Sister Outsider
Sister Outsider: Essays and Speeches is a collection of essential essays and speeches written by Audre Lorde, a writer who focuses on the particulars of her identity: Black woman, lesbian, poet, activist, cancer survivor, mother, and feminist. This collection, now considered a classic volume of Lorde's most influential works of non-fiction prose, has had a groundbreaking impact in the development of contemporary feminist theories. In fifteen essays and speeches dating from 1976 to 1984, Lorde explores the complexities of intersectional identity, while explicitly drawing from her personal experiences of oppression to include sexism, heterosexism, racism, homophobia , classism, and ageism. The book examines a broad range of topics, including love, self-love, war, imperialism, police brutality, coalition building, violence against women, Black feminism, and movements towards equality that recognize and embrace differences as a vehicle for change. With meditative conscious reasoning, Lorde explores her misgivings for the widespread marginalization deeply-rooted in the United States' white patriarchal system, all the while, offering messages of hope. The essays in this landmark collection are extensively taught and have become a widespread area of academic analysis. Lorde's philosophical reasoning that recognizes oppressions as complex and interlocking designates her work  as a significant contribution to critical social theory. Themes. The paradoxical title of "Sister Outsider" expresses Lorde's commitment to her identity and the multiplicities gathering together to assemble her unique identity – multiplicities that often placed her "on the line", in a space that refused safety of an inside parameter, demonstrating Lorde's ability to embrace difficulty in the path to create change. Lorde informs readers through these essays that the histories of westernized culture have conditioned inhabitants to view "human differences in simplistic opposition to each other" – good/bad, superior/inferior – and to always be suspicious of the latter . Instead, Lorde suggests, use differences as a catalyst for change. Throughout the collection, Lorde also emphasizes the use of poetry as a profound form of knowledge, a powerful tool for diagnosing and challenging power relations within a racist, patriarchal society. In this charged collection, Lorde challenges sexism, racism, ageism, homophobia, and classism with determination. She propounds the recognition of difference as an empowering vehicle for action and creative change and emphasizes the necessity for applying these concepts to the next generation of feminism - a response to the current lacking thereof between women in the mainstream feminist movement. Lorde also explores  the fear and suspicion that arises among African American men and women, lesbians, feminists, and white women that ultimately creates an isolating experience for African American women - constructing a social institution that dehumanizes lives. Throughout these essays, Lorde confronts this problem of institutional dehumanization plaguing American culture during the late 1970s and early 1980s, and provides with philosophical reasoning, messages of hope. The Erotic vs. The Pornographic. In "Sister Outsider", Lorde tasks herself with discerning the difference and meaning of the erotic and the pornographic. This is all within the context of sexuality, power dynamics, and queerness. As Lorde says  in her text, "the erotic offers a well of replenishing and provocative force to the woman who does not fear its revelation, nor succumb to the belief that sensation is enough". We see here that Lorde draws our attention to the emotional experience of sexuality, and defines the erotic in a way that disconnects the typical male dominated interpretation. She continues to separate the erotic and pornographic by conveying the effect of power between the two. "But pornography is a direct denial of the power of the erotic, for it represents the suppression of true feeling. Pornography emphasizes sensation without  feeling". After defining these two terms she relates them to her own identity as a Black lesbian feminist. The erotic in her eyes is not simply a physical experience or drive, it is a show of resilience in the face of a racist, patriarchal, and homophobic society. Publication. Lorde signed a contract with The Crossing Press on November 19, 1982 with a projected publication date of May 31, 1984. She was the first major lesbian author the press was to sign, despite the firm's policy of not taking books represented by agents. Lorde expressed to her agent that she  felt rushed into signing the contract that provided an advance against royalties of a mere $100. The book was ultimately a huge financial success for the firm. It was republished in 2007 by The Crossing Press with a new forward provided by scholar and essayist, Cheryl Clarke. Content. The book is composed of essays and talks by Lorde, including the following: Impact. "Sister Outsider" is a groundbreaking essential contribution to Black feminism, Postcolonial feminism, gay and lesbian studies, critical psychology, black queer studies, African American studies, and feminist thought at large. The canonical work has been cited by renowned  scholars like Patricia Hill Collins, Donna Haraway, and Sara Ahmed. The publication was met with overall "resounding praise". A reviewer for "Publishers Weekly" referred to the work as "an eye-opener". American author Barbara Christian called the collection, "another indication of the depth of analysis that black women writers are contributing to feminist thought." From this work, Lorde is said to have created a new critical social theory that understands oppressions as overlapping and interlocking, informed from her position as an outsider. She presented her arguments in an accessible manner that provides readers with the language to articulate difference and  the complex nature of oppressions. American professor and theorist Roderick Ferguson cites "Sister Outsider" as a critical influence in his book, "Aberrations in Black," in which he coins the term Queer of Color Critique. "Sister Outsider" received critical reception, as well, as the collection challenges readers' unacknowledged privileges and complicity in oppression. Negative reviewers tended to focus on how "Sister Outsider" caused them discomfort with confronting their guilt as individuals whose identities occupy dominant positions within the United States, specifically through whiteness, maleness, youth, thinness, heterosexuality, Christianity, and financial security. While some reviewers claimed that the work is hard to  identify with if they are not similar to Lorde, others refute this, claiming that Lorde uses a "flexible model of subject positioning" that allows readers of various backgrounds to determine points of similarity and difference, challenging their standard notions of selfhood and subjectivity. In "The Man Question," Kathy Ferguson questions Lorde's employment of what she defines as "Cosmic Feminism", a feminism that relies on a feminine primitivism and values feelings that are more intense and seemingly deep-rooted.