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80-753: Separatist groups practice a form of identity politics , or political activity and theorizing founded in the shared experiences of the group's members. Such groups believe attempts at integration with dominant groups compromise their identity and ability to pursue greater self-determination . However, economic and political factors usually are critical in creating strong separatist movements as opposed to less ambitious identity movements. Groups may have one or more motivations for separation, including: Ethnic separatism can be based on cultural, linguistic as well as religious or racial differences. Ethnic separatist movements were relevant since they represented historical delineations between states , or in recent times, were

160-643: A "Euro-American radical right" would promote a trans-national white identity politics, which would invoke populist grievance narratives and encourage hostility against non-white peoples and multiculturalism . In the United States, mainstream news has identified Donald Trump 's presidency as a signal of increasing and widespread utilization of white identity politics within the Republican Party and political landscape. Journalists Michael Scherer and David Smith have reported on its development since

240-1016: A community distinct and separate from other social groups. On the other hand, the MGTOW movement is sometimes considered a male-gender separatism, as at the center of this ideology is the notion of male separatism where men should not be a part of a feminist-biased society. Some fringe elements even propose a utopical no-women state. Some examples include: Some separatist groups seek to separate from others along racial lines. They oppose interracial marriage and integration with other races and seek separate schools, businesses, churches and other institutions, and often separate societies, territories, countries, and governments: Religious separatist groups and sects want to withdraw from some larger religious groups and/or believe they should interact primarily with coreligionists: How far separatist demands will go toward full independence, and whether groups pursue constitutional and nonviolent action or armed violence, depend on

320-416: A form of Māori identity politics, directly oppositional to Pākehā (white New Zealanders), has helped provide a "basis for internal collaboration and a politics of strength". A 2009, Ministry of Social Development journal identified Māori identity politics, and societal reactions to it, as the most prominent factor behind significant changes in self-identification from the 2006 New Zealand census. Since

400-485: A group identity. Groups may also choose to label themselves in order to separate themselves from mainstream society, setting themselves apart as superior to those who follow the norm. Labels may function not only to say what a group is, but to say what the group is not. George Herbert Mead explained that positioning a group in opposition to a common enemy is "the easiest way of getting together". He further claims that values are strengthened and validated when aligned with

480-515: A group to be inferior. This in turn can strengthen the group's association with their label and the actions and behaviors associated with them. Individuals can bond over shared interests and characteristics, leading to a sense of connection and community. Labels are not restricted to changeable aspects of one's self, but may be used to describe foundational aspects of one's identity, including race, gender, and sexuality. Communities that share labels may have similar experiences that bind individuals to

560-437: A healthy love for ourselves, our sisters and our community which allows us to continue our struggle and work. This focusing upon our own oppression is embodied in the concept of identity politics. We believe that the most profound and potentially most radical politics come directly out of our own identity, as opposed to working to end somebody else's oppression. Identity politics, as a mode of categorizing, are closely connected to

640-460: A label to describe a certain aspect of themselves, and these labels may change over time. Labels can describe a certain facet of one's personality, or they may highlight certain achievements. Labeling one's self can amplify the role of the described behavior in their life, influencing them to conform to behaviors that are expected by those who are in the labeled group. Despite groups holding many positive qualities, others may perceive positive traits of

720-404: A lot of attention from all sides of the political sphere. A counter movement formed the hashtag, # AllLivesMatter , in response to # BlackLivesMatter . See also: White identity , White nationalism , White supremacy , White defensiveness , White backlash , and Identitarian movement In 1998, political scientists Jeffrey Kaplan and Leonard Weinberg predicted that, by the late 20th-century,

800-512: A majority and minority group phenomenon, racial identity politics can develop as a reaction to the historical legacy of race-based oppression of a people as well as a general group identity issue, as "racial identity politics utilizes racial consciousness or the group's collective memory and experiences as the essential framework for interpreting the actions and interests of all other social groups." Carol M. Swain has argued that non-white ethnic pride and an "emphasis on racial identity politics"

880-531: A majority felt Muslims are "scattered improperly"; an analyst for IFOP said the results indicated something "beyond linking immigration with security or immigration with unemployment, to linking Islam with a threat to identity". Gender identity politics is an approach that views politics, both in practice and as an academic discipline, as having a gendered nature and that gender is an identity that influences how people think. Politics has become increasingly gender political as formal structures and informal 'rules of

