The Combahee River Collective (CRC) (/kəmˈbiː/kəm-BEE)[1] was a Black feministlesbiansocialist organization active in Boston, Massachusetts, from 1974 to 1980.[2][3] The Collective argued that both the white feminist movement and the Civil Rights Movement were not addressing their particular needs as Black women and more specifically as Black lesbians.[4] Racism was present in the mainstream feminist movement, while Delaney and Manditch-Prottas argue that much of the Civil Rights Movement had a sexist and homophobic reputation.[5][6]
The Collective is perhaps best known for developing the Combahee River Collective Statement,[7][8] a key document in the history of contemporary Black feminism and the development of the concepts of identity politics as used among political organizers and social theorists,[9][10] and for introducing the concept of interlocking systems of oppression, including but not limited to gender, race, and homophobia, a fundamental concept of intersectionality.[11] Gerald Izenberg credits the 1977 Combahee statement with the first usage of the phrase "identity politics".[12] Through writing its statement, the CRC connected themselves to the activist tradition of Black women in the 19th century and to the struggles of Black liberation in the 1960s.[13] The document embarked upon the separation of a gender-only focused feminism and highlighted the significance of interlocking systems of oppression.
^Merriam-Webster's Geographical Dictionary, Third Edition (Merriam-Webster, 1997; ISBN0877795460, p. 272.
^Marable, Manning; Leith Mullings (eds), Let Nobody Turn Us Around: Voices of Resistance, Reform, and Renewal, Combahee River Collective Statement, Rowman and Littlefield, 2000, ISBN0-8476-8346-X, p. 524.
^Manditch-Prottas, Zachary (2019). "Meeting at the Watchtower: Eldridge Cleaver, James Baldwin's No Name in the Street, and Racializing Homophobic Vernacular". African American Review. 52 (2): 179–195. doi:10.1353/afa.2019.0027. ISSN1945-6182. S2CID197851021.
^The full text of the Combahee River Collective Statement is available here.
^Smith, Barbara, ed. (1983). Home Girls: A Black Feminist Anthology. New York, NY: Kitchen Table: Women of Color Press. pp. 272–282. ISBN0-913175-02-1.
^Hawkesworth, M. E.; Maurice Kogan. Encyclopedia of Government and Politics, 2nd edn Routledge, 2004, ISBN0-415-27623-3, p. 577.
^Sigerman, Harriet. The Columbia Documentary History of American Women Since 1941, Columbia University Press, 2003, ISBN0-231-11698-5, p. 316.