Mammy’s Daughters; Or, the DNA of a Feminist Sexual Ethics

Abstract

I am a woman who was once a girl who loved to read stories. I readily imagined myself as Heidi though I wasn’t Swiss, as Wilma Rudolph though I couldn’t run fast, and as Wonder Woman though I had no gold tiara and was not and never would be really good with a lariat. My imagined self merged into my experienced self, and both were affected by the self I was told I was or should become. I am a literary historian who believes that our stories reflect and define our identities. I am one of those who affirm that we can know what is true, and that we must tell the truth if we are to be free. Like many of my ilk, I take it as gospel that sometimes the only way truth can be told is through fiction. Not coincidently, I am an African American woman reared in segregated neighborhoods, educated in a segregated school system, graduated with honors from predominantly white universities, and instrumental in founding the first women’s studies department and one of the first black-studies departments in the nation. And I am one who has defied the odds by making and keeping intimate friendships with women who do not share the same stories.