Honoring 50 Years of the National Black Feminist Organization: An Interview with Dr. Kimberly Springer
Image of Dr. KImberly Springer. Photo by Julie B. Thompson for Columbia Magazine. Photo courtesy of Dr. Kimberly Springer.
By Karla Méndez
As we approach the 50th anniversary of the founding of the National Black Feminist Organization, scholar Dr. Kimberly Springer reflects on its legacy and contributions to Black feminist activism.
In May 1973, a group of Black feminists that included Margaret Sloan–Hunter, Eleanor Holmes Norton, Doris Wright, Faith Ringgold, and Florynce (Flo) Kennedy held what was the first official meeting of the newly established group, the National Black Feminist Organization (NBFO). Through its 1973 Statement of Purpose, the organization declared its aim was to “address ourselves to the particular and specific needs of the larger, but almost cast-aside half of the black race in Amerikka, the Black woman.” The group’s official announcement came on August 15th, 1973, and by August 16th, it had attracted 400 women interested in joining.
Like other Black feminist organizations during this political and social activism period for civil and women’s rights, the NBFO became a casualty of limited resources and support from established groups, division amongst group members, disparate political perspectives, and strategic differences led to its disbandment in 1976. Though it was only nationally active for a short period––with some chapters operating until 1980––during its peak, the organization boasted over 2,000 members across ten chapters.
One of the earliest Black feminist organizations, the NBFO paved the way for succeeding groups like the Combahee River Collective and the National Alliance of Black Feminists, which grew from the NBFO in 1974 and 1976, respectively.
To commemorate the 50 years since its establishment, Black Women Radicals and The School for Black Feminist Politics is hosting a two-day summit in New York City, featuring original members of the National Black Feminist Organization, such as Diane Lacey, Deborah Singletary, and Eugenia Wiltshire.
In anticipation of this monumental event, writer Karla Mendez interviewed Dr. Kimberly Springer, author of Living for the Revolution: Black Feminist Organizations, 1968–1980 — which is the first in-depth analysis of the Black feminist movement — to speak about NBFO’s legacy; the importance of Springer’s scholarship in her documentation of the NBFO and other Black feminist movements; and what freedom means for Black feminists.
Please note: This interview has been edited for clarity.
Karla Méndez (KM): What does the National Black Feminist Organization and its work and legacy mean to you?
Dr. Kimberly Springer (KS): Even though the NBFO technically had the shortest life span of the organizations I looked at –– from 1973 to 1975 –– what I take from their legacy is just boldness. The boldness it takes to have a group of people meet and then decide that you’re going to announce a national organization, I think, is so bold. Like yes, do that! It had its pitfalls and its problems, just in terms of “we don’t have an office,” “what is our infrastructure,” and “we told the New York Times that we have chapters all over the United States, I guess we better have chapters.”
One of the main things I take [from the NBFO] is that if you see a problem, don’t think you can’t fix it. I also admire that in traces of documentation about the group, they were concerned with the material needs of Black people and the material needs of Black women, specifically. And I find that sometimes, we can get into a theoretical petty space and not think about what material needs mean for others in practical terms. What does this mean for people’s everyday lives and their material needs? And I believe that the NBFO, in aspiring to be a national organization like the National Organization for Women (NOW), bit off more than they could chew, but I admire the gumption of it.
I want to contextualize that statement. It might seem insignificant in the age of self-promotion and social media because people are out here every day declaring themselves a consultant, inspirational speaker, or organization. Still, it's helpful to remember the context of the late 1960s and 1970s and that aspiring to be a national organization was very bold. We didn’t have the critique we have now of the non-profit structure, but there was something to it that they said we’re going to create a national organization.
KM: I appreciate that you contextualized it because I feel that it was in an era where although there were so many civil rights and women’s rights groups being founded, it was unexpected for a group of Black women to come forth and say, now we’re going to do something as well because we’ve been shut out of both of these groups. No one seems to be placing any urgency on our needs.
KS: Exactly. Like we’re not going to be told to wait anymore.
“Even though the NBFO technically had the shortest life span of the organizations I looked at – from 1973 to 1975 – what I take from their legacy is just boldness. The boldness it takes to have a group of people meet and then decide that you’re going to announce a national organization, I think, is so bold.”
Collage of Margaret Sloan-Hunter, Black lesbian feminist activist and chairwoman and the only president of the National Black Feminist Organization. Collage by Doriana Diaz.
KM: In what ways did the National Black Feminist Organization inspire your work? What are the intersections between your work and that of the organization?
KS: This is connected to the previous question regarding the boldness and their actions. It inspires me to think boldly about solutions to problems that are not necessarily what the status quo is offering. And what I mean by that is, when I did this research and was thinking about it at the time –– this was more than 20 years ago –– I was thinking about it in a sociological framework of success and failure. It showed me that we need to rethink what it means to succeed and what it means to fail.
