politics

L11(a) - Carving Out Our Own Political Spaces of Resistance: The Issues and Strategies of Black, Immigrant/Ethnic and Low-Income Women Activists in Canada, 1960s-1990s

Date: Jun 4 | Time: 10:15am to 11:45am | Location: SJA-713

Chair/Président/Présidente : Samia Dumais (Concordia University)

Discussant/Commentateur/Commentatrice : Kushan Azadah (York University)

Canadian political science, with its tendency to focus on traditional political institutions (political parties, legislatures and bureaucracies) has been slow to acknowledge women’s activism that occurred outside these corridors of power. And when women’s activism has been acknowledged for the 1960s-1990s era there has been attention on mainstream feminist activism, predominantly led by white, professional feminists. This has led to the devaluation and erasure of activism by Black, immigrant/ethnic and low-income women activists in Canada. This panel attempts to widen the political lens to highlight both the political issues and the distinctive strategies used by these disparate women’s groups. Through archival research and oral history interviews this panel explores five distinct sites of women’s activism in Canada during the 1960s-1990s to deepen our understanding of how these particular women carved out their own political space to confront and resist racism, xenophobia, sexism and poverty. These papers include an exploration of: • the decades of activism which culminated in the Second National Congress of Black Women in Montréal (1974) • Haitian women’s activism in Montréal during the Duvalier dictatorship (1957-1987) • the India Mahila Association in Vancouver, 1970s to 1990s • Jewish women’s activism in Vancouver and Toronto, 1970s to 1990s • Low-income women’s activism in Ontario, 1960s-1990s Separately, these papers demonstrate women’s experiences and struggles against numerous injustices. They also highlight distinctive strategies these women activists used to resist and to mobilize. Together, this panel demonstrates that Black, immigrant/ethnic and low-income women’s resistance was vibrant and persistent during this era and must be understood as a vital part of the Canadian political landscape.

Haitian feminism in Montreal between the 1960s and 1980s – Antiracist theoretical contours and praxis: Célia Romulus (University of Ottawa)
Abstract: Eurocentric and androcentric biases in Haitian historiography, originating in Haiti and abroad, result in the devaluation and erasure of the experiences and memory of the participation of Haitian women and feminists. From the Haitian revolution to the present day, women's experiences and their role in political struggles have been highlighted mainly by novelists such as Marie-Vieux Chauvet, Kettly Mars, Evelyne Trouillot and feminist works. This intervention is part of a movement to preserve and valorize knowledge derived from Haitian feminist experience and aims to identify the strategies of action historically employed by feminists both locally and abroad. It will address a key moment in contemporary Haitian history, highlighting the historical-political legacies of Haitian feminist groups' resistance to the Duvalier dictatorship (1957-1986), racial capitalism and anti-black racism in Montreal. A focus on these periods will enable us to analyze feminist modes of mobilization: epistemic resistance, informational activism, and advocacy with the state and international institutions. These political and epistemic resistances deployed in several theaters, evolving according to the periods, reactivate Haiti's anti-colonial, anti-imperialist and internationalist traditions as tools for political awareness and the decolonization of knowledge. This contribution thus addresses questions essential to the decolonization of knowledge, women's empowerment. What strategies have Haitian feminists historically mobilized? How are these strategies documented, valued and passed on?

The Second National Congress of Black Women (1974) : Tackling belonging within the institution and oneself through community-based practices: Samia Dumais (Concordia University)
Abstract: In November 1974, the Second National Congress of Black Women (SNCFN), entitled The Black Woman and Her Family, took place in Montreal. Initiated by the Coloured Women's Club and organized by the National Congress of Black Women, the SNCFN brought together over 500 women from Canada, the United States, and Africa. The SNCFN follows on from the first congress in Toronto, the culmination of years of community organizing through the Canadian Negro Women’s Association. Through shared experiences and practices of community-building and organizing, Black women recognized not only the specificity of their lived experience in Canadian society : they were also concerned with the future of the youth and the fate of their own communities. Participants of the Congress acknowledged the rampant lack of confidence of young Blacks within the education structures, and the difficulty of raising their parents’ awareness on this matter. Through an exploration of the resolutions of the education and youth panels, this paper aims to demonstrate the existence of an educational and intergenerational Black feminine thought with Montreal roots. These resolutions are influenced by the transnational nature of both the Congress and Montreal, the importance of community organization for Black communities at the turn of the 1970s, and by the institutionalization of the education system in the aftermath of the Quiet revolution.

Teeyan and Sukkot: Reshaping Culture and Religion as Feminist Strategy among South Asian and Jewish Activists in Vancouver and Toronto from the 1970s to the 1990s: Lynne Marks (University of Victoria)
Abstract: This paper will explore overlapping political strategies used by immigrant/ethnic and racialized women in Canada, focusing on South Asian women in Vancouver and Jewish women in Vancouver and Toronto, analyzing the ways in which they reinterpreted traditional religio-cultural celebrations in more woman-centred and feminist ways. The political efforts of South Asian women challenged the racism of Canadian society and also sought to improve the lives of women within their families and communities. Their strategies included a focus on community and culture. For example, the India Mahila Association in Vancouver organized Canadian and more feminist versions of the traditional woman-centred Indian Teeyan festivals to draw South Asian and other women together, and to celebrate women’s power and sisterhood, while other South Asian women’s organizations organized gender neutral versions of traditionally patriarchal cultural and religious community celebrations. Jewish feminists also increasingly celebrated feminist versions of more traditional Jewish religious holidays, as a way of both celebrating Jewish culture and providing a feminist critique of patriarchal elements of Jewish culture and religious practice. This paper is based on both oral history interviews with South Asian and Jewish activists, and newspaper and archival research.

Fierce Maternal Politics: The Political Strategies of Low-Income Women Activists, 1960s-1990s: Margaret Hillyard Little (Queen’s University), Hanna Jalal (Queen's University)
Abstract: Low-income women activists have used their maternal everyday lives to shape their politics, both as necessity and savvy strategy. Through archival research and oral history interviews this paper will explore a variety of low-income women activist groups in Ontario in the 1960s-1990s, exploring their political topics and strategies (including the Just Society Movement, Low Income Families Together, Mother-Led Union, Family Benefits Work Group and Mothers Action Group). The political topics they addressed were: welfare rights, daycare and valuing unpaid motherwork. Many of these activists endorsed a maternalist politics that believed all women should have the right to stay home and mother their children and to choose when and under what conditions low-income mothers engaged in the paid labour force. The political strategies they used were quite distinctive from professional women’s activism such as the National Action Committee on the Status of Women and male-dominated anti-poverty activism such as the Ontario Coalition Against Poverty. Given that their children were always present they embraced political strategies that included and even spotlighted children. Their political meetings welcomed children. In some cases, male members of their political groups did daycare so these moms could play leadership roles in their political events. And they also used their children as tactics, bringing their children to city council meetings or dropping their children off at the provincial legislature to disrupt and highlight the needs for more daycare