Knowra Combahee River Collective Combahee River Collective The Combahee River Collective was a Black feminist lesbian socialist organization active in Boston from 1974 to 1980. Its members developed a politics centered on the interlocking effects of race, gender, sexuality, and class.
National Black Feminist Organization : A U.S. organization founded in 1973 to advance Black feminist politics and organize Black women. Collective members’ earlier involvement in this organization helped shape their breakaway organizing.
Barbara Smith : An American Black feminist writer, editor, and activist who helped found the Combahee River Collective. She was a central organizer and coauthor of the Collective’s foundational statement.
Identity politics : A political approach that organizes around the experiences and interests of groups shaped by shared identities and oppression. The Collective connected political analysis to members’ lived positions as Black women and lesbians.
The Combahee River Collective Statement : A 1977 political statement by the Combahee River Collective outlining its history, analysis, and organizing aims. It remains the clearest published account of the Collective’s politics.
Liberal feminism : A feminist approach that seeks women’s equality through legal reform, individual rights, and access to existing institutions. The Collective rejected equality limited to reforms that left racism and class exploitation intact.
Black feminism : A political and intellectual tradition addressing the specific conditions and intersecting oppressions faced by Black women. The Collective emerged within this tradition and pressed it toward an explicitly socialist, lesbian politics.
Beverly Smith : An American Black feminist activist and writer associated with the Combahee River Collective. She helped articulate the group’s politics and coauthored its statement.
Intersectionality : A framework for analyzing how systems of power interact to shape distinct forms of disadvantage. The Collective described interlocking oppressions before Kimberlé Crenshaw later coined this term.
Black feminist thought : A body of analysis developed by Black women about knowledge, power, and the conditions of their lives. The Collective’s statement became a frequently cited contribution to this intellectual tradition.
Marxist feminism : A feminist approach analyzing women’s oppression through Marxist concepts of class, labor, and capitalism. The Collective’s framework insisted that class analysis alone could not explain Black women’s oppression.
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