DOSSIER: EL PENSAMIENTO DE LÉLIA GONZALEZ, UN LEGADO Y UN HORIZONTE

Amefricanidade: The Black Diaspora

Feminism of Lélia Gonzalez
by Keisha-Khan Y. Perry | Brown University | [email protected]
and Edilza Sotero | Federal University of Bahia | [email protected]

On September 30, 2015, the United Nations in Studies at the University of California, Los Angeles.
Brazil celebrated the opening of its newest building, This is one of her most cited texts, which she later
in Brasília, which now houses representatives expanded and published as a book titled Lugar de
of the UN Population Fund, UN Women, UN negro with Carlos Hasenbalg (1982). In a visit to the
Environmental Programme, and UNAIDS. This new Center for Puerto Rican Studies at SUNY Buffalo,
building was named after Lélia Gonzalez, iconic Gonzalez spoke extensively with Molefi Kete Asante
Brazilian activist of the black and black women’s about the ideas he was developing for his book
movements of the 1970s and 1980s in Brazil. This Afrocentricity (1980). Gonzalez returned often
recognition of a black feminist scholar-activist to the US, including to UCLA in 1980 to present
came on the 70th anniversary of the creation of the “The United Black Movement,” now a classic
UN in 1945, the 20th anniversary of the 1995 Beijing essay published in Pierre Fontaine’s anthology
Fourth International Conference on Women, and Race, Class and Power in Brazil (1985). Gonzalez
in the framework of the UN’s International Decade traveled within the US and to Panama, France, Italy,
for People of African Descent (2015–2024). The year Switzerland, Finland, Burkina Faso, Senegal, and
2015 also marked the 40th anniversary of the UN’s Mali. She describes her journeys abroad during
Decade for Women. During the period from 1975 the Brazilian dictatorship and the struggle for
to 1985, Lélia Gonzalez was a frequent participant democracy as an opportunity to “breathe new air.”
in conferences and meetings organized as part of
or separate from official UN events (Carneiro 2014). This article situates Gonzalez as a critical thinker
It was precisely during this time that she became in the black radical and feminist traditions who
a leader in a burgeoning transnational network of should be known and taken more seriously in North
women’s activists and intellectuals who organized America. Her life and legacy teach us that in Latin
themselves in social movements, cultural groups, America and the Spanish-speaking Caribbean,
and political collectives. national narratives and policies of whitening and
multiculturalism operate in stark contrast to the
Between 1979 and 1981, Gonzalez traveled around reality that the black population in the region forms
the world to participate in academic and political the largest segment of the African diaspora outside
events and meet with black leaders in several Africa, with an estimated one hundred million
countries. In April 1979, she traveled to Pittsburgh, people. Vibrant struggles for cultural recognition,
Pennsylvania, in the US, to attend the LASA annual citizenship, and human rights, oftentimes founded
meeting and present a paper titled “Culture, and led by black women, have always been
Ethnicity and Work: Linguistic and Political Effects occurring. What would it mean, then, for African
on the Exploitation of Black Women” (Gonzalez diaspora studies and black feminist studies to
1979a). That same year, she presented “Brazilian decenter the Caribbean and North America and
Black Youth and Unemployment” at the African give more attention to Afro-Latin America?
Heritage Studies Association meeting, which
she attended regularly (Fierce 2000). In May, she To expand our assertion that African diaspora
presented “A mulher negra na sociedade brasileira” and Latin American studies need to refocus on
(Gonzalez 1979b) at the Center for African American the social, intellectual, and political experiences

