Abstract

In the dissertation I explore feminist philosophical issues concerning writing, power, and resistance, with particular emphasis on the possibilities of multicultural alliances among women across cultural differences. I show that alliances which are multicultural reflect persistent struggles with intersections of gender, race, class, and sexuality. In the dissertation, reflections on the possibilities of multicultural alliances among women are shaped by frameworks of my experiences as a white, middle-class, southern lesbian in the United States. My analysis combines postmodern, feminist, and multicultural approaches in its consideration of the convergence of writing, alliances, and cultural differences. ;The work of feminist writers such as Gloria Anzaldua, Nicole Brossard, Trinh T. Minh-Ha, Adrienne Rich, and Audre Lorde are taken as points of departure for meditations on the possibilities of a feminist writing which is shaped by what it means for women to love other women. Each writer, in her own way, is engaged in textual activism. Textual activism opens a writer to experiencing struggles of resistance to oppression personally. I suggest that textual activism results when the intersecting cultural locations of a writer are opened as sites of critical reflection. Textual activism is concerned with spaces which are created when both reader and writer take risks. ;In my analysis of the possibilities of multicultural alliances among women, I exercise creative writing styles which reflect a perpetual resistance to isolating gender from race, class, and sexuality. In my attempts to maintain a sustained focus on intersecting identities, I move toward an understanding of the myriad relationships between writing and power. Through the incorporation of stories, memories, and dreams, I am engaged in revealing the struggle with words necessary to articulate a multiple presence in writing. ;My concern is that many feminist writers have not allowed our desires for multicultural alliances to shape the way in which we write. What would it mean to seriously consider the connections between feminist writing and political action? The dissertation reveals that feminist desires for multicultural alliances among women must be reflected in our theory if it is to remain focused on political action