According to the newest General Social Survey taken in 2018, 23% of Black women ages 18-34 now identify as bisexual. This is a significant finding, as the number of self-identifying bisexual Black women is three times the number that it was only ten years ago. Many groups including young progressives, LGBTQIA advocacy groups, Christian and conservative organizations, feminists critics, and social scientists have taken notice of this sharp increase and what it might mean for the future of sexuality and the American family. For some social critics, this increase marks a critical moment in the development of Black women’s understanding and relationship with sexuality including Black gender dynamics more broadly.
I have a feeling that the increase in bisexuality among Black women in the United States is indicative of something more than an increase in visibility or more variation in sexuality. It can also be an act of resistance against racist and sexist views of Black sexuality. This speaks to the very foundation of the Black feminist movement itself, which is self-definition and autonomy.
What is Black Feminist Theory?
When I say Black feminist theory, I am referring to an intellectual tradition that is distinct in its centering of the Black woman’s experience. This is not just a group of feminists who theorize around issues affecting Black women, or Black women who use feminist theoretical approaches. Black feminists are critical of feminism that leaves out the experiences of Black women. As expressed in a statement made by the Combahee River Collective, an organization of Black lesbian feminists revolutionaries of the 1970s and 1980s, Black women’s participation in feminists movements were limited by racist feminist organizing and ideology: “Contemporary Black feminism is the outgrowth of countless generations of personal sacrifice, militancy, and work by our mothers and sisters…Black, other Third World, and working women have been involved in the feminist movement from its start, but both outside reactionary forces and racism and elitism within the movement itself have served to obscure our participation” (Combahee River Collective 1986). In many ways, this is a movement of rediscovering theories of Black womanhood that have been suppressed throughout history and a continuation of an intellectual tradition that privileges the voices of Black women and their contributions to the world of general knowledge.Taken into consideration the historical defining of Black womanhood through white supremacy ideology and the silencing of Black woman intellect, one major goal of Black feminism is self-definition and resistance against all forms of coercive powers. Coercion takes form in various aspects of life, including in the regulation of one of the most intimate social activities and the topic of this post: sexuality.
Black feminist theorists and activists brought attention to the specific oppression faced by Black women in regards to our sexuality:
“ We believe that sexual politics under patriarchy is as pervasive in Black women’s lives as are the politics of class and race. We also often find it difficult to separate race from class from sex oppression because in our lives they are most often experienced simultaneously. We know that there is such a thing as racial-sexual oppression which is neither solely racial nor solely sexual, e.g., the history of rape of Black women by white men as a weapon of political repression”
(Combahee River Collective 1974)
This statement is referencing the exploitation of Black women’s bodies during slavery as a tool of repression, emphasizing the importance of understanding sexual politics as a power structure for the liberation of Black women. This sexual repression is not limited to the institution of slavery. Racist narratives around Black women’s sexuality continue to affect meanings of sexuality currently.
Because of this history, the increase in bisexuality among Black women is meaningful phenomenon. For Black women, sexual expression can also be a reclamation of the body from these racist influences. This is not to say that same-sex sexuality or women-centric relationships did not exist among Black women previous to our current categorization of sexual identities, including bisexuality. However, the self-defined aspect of it gives the the current trend in bisexuality significant historical meaning.
Black feminist theorist bell hooks summarizes the importance of self-identification for Black women: “As subjects, people have the right to define their own reality, establish their own identities, name their history…as objects, one’s reality is defined by others, one’s identity created by others, one’s history named only in ways that define one’s relationship to those who are subject…Oppressed people resist by identifying themselves as subjects, by defining their own reality, shaping their new identity, naming their history, telling their story” (hooks, 1989). The increase in Black women identifying as bisexual is a shaping of a new identity, challenging the history of regulation of Black women’s sexuality. As said by Angela Davis, “Racism has always nourished itself by encouraging sexual coercion” (Davis 1978). This is what makes implications of increasing numbers of sexually self-identifying Black women so powerful. This is a reclamation of a sexual self denied over centuries of rape, abuse, and erasure. This is revolutionary.
The Sensual Scholar 
As a Black male bisexual, this emergence of bisexual Black women makes me happy… but I’ve always known that Black women are and can be bisexual. I don’t get all wrapped up in the sociopolitical stuff; Blacks are bisexual and for whatever reason they are but, still, it often dismays me to hear Black, bisexual women bad-mouthing Black, bisexual men. I get that my sisters have to stand up for themselves but there is still much divisiveness between us about being bisexual. There is a high level of commonality we share with each other – and without all that sociopolitical stuff (and not saying this isn’t important) and I hope I can live long enough to see our people embrace this level of commonality so we can stand together against those who continue to frown upon things LGBTQ+.
It has always amazed me to hear that there’s no such animal as a Black bisexual when I know it’s a lie, that and it’s impossible that I’m the only Black and male bisexual on the planet. I know better than that; I know there are a lot of Black and bisexual women but the hype has been that we’re all homophobic and rabidly so. Our history of sex between us isn’t something that can be held up as a shining example of how a people express themselves sexually – we can be and do better and it begins with – or includes – accepting that we can be and are bisexual. What others have to say about us being this way, bottom lining it – means nothing if we can’t get on the same page with this amongst ourselves. So it’s just not making some kind of sociopolitical statement and one based upon a history that none of us currently alive every really experienced first hand – but we know about just the same. I support Black bisexual women 100% but, as a bisexual man, we still need to work this out between ourselves as well as present a united front to all those who are of a mind that we’re not what we say we are.
And what a lot of us want and need to be. Bisexual. And unafraid to be.
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Thank you for your thoughtful comment.
I sympathize with your frustrations about homophobia within the Black community and even within the LGBTQ Black community with respect to bisexuals and transgender people.
As a Black feminist, I believe the personal is the political. Yes, we individually identify with certain groups, but this also points to a larger historical trend.
In response to your last comment, I don’t agree that what others say has “nothing to do with us if we don’t get on the same page” because we (Black people) are not alone in their making of generalizations of Black LGBTQ people, and Black sexuality more generally. I’ll be expanding on this in another post, but in short, as said by Angela Davis, sexual coercion (including sexual violence but also suppression of identities) has always has been a vehicle for racism in the United States. Therefore, a lot of how people generally understand Black sexuality (as deviant, hypersexual, etc.) is rooted in white supremacy, both current and historic.
We are living in a social context informed by a long history of Black people in the United States, so I situate my understanding of sexuality in a historical-cultural context. One does not have to live in a specific era be influenced by it’s legacy, although I’m not making the argument that racist ideas about sexuality are from another time.
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Also, I’m not saying that Black bisexuality (sex between people of the same gender) is new. I’m saying the self-identification and embrace of the label is.
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I tend to agree: The stereotypes that surround us have some basis in fact. I am also quite pleased to see someone address bisexuality in Blacks from a historical point of view; we know there are Black bisexuals but we don’t talk about it and because of our alleged and virulent homophobia which is, of course, a gross misconception since one homophobic person doesn’t mean all people like that are homophobic.
Is it racist… or just another aspect of our fear of the other, that thing that makes us say that if you’re not like us, you’re against us and, as such, we’re gonna do whatever we can to devalue you.
I’ll keep an eye out for your next writing and thank you for allowing me to comment.
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