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960-556: A monolithic Muslim identity. The construction of British Muslim identity politics is marked with Islamophobia ; Jonathan Brit suggests that political hostility toward the Muslim "other" and the reification of an overarching identity that obscures and denies cross-cutting collective identities or existential individuality are charges made against an assertive Muslim identity politics in Britain. In addition, because Muslim identity politics

1040-509: A more equal society. In the United States, identity politics is usually ascribed to these oppressed minority groups who are fighting discrimination. In Canada and Spain, identity politics has been used to describe separatist movements; in Africa, Asia, and eastern Europe, it has described violent nationalist and ethnic conflicts. Overall, in Europe, identity politics are exclusionary and based on

1120-498: A particular meaning in relation to the national and cultural identities of the citizens of non-Arab countries, such as Turkey and Iran . In their 2010 Being Arab: Arabism and the Politics of Recognition , academics Christopher Wise and Paul James challenged the view that, in the post- Afghanistan and Iraq invasion era, Arab identity-driven politics were ending. Refuting the view that had "drawn many analysts to conclude that

1200-411: A picture to a word, to a common set of values. Social roles hold symbolic meaning and can define what expectations are placed on individuals. The concept of social roles are closely tied to the concept of labels. Social roles come with expected behaviors that can help situate people in unfamiliar contexts by providing a framework they can use to interpret the meanings behind actions. For example, offering

1280-607: A product of their social context, and may not be applicable outside their context. For example, a society without a formal legal system may not have the label "criminal", as there can be no stigmatization of crime in a society without laws. Labels are also be used to differentiate between groups for negative reasons. A label may be placed on someone to designate them as different from mainstream society. This can result in in-group favoritism and othering . In-group favoritism occurs when individuals in one group (united by one label) favor members of their group above outsiders. Othering

1360-411: A redistribution within existing structures and relations of production that does not challenge the status quo. Instead, Fraser argued, identitarian deconstruction, rather than affirmation, is more conducive to leftist goals of economic redistribution. Similarly, Marxist academics such as Kurzwelly, Pérez and Spiegel, writing for Dialectical Anthropology , argue that because the term " identity politics "

1440-403: A reemergent Arab identity in the region. Najla Said has explored her lifelong experience with Arab identity politics in her book Looking for Palestine . In the political realm of the United States, according to Jane Junn and Natalie Masuoka, the possibilities which exist for an Asian American vote are built upon the assumption that those Americans who are broadly categorized as Asians share

1520-735: A role in electoral politics, government jobs and affirmative actions , development projects. Due to somewhat competing tribe-based versus pan-Māori concepts, there is both an internal and external utilization of Māori identity politics in New Zealand . Projected outwards, Māori identity politics has been a disrupting force in the politics of New Zealand and post-colonial conceptions of nationhood. Its development has also been explored as causing parallel ethnic identity developments in non-Māori populations. Academic Alison Jones , in her co-written Tuai: A Traveller in Two Worlds , suggests that

1600-410: A sense of racial identity, and this group consciousness has political consequences. However, the belief in the existence of a monolithic Asian American bloc has been challenged because populations are diverse in terms of national origin and language—no one group is predominant—and scholars suggest that these many diverse groups favor groups which share their distinctive national origin over any belief in

1680-646: A strong supporter of liberal conceptions of civil rights , argues that a liberal democracy requires a common basis for culture and society to function. Rather than seeing civil society as already fractured along lines of power and powerlessness (according to race, ethnicity, sexuality, etc.), Schlesinger suggests that basing politics on group marginalization is itself what fractures the civil polity, and that identity politics therefore works against creating real opportunities for ending marginalization. Schlesinger believes that "movements for civil rights should aim toward full acceptance and integration of marginalized groups into

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1760-667: A then-record- breaking fourteen women ran for governor or U.S. senator, four of whom were successfully elected into office. In analyzing the possibility that male and female voters react differently to the opportunity to cast a vote for a woman, the study provided lent support to the idea that women tend to vote for women and men tend to vote against them. For example, among Republican voters in California, Barbara Boxer ran 10 points behind Bill Clinton among men and about even among women, while Dianne Feinstein ran about 6 points among men but 11 points ahead among women. This gender effect

1840-430: A tip to a waiter in a restaurant has a different symbolic meaning as offering a tip to an airline worker. Social context determines whether an action is normative or irregular. Symbolic interactionism and its examination of social roles is the theoretical basis for labeling theory. Symbolic interactionism preceded the creation of labeling theory, which drew heavily upon the work of symbolic interactionism. Labeling theory