But also, just because these organizations don’t exist anymore doesn’t mean they weren’t successful. And if we think about them as planting, not only harvesting the seeds of their predecessors but planting more seeds, I think they were incredibly inspiring. They thought here’s a thing that we could do for ourselves, so let’s do it and see if it works. They were willing to self-examine and see what they might have been wrong about and how to change that. And I’m specifically thinking about their leadership structure, which started off as this hierarchical chair and vice chair structure. They realized it was too much work for a chair and a vice chair with no staff. They began thinking about how to empower and delegate some of this work and actively tried to shift the structure. That willingness to change is how I think about aligning my work and interest with the organization's legacy.
KM: Do you believe there could ever be a feminist group radical enough to address the issues Black women experience?
KS: What is behind this question for you?
KM: For me, it seems like, at least in my research or what I have studied as a student, that specific groups had specific lists of things that they wanted to address and challenge and work against to dismantle but conflicted with the reality that the Black woman or just the Black experience, in general, is not monolithic. It’s varied. Since the NBFO, groups have come about and utilized the word ‘radical’ or labeled themselves as such. I want to know if you think that there could ever be a space or a world that we live in in which there is a group that is “radical” enough to address the multitude of issues that Black women, Black femme, and Black gender-expansive people experience.
KS: I don’t think there could ever be a single group, but to your question, I think there could be multiple groups working on a range of issues. I believe that part of the thing that social movements must constantly reckon with is that there are so many ways of approaching these issues because the conditions that cause oppression continue to mutate and change. I was thinking of the definition of radical that people usually defer to as this idea of going to the root or the origin, which implies that you must have groups capable of digging up something and starting over completely. And so instead, I’m wondering if we, looking at how Black women’s groups and feminist groups today are operating, maybe need to think about another definition of radical that is thorough and far-reaching.
In being thorough, we can dig down and go deep, but I know with far-reaching, many young activists today are interested in this idea of the rhizome and mushrooms spreading out across something and working that way. When thinking about being radical enough, we need to be expansive and welcoming enough instead of competing for limited resources. How do we shift our paradigm within activist spaces and say yes, all these things are problems, and there are multiple solutions, but how do we think about solidarity and how solidarity can work in something vast and address the issues that many Black women experience?
KM: The topic of solidarity is something that during this summit, we’ll get more into on a few of the panels just because it’s a discussion we’ve had behind the scenes of all these organizations and groups, but there’s almost as you said, at times competition for these limited resources. And it’s almost like can we foresee a time when we’re not so divided, and we’re working together even though there may be differences in how you’re fighting for something or what you’re working towards?
KS: I mean, it seems that if people can keep being self-reflective and self-aware and look at what they have in their capacity to do and ask: is there a way to remix what we’re doing that aligns with what another group is doing, and compound and multiple resources and scope? Also, we should be able to say something didn’t work out, but how do we evaluate this in a way that doesn’t respond by never attempting that again but instead looks at the lessons learned from it and what opportunities it presents down the line?
“When thinking about being radical enough, we need to be expansive and welcoming enough instead of competing for limited resources. How do we shift our paradigm within activist spaces and say yes, all these things are problems, and there are multiple solutions, but how do we think about solidarity and how solidarity can work in something vast and address the issues that many Black women experience?”
KM: In your research, what were some issues you found the NBFO was up against when it was first founded?
KS: The same boldness that I admire in declaring a national organization was also the biggest pitfall. They announced their founding in August of 1973, and then they had this conference of 400 people in December of 1973. That speaks to the need that people had for it, but also, how did you plan a conference at that time? I think the main thing they were up against was their aspirations. And I’m using aspirations specifically as opposed to ambition because I believe many of these women already felt professionally and personally successful. Still, I think they aspired to do more and considered a national organization the way to do that. But perhaps it was not best served by that structure. The requirements of non-profit status and all that.
KM: Do you think that perhaps, the NBFO’s early association with (or growth out of) mainstream feminism, e.g., NOW and Ms. Magazine, colored its view of Black lesbians within Black feminism?
KS: This is something I’m hoping to hear from NBFO members who are coming to the summit because I would like to hear how they think about the past, particularly with growth or changes that have happened. To answer your question directly, I don’t believe that that association was what impacted the NBFO’s view of Black lesbians. But to think about homophobia within the context of Blackness is super relevant. Just in terms of thinking, again, the rhetoric of “coming out of the closet” in that period was a very kind of political way of demonstrating one’s sexuality instead of thinking about what does it mean within the context of Blackness to have same-sex loving and how might a conversation about that been very different from a conversation about labeling who’s in and who’s out of a particular political closet. I wasn’t there, but I’m thinking about missed opportunities in terms of interpersonal ways we think about how we include different kinds of people under the banner of Blackness. I don’t think it was just about the association with Ms. Magazine. I think it was perhaps maybe due to thinking about sexuality and being reactive to “accusations” of being lesbians, because I think that’s kind of what troubled these groups. They spent so much time having to defend themselves and react. It kind of foreclosed a certain amount of space of being proactive.
