WITMonth Day 10 | Intersections

I've found myself thinking about intersections quite a bit today. Not that I don't try to contemplate intersections in general - it's definitely a topic that comes up frequently - but today it seemed especially prominent, as more and more friends and family members began asking me about this women in translation project that they hadn't really known until now. Suddenly, people who until now had only a vague sense of what this project meant to me began wondering: What about other languages? Are there differences between countries? Is there a difference with regards to self-published literature?

At this point in the conversation, I almost always have to bring up intersectionalism as a concept. Curiously, I've found that those unfamiliar with the concept (or not explicitly in its feminist context) accept it much more simply when they themselves are challenging it. It's the easiest thing in the world to just say, "Yes, there is more than one problem". Because there is.

While WITMonth explicitly focuses on women (and trans and nonbinary) writers in translation, yes. But longtime readers of this blog will recall that I have tried to have as broad of a WITMonth since its inception, even though I don't always succeed. And regardless my reading, I have always hoped that WITMonth recognize the other ways in which women writers in translation may belong to marginalized groups.

This is why I look at classic literature. At queer literature. Why I've pointed out the overall imbalances in publishing between books from Western Europe and the rest of the world. Women in translation are not a homologous monolith, each with exactly the same sort of bias against her. Within translated literature (and within the WIT project) exist several other intersections, like sexuality, ability, country of origin, writing language, and so on.

I know I say this all the time (and I'm becoming a bit of a broken record on the matter...), but it's important that we remember this point. It's important that we challenge our reading at every step of the way, because the point isn't just to check off the "women in translation" box on our "diversity" cards (eurgh). As I've argued before, the point is to experience the world as it truly is. That entails reading women of all backgrounds, and recognizing the intersecting identities that many women hold.

We cannot ignore that literature in translation has a demographic/continental bias. We cannot ignore that literature in translation overall favors certain languages over others. We cannot ignore that literature in translation rarely explores the working class experience. We cannot ignore the fact that each and every one of these factors plays a role when it comes to the books we see published overall, and doubly so for women writers. Yes, WITMonth will remain focused on women, but that doesn't mean we can't recognize some other problems along the way. Especially since they are equally solvable.