1920-851: A variety of economic, political, social and cultural factors, including movement leadership and the government's response. Governments may respond in a number of ways, some of which are mutually exclusive. Some include: Identity politics Identity politics is politics based on a particular identity, such as ethnicity , race , nationality , religion , denomination , gender , sexual orientation , social background , caste , and social class . The term encompasses various often- populist political phenomena and rhetoric, such as governmental migration policies that regulate mobility and opportunity based on identities, left-wing agendas involving intersectional politics or class reductionism , and right-wing nationalist agendas of exclusion of national or ethnic "others." The term identity politics dates to

2000-464: A white feminist perspective that the politics of Black women had to be comprehended by broader feminist movements in the understanding that the different forms of oppression that Black women face (via race and gender) are interconnected, presenting a compound of oppression ( Intersectionality ). A contemporary example of Black identity politics is # BlackLivesMatter which began with a hashtag. In 2013, Alicia Garza, Patrisse Cullors and Opal Tometi created

2080-594: Is a sociological theory that claims labels have a profound impact on individuals. Labeling theory is closely connected with criminology, and examines conceptualizations of deviance . While labeling theory is not singularly focused on the study of crime, it uses "deviance" and "the criminal" to explain the effect of labels. Other labels are commonly researched under this theory, including "homosexual" and "mentally ill". Labeling theory emphasizes that labels do not necessarily represent inherent truths, but actions and behaviors that are responses to social constructions. "Deviance"

2160-466: Is a specific form of labeling in which the label produces patterns of power and privilege by designating those who do not follow accepted social norms as lesser. In some cases, othering can cause social exclusion, in which case groups labeled as "other" are denied full participation in society. Labels have been used to alienate groups and justify unequal power dynamics, which can harm the individual experiencing exclusion and alienation. Some may rely on

2240-573: Is a “sinister authoritarian plot” to disarm law abiding citizens. According to an article published by Southern Poverty Law Group, Proud Boys members are regularly affiliated with white nationalist extremists and are known for sharing white nationalist content across social media platforms. Another contemporary example is the hashtag movement # AllLivesMatter . # AllLivesMatter began as a counter narrative to # BlackLivesMatter . People who identify with this countermovement use this hashtag to represent what they call “anti-identity” identity politics, which

2320-419: Is defined differently based on a given author's or activist's ideological position, it is analytically imprecise. The same authors argue in another article that identity politics often leads to reproduction and reification of essentialist notions of identity, which they view are inherently erroneous. The Oxford English Dictionary traces the phrase "identity politics" to 1973. Mark Mazower writes of

2400-636: Is fomenting the rise of white nationalism . Anthropologist Michael Messner has suggested that the Million Man March was an example of racial identity politics in the United States. Arab identity politics concerns the form of identity-based politics which is derived from the racial or ethnocultural consciousness of the Arabs . In the regionalism of the Arab world and the Middle East , it has

2480-632: Is seen as internally/externally divisive and therefore counterproductive, as well as the result of manipulation by religious conservatives and local/national politicians, the progressive policies of the anti-racist left have been outflanked. Brit sees the segmentation that divided British Muslims amongst themselves and with the anti-racist alliance in Britain as a consequence of patriarchal, conservative mosque-centered leadership. A Le Monde / IFOP poll in January 2011 conducted in France and Germany found that

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2560-418: Is supposed to symbolize a movement against racial identities, but they've been criticized as being a white nationalist movement. Created, adopted and circulated beginning in 2016, # WhiteLivesMatter exalted themselves as an anti-racist movement, while identifying # BlackLivesMatter as the opposite. Columnist Ross Douthat has argued that white identity politics have been important to American politics since

2640-706: Is that of African-American homosexual women , who can constitute a particular hyper-specific identity class. Criticism of identity politics often comes from either the center-right or the far-left on the political spectrum. In addition, some activists who promote intersectionality, such as Kimberlé Crenshaw , criticize narrower forms of identity politics that overemphasise inter-group differences and ignore intra-group differences and forms of perceived oppression. Many socialists , anarchists and Marxists have criticized identity politics for its divisive nature, claiming that it forms identities that can undermine their goals of proletariat unity and class struggle . On

