From Lélia Gonzalez to bell hooks: for an Afro-Latin American and radical visionary feminism

Abstract

This paper aims to elucidate Lélia Gonzalez and bell hooks´ criticism against oppression, mainly those of race, class and sex, as well as to show the types of feminisms they support to overcome them. Lélia clarifies how these oppressions are produced and reproduced in the Brazilian context, showing that black population, especially black women, are in the most socially devalued places, from the point of view of work and income, from the point of view of their housing and even with regard to education, proposing an Afro-Latin American feminism as a way to dismantle all the explorations listed. bell hooks shows how oppression was and is reproduced in places where we don´t expect it, as in feminist movements (such as the racism and elitism present in the suffragist movements), in black movements (as shown by the reproduction of sexism in the black panthers) and in the classroom (such as when white students have more speaking space than others). bell hooks explains that any movement which does not oppose all forms of oppression has the risk of becoming a movement for just a few, by supporting positions that often reproduce exploitation. In this sense, the author supports a radical or visionary feminism as a form to articulate a joint fight against all oppressions, approaching Lélia's proposal of feminism. Theories and practices of both authors combat any oppression, in all spaces, based on the feminisms proposed by them, aiming the construction of a mutual, communal and, why not, loving society…