Toni Cade Bambara: Tools of Resistance from an Activist-Pedagogue

• In Event: If Black Women Were Free: The Politics and Pedagogy of Black Power from the U.S. to the U.K.

Abstract

Toni Cade Bambara (1939-1995) is a seminal figure in Black Feminist Studies and the Black Arts Movement. Viewing herself as a “cultural worker,” Bambara believed in a holistic, whole person approach to activism inside and out of institutions. This is in part because, as she writes in the preface to her groundbreaking anthology The Black Woman, published over 50 years ago, various fields of study have failed to provide us with paths to liberation. As a teacher, Bambara’s pedagogical practices focused heavily on forming intellectual, spiritual and physical solidarity with oppressed, or as she called them, “downpressed” people across the globe. Her syllabi, accessible in part through the archives at Spelman College, are filled with minoritized women authors.

Outside of formalized teaching, Bambara also considered herself to be part of the worldwide anti-imperialist movement. In 1975, she traveled to Vietnam at the invitation of the Women’s Union (which was a merging of other groups such as Women against Imperialism, Women for the Defense of the Country, etc.) to work with other women also opposed to war. In her writing during this time, Bambara links the struggle of Black women and Vietnamese women, “women who had experienced two thousand years of feudalism.” Alongside the struggle, Bambara joyfully contemplates that when “you’re in the presence of Vietnamese women for five minutes and you recall, yes, Harriet Tubman, right Sojourner Truth. They gave me back my grandmother.”

Toni Cade Bambara’s international and multicultural approach to teaching, writing, and organizing live on in her syllabi, writing such as The Sea Birds Are Still Alive (1977) and The Salt Eaters (1980) and the principles she left for us in her own words. Today, it is even more necessary to embrace her pedagogical/cultural worker legacy in order to continue the tradition of teaching (and learning) as resistance.

Author

• Makeba Lavan, Grinnell College