2720-438: Is the only thing that grants authority to speak on these topics; that, "If I didn't define myself for myself, I would be crunched into other people's fantasies for me and eaten alive." The term identity politics has been applied retroactively to varying movements that long predate its coinage. Historian Arthur Schlesinger Jr. discussed identity politics extensively in his 1991 book The Disuniting of America . Schlesinger,

2800-494: Is the privilege of whiteness, which is the identity that pretends not to have an identity, that denies how it is tied to capitalism, to race, and to war". According to Leonie Huddy, Lilliana Mason, and S. Nechama Horwitz, the majority of Latinos in the United States identity with the Democratic Party. Latinos' Democratic proclivities can be explained by: ideological policy preferences and an expressive identity based on

2880-426: Is used "as a tool to frame political claims, promote political ideologies, or stimulate and orient social and political action, usually in a larger context of inequality or injustice and with the aim of asserting group distinctiveness and belonging and gaining power and recognition." The term identity politics may have been used in political discourse since at least the 1970s. The first known written appearance of

2960-595: The Combahee River Collective (CRC) argued that Black women struggled with facing their oppression due to the sexism present within the Civil Rights Movement and the racism present within second-wave feminism . The CRC coined the term "identity politics", and in their opinion, naming the unique struggle and oppression Black women faced, aided Black women in the U.S. within radical movements and at large. The term "identity politics", in

3040-658: The Richard Nixon -era of the Republican Party. Historian Nell Irvin Painter has analyzed Eric Kaufmann 's thesis that the phenomenon of white identity politics is caused by immigration-derived racial diversity , which reduces the white majority, and an "anti-majority adversary culture". Writing in Vox , political commentator Ezra Klein believes that demographic change has fueled the emergence of white identity politics. Viet Thanh Nguyen says that "to have no identity at all

3120-484: The initialism LGBT , or " queer " as a counterculture shorthand for LGBT, did not gain much acceptance as an umbrella term until much later in the 1980s, and in some areas not until the '90s or even '00s. During this period in the United States, identity politics were largely seen in these communities in the definitions espoused by writers such as self-identified, "black, dyke, feminist, poet, mother" Audre Lorde 's view , that lived experience matters, defines us, and

3200-471: The 1970s were the peak of "gay liberation" in New York City and other urban areas in the United States, "gay liberation" was the term still used instead of "gay pride" in more oppressive areas into the mid-1980s, with some organizations opting for the more inclusive "lesbian and gay liberation". Women and transgender activists had lobbied for more inclusive names from the beginning of the movement, but

3280-524: The 1970s, the interaction of religion and politics has been associated with the rise of Islamist movements in the Middle East. Salwa Ismail posits that the Muslim identity is related to social dimensions such as gender, class, and lifestyles ( Intersectionality ), thus, different Muslims occupy different social positions in relation to the processes of globalization. Not all uniformly engage in the construction of Muslim identity, and they do not all apply to

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3360-631: The 19th century, during the Second Party System (1830s–1850s) as well as the Third Party System (1850s–1890s). Racial identity has been the central theme in Southern politics since slavery was abolished . Similar patterns which have appeared in the 21st century are commonly referenced in popular culture, and are increasingly analyzed in media and social commentary as an interconnected part of politics and society. Both

3440-536: The United States are uniquely American constructs that Asian American immigrants may not adhere to upon entry to the United States. Junn and Masuoka find that in comparison to blacks, the Asian American identity is more latent, and racial group consciousness is more susceptible to the surrounding context. Black feminist identity politics are the identity-based politics derived from the lived experiences of struggles and oppression faced by Black women. In 1977,

3520-504: The United States were forming more visible communities, and this was reflected in the political strategies of American homophile groups. Frank Kameny , an American astronomer and gay rights activist, had co-founded the Mattachine Society of Washington in 1961. While the society did not take much political activism to the streets at first, Kameny and several members attended the 1963 March on Washington , where having seen

3600-480: The ascription that some social groups are oppressed (such as women, ethnic minorities , and sexual minorities ); that is, the idea that individuals belonging to those groups are, by virtue of their identity, more vulnerable to forms of oppression such as cultural imperialism , violence , exploitation of labour , marginalization , or subjugation. Therefore, these lines of social difference can be seen as ways to gain empowerment or avenues through which to work towards