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of black women, we provide a description of In 1976, Gonzalez joined the Instituto de Pesquisas
Gonzalez’s diasporic travels and experiences and das Culturas Negras (IPCN), which brought together
the impact on her formulation of amefricanidade students, scholars, and activists doing research and
and black diaspora feminism, concluding with organizing against racism in Rio de Janeiro. In 1978
a reflection on the politics of a black feminist Gonzalez, along with other black activists including
diaspora as an anti-imperialist and decolonial Abdias Nascimento, founded the Movimento
project in Africana and black feminist studies. Like Negro Unificado Contra a Discriminação Racial
Davies’s recent work on Claudia Jones (2008), this (MNU) in São Paulo. She attended gatherings in
ongoing research on black women in Latin America Rio de Janeiro, Salvador, Belo Horizonte, and other
follows in this black left feminist intellectual major cities throughout Brazil to disseminate
tradition of resisting the erasure of black women as the work of the MNU, which would prompt the
key social, economic, cultural, and political actors. diasporic view of black consciousness she later
In analyzing Gonzalez’s travels, we assert that black espoused. The importance of Gonzalez’s travels
women in Brazil should be centered as producers was not limited to her work educating young
of knowledge, not just objects of study (and desire) Afro-Brazilian students and activists. Through her
in the region. travels she witnessed firsthand how black people
lived and articulated politics across Brazil. She saw
A Remarkable Life her activism as evolving alongside emergent black
social movements, and that these movements
The following brief biography of Lélia Gonzalez
had become spaces for the circulation of political
will help us to fully understand her formation
pedagogies.
as a global black radical female subject in black
feminist and black diaspora studies.
On one of her trips to Europe, she stopped in Dakar,
Senegal, where she met exiled Cuban activist and
Gonzalez’s travels began in 1942 with her family’s
intellectual Carlos Moore. Their friendship reflected
move to Rio de Janeiro. The second to last of 18
the diasporic encounter between two Afro-
children, she attended the traditional Colégio
Latin intellectuals outside their home countries,
Pedro II in Rio, still known as one of the best
connecting around shared political ideologies of
public high schools in Brazil, and completed her
critiquing the racial conditions of the Americas.
bachelor’s degree in history and geography in 1959
Gonzalez traveled throughout the interior of Africa,
at the State University of Guanabara (now the State
from Senegal to Burkina Faso. She was particularly
University of Rio de Janeiro) and another bachelor’s
interested in the social transformation of African-
degree in philosophy in 1962. Before the recent
descendant women’s lives, assuming the beginning
implementation of affirmative action programs
of her role as an anthropologist.
for poor black students in public universities,
blacks made up less than 10 percent of Brazilian
Gonzalez joined the Workers Party in 1981 and
university students, and in some fields of study,
ran for political office in 1982. A few years later
like philosophy, less than 5 percent. It would still
she joined the Democratic Labour Party and
be remarkable today for any black woman raised
once more sought a position in the House of
in the poorest neighborhoods of Rio de Janeiro
Representatives of Rio de Janeiro. In 1983, after
to complete a bachelor’s degree, a professional
much discussion and critique of sexism in black
studies course in Lacanian thought, and a master’s
movement organizations, she and other women
degree in communication at the Federal University
founded the Nzinga Coletivo de Mulheres Negras
of Rio de Janeiro, while founding the Institute
in Rio de Janeiro, one of the first black women’s
of Research on Black Culture and the School of
organizations in the country (Gonzalez 1983;
Freudian Thought, and to begin a doctorate in
Santos 2010).
anthropology.
In 1984, as a Ford Foundation fellow, she traveled
to the US and met with black women leaders
such as Angela Davis in a seminar at Morgan State

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University in Baltimore. The period between 1974 North America. Her key ideas, like amefricanidade
and 1988 was the most intense period of Gonzalez’s and Afro-Latin feminism, should be read alongside
political life, defined by her MNU and Nzinga the theorization of Afrocentricity, hemispheric
activism, work as a professor, and commitment blackness, decoloniality, and the globalization of
to diasporic travel, thought, and solidarity. Her last black feminist thought.
two trips, to Panama and Bolivia, deeply impacted
her black diaspora feminist ideas, but her work in The Formulation of Hemispheric Blackness
North America, Europe, and Africa were crucial for (Amefricanidade)
disseminating information about racial injustices in
Much of Gonzalez’s travels focused on her political
Brazil and dispelling the myth of racial democracy
work connecting the Brazilian struggle against
(Bairros 1999b; Carneiro 2014).
racism with struggles in other American contexts,
and she espoused a hemispheric and diasporic
In 1990, Lélia traveled again throughout Africa. In
approach to black liberation. In Panama, Gonzalez
early 1994 she became the head of the Department
observed that the discussions and analyses taking
of Sociology and Politics at the Catholic University
place helped to tear down barriers between
of Rio de Janeiro. On July 10 of that year she died
disenfranchised women, such as some feminists’
suddenly of a heart attack. Her death was tragic for
racism, and the antifeminism of American
the black and black feminist movements.
Indians and amefricanas (American Africans).
In Bolivia, Gonzalez identified the significance of
Gonzalez’s life reveals how her travels throughout
the amefricana voice recognizing the racism and
Brazil, the Americas, and Africa shaped her
sexism that black women face. Drawing from
intellectual formation and political consciousness.
psychoanalysts, specifically Magno’s Améfrica
Her travels throughout the black diaspora made
Ladina (1980), she synthesized a conception
centering black people and culture and eradicating
of the African diaspora and coined the term
antiblack racism her core mission. Gonzalez’s
amefricanidade to describe the common
life exemplified the diasporic consciousness of
experiences of blacks in the Americas. She negated
a hemispheric blackness and interconnected
the idea of a “latinidade das Americas,” arguing for
struggles against gendered and class-based racism.
recognition of Amerindian and African elements
in the cultures. She argued that “latinidade” stems
The impact of Gonzalez’s work as an activist and
from colonizers’ long and violent domination of
intellectual can be seen in the celebration of
the Iberian Peninsula. She defines amefricanidade
her life, scholarship, and political work (Carneiro
as follows: “A historic process of intense
2014; Barreto 2005; Cardoso 2014; Gonzalez 2018;
cultural dynamic (resistance, accommodation,
Ratts and Rios 2010; Viana 2006). She is still
reinterpretation, creation of new forms) referenced
remembered by a generation of scholars and
in African models that shape the construction of an
activists who worked alongside her in the national
ethnic identity. The value of this category is in fact
black movement and those who forged solidarity
to rescue a specific unity, historically forged in the
with that struggle from black communities around
interior of different societies that are formed in a
the world (Bairros 1999a). Gonzalez has been a
certain part of the world” (Gonzalez 1988a, 77; our
key reference for a new generation of activists
translation).
driven by her original standpoint within the black
feminism prism.
Sterling (2012) argues that this new culture formed
outside Africa does not erase the centrality of
In the US, Gonzalez was one of few Afro-Brazilians
Africanness in the formulation of blackness. At
actively participating in black academic circles,
the center of amefricanidade is black culture,
impacting the development of global perspectives
shaping all of Brazilian culture, expressed in the
and the centering of Brazil in Africana studies
everyday “speech, gestures, movements and ways
(Fierce 2000). Twenty-five years after her untimely
of being that manifest in ways that we are not even
death, we are struck by Gonzalez’s intellectual
conscious of them” (Gonzalez 1988a, 70). Pretoguês
erasure from Africana and black feminist studies in

