DEMOCRACY NOW
We speak with the legendary African-American feminist scholar Barbara Smith. She is a founder of the Combahee River Collective and of Kitchen Table: Women of Color Press. Barbara Smith recently wrote a column in The Guardian newspaper titled “I helped coin the term ‘identity politics’. I’m endorsing Bernie Sanders.” Her latest book is “Ain’t Gonna Let Nobody Turn Me Around: Forty Years of Movement Building with Barbara Smith.”
AMY GOODMAN: This is Democracy Now!, democracynow.org, The War and Peace Report. I’m Amy Goodman, as we continue to look at the presidential race following Bernie Sanders’ victory in the New Hampshire primary. The race now moves to Nevada and South Carolina.
We’re joined by the legendary African-American feminist scholar Barbara Smith, founder of the Combahee River Collective and of Kitchen Table: Women of Color Press. Barbara Smith recently wrote a column in The Guardian newspaper headlined “I helped coin the term ‘identity politics’. I’m endorsing Bernie Sanders.” Her latest book is Ain’t Gonna Let Nobody Turn Me Around: Forty Years of Movement Building with Barbara Smith. She’s joining us from the capital of New York state, Albany.
Barbara Smith, welcome to Democracy Now! It’s great to have you with us. We are speaking to you —
BARBARA SMITH: Great to be with you, Amy. Thank you.
AMY GOODMAN: We’re speaking to you on the day after the New Hampshire primary, after, actually, in the last two weeks, the primary, first primary, and caucus, Iowa and New Hampshire, that take place in two of the whitest states in the country. And now we move to states of far more diversity, Nevada and South Carolina, and then on to Super Tuesday. So, you are now supporting Bernie Sanders. You’re a surrogate for Senator Sanders. I was wondering if we could step back and you give us a little of your background. I was recently at the Combahee River in South Carolina, after we did an environmental justice forum in Orangeburg, speaking with some of the presidential candidates, and made that trip to the Combahee River because it is so significant — Harriet Tubman and all that she had accomplished. But talk about your background, before you tell us why you support Senator Sanders.
BARBARA SMITH: Are we starting at birth, or are we going to fast-forward?
AMY GOODMAN: Wherever you’d like to start.
BARBARA SMITH: Well, I think it’s really important for people to know — and I say this in the article that was in The Guardian — it’s important for people to know that I was born under Jim Crow. I was born in 1946, so Jim Crow was the law of the land during that time, during my growing-up years. And the reason it’s important, I think, is because it shaped very much who I was and my perspective on this project of U.S. democracy, that we’re still trying to improve.
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