3680-587: The cause of conflicts between peoples in Europe, Africa and Asia with different ethnic/linguistic origins. The relationship between gender and separatism is complex. Feminist separatism is women's choosing to separate from ostensibly male-defined, male-dominated institutions, relationships, roles and activities. Lesbian separatism advocates lesbianism as the logical result of feminism. Some separatist feminists and lesbian separatists have chosen to live apart in intentional community , cooperatives , and on land trusts . Queer nationalism (or "Gay separatism") seeks

3760-631: The change he observed. Both positive and negative labels may create a case of self-fulfilling prophecy. While the application of negative labels may cause discrimination and stigmatization, applying positive labels can also have negative effects on individuals like high expectations and discrimination. American sociologist Howard S. Becker emphasized that labels and labeling are not the sole factors in behavior, and must be considered among other factors. Becker claimed that certain labels may increase one's likelihood of aligning with expected behavior, but they do not fully predict action. Individuals may choose

3840-584: The defense of Latino identity and status, with a strong support for the latter explanation hinged on an analysis of the 2012 Latino Immigrant National Election Study and American National Election Study focused on Latino immigrants and citizens respectively. When perceiving pervasive discrimination against Latinos and animosity from the Republican party, a strong partisanship preference further intensified, and in return, increased Latino political campaign engagement. In India, caste, religion, tribe, ethnicity play

3920-516: The differences." Label (sociology) A label is an abstract concept in sociology used to group people together based on perceived or held identity. Labels are a mode of identifying social groups. Labels can create a sense of community within groups, but they can also cause harm when used to separate individuals and groups from mainstream society. Individuals may choose a label, or they may be assigned one by others. The act of labeling may affect an individual's behavior and their reactions to

4000-801: The emergence of social activism , manifesting in various dialogues within the feminist , American civil-rights , and LGBT movements, as well as within multiple nationalist and postcolonial organizations. In academic usage, the term identity politics refers to a wide range of political activities and theoretical analyses rooted in experiences of injustice shared by different, often excluded social groups. In this context, identity politics aims to reclaim greater self-determination and political freedom for marginalized peoples through understanding particular paradigms and lifestyle factors, and challenging externally-imposed characterizations and limitations, instead of organizing solely around status quo belief-systems or traditional party-affiliations. Identity

4080-506: The era of Arab identity politics has passed", Wise and James examined its development as a viable alternative to Islamic fundamentalism in the Arab world. According to Marc Lynch , the post- Arab Spring era has seen increasing Arab identity politics, which is "marked by state-state rivalries as well as state-society conflicts". Lynch believes this is creating a new Arab Cold War , no longer characterized by Sunni-Shia sectarian divides but by

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4160-399: The existence of a pan-ethnic racial identity . According to the 2000 Census, more than six national origin groups are classified collectively as Asian American, and these include: Chinese (23%), Filipino (18%), Asian Indian (17%), Vietnamese (11%), Korean (11%), and Japanese (8%), along with an "other Asian" category (12%). In addition, the definitions which are applied to racial categories in

4240-651: The experiences of those they view as facing systemic oppression so that society can better understand the interplay of different forms of demographic-based oppression and ensure that no one group is disproportionately affected by political actions. Contemporary identity labels —such as people of specific race, ethnicity, sex, gender identity , sexual orientation , age, economic class, disability status, education, religion, language, profession, political party, veteran status, recovery status, or geographic location—are not mutually exclusive but are, in many cases, compounded into one when describing hyper-specific groups. An example

4320-436: The fact that he still has significant support from liberal and moderate Republicans—who are more favorable toward immigration and the legalization of undocumented immigrants—but believes that it could become a bigger issue as whites become a minority and assert their rights like other minority groups. Salam also states that an increase in "white identity" politics is far from certain given the very high rates of intermarriage and

4400-456: The game' have become gendered. How institutions affect men and women differently are starting to be analysed in more depth as gender will affect institutional innovation. A key element of studying electoral behavior in all democracies is political partisanship . In 1996, Eric Plutzer and John F. Zipp examined the election of 1992 election, also commonly referred to as " Year of the Woman ", where

4480-576: The hashtag in response to the acquittal of George Zimmerman , the man who killed Trayvon Martin in 2012.   Michael Brown and Eric Garner were killed by police in 2014, which propelled the # BlackLivesMatter movement forward, first nationally, and then globally. The intention of # BlackLivesMatter was to create more widespread awareness of the way law enforcement engages with the black community and individuals, including claims of excessive force and issues with accountability within law enforcement agencies. The hashtag and proceeding movement garnered

