Tactics of Brown Bodies
Responding to U.S. Third World Feminism, by Chela Sandoval
Sandoval’s reading highlights the differences between “strategies” and “tactics”. Strategies are designed to shift cultural norms. They are largely theoretical, and deployed in order to achieve large scale, generalized change. Strategies are verbally articulated, often written as part of academic theories.
Tactics, on the other hand, are what Cherrie Moraga describes as “guerrilla warfare” survival tactics used by women of color, and oppressed/marginalized groups, to navigate interventions of the state in their every day lives. Tactics are necessary behaviors, outlooks, and approaches that are created as required, by experience. They are not taught, nor are they archived through text; they are constructed in response to lived realities.
The difference in these approaches is something that I can personally relate to. I feel that there are many behaviors that I have adopted, non-consciously, to make it easier — or at times safer — for me to interact with individuals or institutions who hold hostile attitudes towards me, based on the different identities that I occupy. It is a constantly evolving process to maneuver between dominant power structures and my intersecting identities. It was not as if one day someone sat me down and said “Okay, there are people who will dislike you because you are a Pakistani, a Muslim, an immigrant, a woman, etc. And this is how you deal with them. Oh, and by the way some people might take out their frustrations on you because you are multiples of those things — so, here is how to deal with someone who is racist and sexist, or someone who is Islamophobic and a misogynist…”
All of these factors politicize me in ways that I cannot escape, for reasons that are completely outside of my control. Although I learned how (or hustled) to navigate these dangers by myself, I did build off the tactics/strategies that other WOCs, theorists, and activists have outlined before me. In those ways, I feel as though I have experienced differential consciousness, by seeing points of similarity with others who have shared experiences with me, even if they have different identities.
Hegemonic institutions exclude many groups, for many different reasons, and this has different implications and consequences. However, there are commonalities within and between “oppressed” or subaltern groups that allow us to create affinity and build coalitions. Those coalitions are incredibly powerful and important in creating alliances between different communities, which in turn helps us to share tactics and create strategies that can advocate for further social change and transformative justice.
