Founded in 1975, the non-partisan National Alliance of Black Feminists (NABF) played a critical role in the Black womens liberation movement and the fight for the Equal Rights Amendment. The Chicago-based organizations Black humanist feminism powered a singular dedication to building coalitions while influencing its historic set of comprehensive political, economic, and cultural demands.
Ileana Nachescu places the NABFs history as the bridge between Black womens social activism in the 1970s and the intellectual activism of the 1980s. Her account details the NABFs work and how it reflected the groups strong humanist belief in the transformation of all human beings. Nachescu also shows that the NABFs post-Eighties erasure from movement histories is consistent with how many white feminists marginalized women of color and rejected their leadership. From there, Nachescu examines Black lesbians vibrant support of the NABF and shows how respectability politics pressured the group to support its lesbian membership in private but maintain a public silence on the issue.
A rare in-depth look at an overlooked organization, The National Alliance of Black Feminists tells an untold story of Black womens liberation in the Midwest.