4560-478: The historical example of the once Anglo-Protestant cultural majority embracing a more inclusive white cultural majority which included Jews, Italians, Poles, Arabs, and Irish. A contemporary example of "White identity politics" is the right-wing group Proud Boys . Proud Boys was formed by Gavin McInnes in 2016. Members are males who identify as right-wing conservatives. They take part in political protests with

4640-453: The idea that the silent majority needs to be protected from globalization and immigration . During the 1980s, the politics of identity became very prominent and it was also linked to a new wave of social movement activism. Social movements have a significant influence on the law through statutory and constitutional evolution according to William Eskridge . Ethnic, religious and racial identity politics dominated American politics in

4720-529: The late 20th century: "In general, political activism increasingly revolved ... around issues of 'identity.' At some point in the 1970s this term was borrowed from social psychology and applied with abandon to societies, nations and groups." During the late 1970s, increasing numbers of women—namely Jewish women, women of color, and lesbians—criticized the assumption of a common "woman's experience" irrespective of unique differences in race, ethnicity, class, sexuality, and culture. The term identity politics

4800-426: The late twentieth century, although it had precursors in the writings of individuals such as Mary Wollstonecraft and Frantz Fanon . Many contemporary advocates of identity politics take an intersectional perspective , which they argue accounts for a range of interacting systems of oppression that may affect a person's life and originate from their various identities. To these advocates, identity politics helps center

4880-510: The mainstream culture, rather than … perpetuating that marginalization through affirmations of difference." Similarly in the United Kingdom, author Owen Jones argues that identity politics often marginalize the working class , saying: In the 1950s and 1960s, left-wing intellectuals who were both inspired and informed by a powerful labour movement wrote hundreds of books and articles on working-class issues. Such work would help shape

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4960-422: The methods used by Black civil rights activists , they then applied them to the homophile movement . Kameny had also been inspired by the black power movements slogan " Black is Beautiful ", coining his own term "Gay is Good". The gay liberation movement of the late-1960s urged lesbians and gay men to engage in radical direct action , and to counter societal shame with gay pride . In the feminist spirit of

5040-438: The mid-2010s. Ron Brownstein believed that President Trump uses "White Identity Politics" to bolster his base and that this would ultimately limit his ability to reach out to non- White American voters for the 2020 United States presidential election . A four-year Reuters and Ipsos analysis concurred that "Trump's brand of white identity politics may be less effective in the 2020 election campaign." Alternatively, examining

5120-461: The most infamous being January 6, 2021 , at the U.S. Capitol, which became violent and led to the arrest of their leader, Henry "Enrique" Tarrio and many others. Proud Boys identify as supporters of Donald Trump for President and are outspoken supporters of Americans having unfettered access to firearms by way of the 2nd amendment of the US constitution, having expressed the belief that gun law reform

5200-501: The opinion of those within the CRC, gave Black women a tool, from which they could use to confront the oppression they were facing. The CRC also claimed to expand upon the prior feminist adage that "the personal is political," pointing to their own consciousness-raising sessions, centering of Black speech, and communal sharing of experiences of oppression as practices that expanded the phrase's scope. As mentioned earlier K. Crenshaw, claimed that

5280-450: The oppression of Black women is illustrated in two different directions: race and sex. In 1988, Deborah K. King coined the term multiple jeopardy , theory that expands on how factors of oppression are all interconnected. King suggested that the identities of gender, class, and race each have an individual prejudicial connotation, which has an incremental effect on the inequity of which one experiences. In 1991, Nancie Caraway explained from

5360-616: The other hand, many conservative think tanks and media outlets have criticized identity politics for other reasons, such as that it is inherently collectivist and prejudicial. Center-right critics of identity politics have seen it as particularist , in contrast to the universalism espoused by many liberal politics, or argue that it detracts attention from non-identity based structures of oppression and exploitation. A leftist critique of identity politics, such as that of Nancy Fraser , argues that political mobilization based on identitarian affirmation leads to surface redistribution—that is,

5440-460: The personal being political, the most basic form of activism was an emphasis on coming out to family, friends and colleagues, and living life as an openly lesbian or gay person. By the mid-1970s, an "ethnic model of identity" had surpassed the popularity of both the homophile movement and gay liberation. Proponents operated through a sexual minority framework and advocated either reformism or separatism (notably lesbian separatism ). While

