WEEKfiveBLOG
While exploring Lordes ideas and rereading over her analysis of age, race, and class, one can see how she is oppressed. One is also able to notice that because of her position and the fact that she is black, lesbian, and in an interacial couple, she is oppressed everyday. Her everyday is much different than ours. She notes that everyone can see how black people, women, and homosexuals are treated as inferior, yet noone really stops and thinks about it. The fact is that this also a part of our 'everyday'. Everyone is taught at a young age how to act, and how to respond to others around you. Everyone is taught how to perform gender, and conform to society's ideas and norms.
On the idea that we perform gender differently according to our age, class, sexuality, and race, I agree. This idea goes hand-in-hand with the fact that what you wear and how you look can determine your age, class, and sexuality. We know limits because of our outward appearance. An 80-year-old isn't supposed to wear high heels and tube tops. They are limited to sweaters and long pants. Lesbians are thought to be 'butch' or are thought to be, as society would label them, a 'lipstick' lesbian. This is whats wrong with our culture. Why are there only 2 catgegories, and why do we even need these categories? These labels are engraved into our perpectives and need not to be.