KM: Do you think that if the NBFO were to be founded today, it would achieve more regarding the issues they wanted to combat? Do you think it would last longer than it did when it was founded in 1973?
KS: Their mission statement was more diagnostic than laying out what they wanted to do. They were very specific and precise about pointing out how sexism works, how racism works, and how they work together. But in terms of laying out, like here’s what we’re going to do, they talk about eliminating racism and sexism. How do you do that? The systems will change and morph. How do you respond to the changes and morphing of the system? What is your plan of action in that way? So, I think with our current awareness and the labeling of intersectionality; people know how to get certain resources and remain focused on what they’re doing.
What’s unique about NBFO is that they were very specific that this organization was for Black women and women of African descent. And I think that drawing that line might rub some people the wrong way because of how we think about inclusivity now. At the same time, I feel like Black people are constantly being asked to sympathize and empathize with other people instead of focusing on what is good for Black people.
Collage of Florynce “Flo” Kennedy, radical Black feminist organizer and founding member of the National Black Feminist Organization. Collage by Doriana Diaz.
KM: The Combahee River Collective, which was born out of a response to the National Black Feminist Organization, famously argued that “If Black women were free, it would mean that everyone else would have to be free since our freedom would necessitate that destruction of all systems of oppression.” Do you foresee a future in which Black women are free?
KS: I want to preface two things. First, I love words; even if I know or don’t know what they mean. I love looking them up and learning where a specific word came from and its origins. Archivists have this inside joke that’s not very funny to anybody else: If you ask an archivist a question, they’ll say, “it depends.” And so, I think for many of these conversations, it depends on how we define specific words. A future where Black women are free depends on how you define free. If I look reflectively at history and my own experience in activist experiences since I was in my late teens, I think Black women are more free. I believe freedom or being free is having autonomy and the agency to decide what you want to do and the resources to go after that. But I also think about being free as having range and having a range of options.
I remember talking to Professor Beverly Guy-Sheftall at Spelman College, one of my dissertation supervisors. She made a statement that Black women contain multitudes, and I remember thinking, “I gotta write that down. Let me cite Dr. Guy-Sheftall.” And then, later, I figured out this was from a Walt Whitman poem. Dr. Guy-Sheftall is a literature and English intellectual scholar, so the idea of Black women being able to have range and not only having Black girl magic but being flawed human beings who make mistakes and learn from those mistakes feels like freedom to me. I think it’s already happening even though structural and resource issues keep Black women from being free collectively.
“...the idea of Black women being able to have range and not only having Black girl magic but being flawed human beings who make mistakes and learn from those mistakes feels like freedom to me.”
KM: I love that, especially Black women being able to be flawed because there’s this expectation placed on Black women where you’re not allowed to make mistakes.
KS: Going from this place of blameless perfection to, how do we grow to learn to be accountable for our actions and lives if we’re not given the room to make those mistakes without being punished, particularly systematically punished?
KM: What does a Black Woman Radical mean to you?
KS: A lot of the things that I talked about initially in terms of autonomy and agency and the kind of range it takes to be radical in the sense of being thorough and far-reaching. Most importantly, consistently challenging the status quo because, generally, the status quo is always wrong. Challenging that “master narrative” is where a Black Woman Radical gets her fire to not bow down to these things and to think this can be changed, it should be changed, and I’m going to work to change it.
Dr. Kimberly Springer is interested in retiring to a beach community and opening a chill DJ bar as soon as possible, but more likely in the year 2037. Until then her research, praxis, and publication areas include archives, privacy, and cultural studies. Dr. Springer’s publications include Living for the Revolution, Black Feminist Organizations, 1968-1980 (Duke University Press, 2005), Still Lifting, Still Climbing: African-American Women’s Contemporary Activism (New York University Press, 1999), and Stories of Oprah: the Oprahfication of American Culture (University of Mississippi Press, 2010).
Karla Méndez (she/her) is currently a student at Brown University, pursuing a master’s in American Studies. She recently graduated from the University of Central Florida, where she majored in Interdisciplinary Studies with a double minor in Political Science and Women’s and Gender Studies. Her research interests include representations of Black American and Latin American women in visual art, literature, performance, and poetry, Black feminist histories and movements, Black American and Latin American women-written literature, Black and Latina cultural productions, and social structures. She is the lead columnist for the Black Women Radicals column, Black Feminist Histories and Movements. She has forthcoming articles in Ampersand Journal and Latinx Project’s Intervenxions. You can follow her on Instagram at @kmmendez.