5520-512: The same breath to be quiet both for the sake of being 'ladylike' and to make us less objectionable in the eyes of white people. In the process of consciousness-raising, actually life-sharing, we began to recognize the commonality of our experiences and, from the sharing and growing consciousness, to build a politics that will change our lives and inevitably end our oppression....We realize that the only people who care enough about us to work consistently for our liberation are us. Our politics evolve from

5600-518: The same poll, David Smith has written that "Trump’s embrace of white identity politics may work to his advantage" in 2020. During the Democratic primaries , presidential candidate Pete Buttigieg publicly warned that the president and his administration were using white identity politics, which he said was the most divisive form of identity politics. Columnist Reihan Salam writes that he is not convinced that Trump uses "white identity politics" given

5680-493: The sidelining of the working class in politics, allowing New Labour to protect its radical flank while pressing ahead with Thatcherite policies. Some supporters of identity politics take stances based on Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak 's work (namely, "Can the Subaltern Speak?") and have described some forms of identity politics as strategic essentialism , a form which has sought to work with hegemonic discourses to reform

5760-441: The social group is generated, feelings of affiliation between group members are strengthened, and the movement's agenda becomes more representative. Specifically for the United States, Weldon suggests that organizing women by race strengthens these movements and improves government responsiveness to both violence against women of color and women in general. By the early-1960s, lesbian , gay , bisexual , and transgender people in

5840-612: The social world. Symbolic interactionism and labeling theory both examine labels as a social concept, and emphasize the social weight of labels and labeling. Symbolic interactionism focuses on expectations of social roles, while labeling theory focuses on the social and individual consequences of labeling. Both theories link between labels and contexts and maintain that their meanings are socially defined rather than universal. Labels serve many functions in sociology. They group individuals with common characteristics, such as academic performance, gender, race, or adherence to law. Labels are

5920-824: The term is found in the April 1977 statement of the Black feminist socialist group, Combahee River Collective , which was originally printed in 1979's Capitalist Patriarchy and the Case for Socialist Feminism , later in Home Girls: A Black Feminist Anthology, edited by Barbara Smith , a founding member of the Collective, who have been credited with coining the term. In their terminal statement, they said: [A]s children we realized that we were different from boys and that we were treated different—for example, when we were told in

6000-499: The understanding of "universal" goals. Others point out the erroneous logic and the ultimate dangers of reproducing strong identitarian divisions inherent in essentialism. For queer theorist Paul B. Preciado , "movements for the emancipation of subaltern minorities (racial, gender and sexual, etc.) ended up crystallizing into identity politics. Without having dismantled the regimes of racial, sexual or gender oppression, identity politics have ended up renaturalizing and even intensifying

6080-402: The use of stereotypes to assign labels. Unlike neutral categorization, stereotyping relies on power imbalances to reduce differences between individuals and groups to exaggerated characteristics. Although stereotypes may have no factual basis, they may alter an individual's behavior if consistently applied. Sociologist Robert K. Merton named this effect " self-fulfilling prophecy " to explain

6160-488: The values of a group. Groups can be united in many ways, including shared experiences, common identity, shared values, or a common enemy. Symbolic interactionism is a sociological theory that examines the role of symbols in communication and interaction. Symbolic interactionism is mainly concerned with smaller groups and interactions between individuals. This theory looks at the construction of symbolic meanings and their use in social contexts. A symbol can be anything from

6240-500: The views of politicians at the very top of the Labour Party. Today, progressive intellectuals are far more interested in issues of identity. ... Of course, the struggles for the emancipation of women, gays, and ethnic minorities are exceptionally important causes. New Labour has co-opted them, passing genuinely progressive legislation on gay equality and women's rights, for example. But it is an agenda that has happily co-existed with

6320-455: Was (re-)coined by the Combahee River Collective in 1977. The collective group of women saw identity politics as an analysis that introduced opportunity for Black women to be actively involved in politics, while simultaneously acting as a tool to authenticate Black women's personal experiences. In the ensuing decades, the term has been employed in myriad cases with different connotations dependent on context. It subsequently gained currency with

6400-499: Was further amplified for Democratic female candidates who were rated as feminist. These results demonstrate that gender identity has and can function as a cue for voting behavior. Scholars of social movements and democratic theorists disagree on whether identity politics weaken women's social movements and undermine their influence on public policy or have reverse effects. S. Laurel Weldon argues that when marginalized groups organize around an intersectional social location, knowledge about

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