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(black Portuguese) was one such example, tied had to defend the need to develop their own
to African linguistic survivals, and African religions political identities, and they claimed the right to
were key dimensions of black cultural life in organize autonomously within anti-black racism
the Americas. movements. Gonzalez’s travels intensified her
notions of blackness and feminism, and many
Gonzalez identified some founding figures in credit her with the diasporization of black feminist
African ancestrality in the Americas, including activism in Brazil (Bairros 1999). As Bairros (1999,
maroon societies, namely Zumbi dos Palmares 355) wrote, Gonzalez articulated “other ways of
and Nanny of the Maroons. For Gonzalez (1988b), thinking the African diaspora synthesized in the
Nanny was significant in rescuing the history of category ‘amefricanidade’, to define the common
black women’s strength in the struggle against experience of black people in the Americas.”
slavery and oppression and reestablishing the
black woman as a founder of amefrican nations. The Feminist Decolonial Project in
Nanny reminded her of the forgotten black Africana Studies
women heroines of Brazil such as Akotirene,
We have provided some key details of Lélia
Dandara, Maria Filipa, and Luiza Mahim. During
Gonzalez’s life and political work in response to
her trips to Martinique in 1991, Gonzalez came to
Campt and Thomas’s (2008, 1) question, “What does
see amefricanidade as the cultural resistance to
it mean to theorize diaspora through an explicitly
Eurocentric sociocultural standards and systems
feminist frame?” A full answer requires that we
and the inheritance of a black/Afro ancestral past.
excavate the contributions of black women in Latin
America and the Hispanophone Caribbean.
Understanding this perspective on defining a
collective black identity that is hemispheric,
Gonzalez’s black diaspora feminist politics reminds
Gonzalez calls for the transnational organization of
us that bringing black women’s intellectual work
African-descendant women in Latin America in her
and ideas to the forefront necessarily contributes
1988 essay, “For an Afro-Latin American Feminism.”
to significant shifts in representations of black
The ideas in her writings resemble those ideas of
subjectivity and the internationalization of
Claudia Jones (Davies 2008, 2011), who understood
antiracism and antisexism politics. Engaging
black women as having a distinct subjectivity and
black women’s experiences and actions seriously
militancy and thus envisioned a diasporic response
in African diasporic research expands notions
to their exploitation. Gonzalez (1988c, 96) writes:
of how black people experience and politicize
race, gender, class, and nation across multiple
When I speak of my own experience, I am talking
geographic communities. If we read more about
about a long process of learning which occurred
women such as Claudia Jones, Eslanda Robeson,
in my search for an identity as a black woman,
Angela Davis, Sueli Carneiro, Nilma Lino Gomes,
within a society which oppresses me and
Beatriz Nascimento, and Luiza Bairros, if we
discriminates against me because I am black.
unearth the archives of knowledge that emerge
But a question of an ethical and political nature
from their intellectual and social justice work, then
arises immediately. I cannot speak in the first
scholars of Latin America never have to question
person singular of something which is painfully
the validity of blackness or black womanhood as a
common to millions of women who live in the
category of humanistic or social scientific inquiry.
region, those “Amerindians” and “Amefricans”
Lélia Gonzalez’s theorization of amefricanidade
who are oppressed by a “latinness” which
challenges the antiblackness foundational in the
legitimizes their “inferiority.”
construction of the Americas, and the story of her
life should inspire a more global commitment
Gonzalez’s account reveals the unsurprising
to eradicating imperialism, gendered racism,
reality that black women throughout Latin
and all forms of subjugation at the core of our
America developed their militancy within the
intellectual mission.
black movement rather than within the women’s
movements. Black women in Latin America

LASA FORUM 50:3 63

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