On May 22, 2024, we celebrated 50 Years of Combahee! At the vanguard of radical leftist Black feminist thought and behavior, the Combahee River Collective has and continues to make an indelible mark on Black feminist movements and beyond. A radical Black feminist socialist organization active between 1974 and 1980, the Combahee River Collective and the Collective’s Statement has shaped generations of Black feminists in the U.S. and globally, and has expanded our frame of reference of power, interlocking oppressions, and Black feminist praxis and resistance.
This conversation will feature two founding members of the Combahee River Collective, Demita Frazier and Barbara Smith, who will offer insights on the 50th anniversary of the formation of the Combahee River Collective and the state and future of Black feminist politics and organizing. The conversation also featured Anastácia Flora Oliveira, Black Women Radicals' Dandara dos Palmares Internationalist Black Feminist Fellow, who spoke about the impact of Combahee as a Black lesbian feminist from the Recôncavo region of Bahia, Brazil. #50YearsofCombahee
About Demita Frazier: Demita Frazier., J.D., is an unrepentant lifelong Black feminist, social justice activist, thought leader, writer, and teacher. She is a founding member of the Combahee River Collective who has remained a committed activist in Boston for over 44 years, was a radical even as a child. While a high school student in Chicago, she helped organize a student walk out in protest of the Vietnam War. She has worked in coalition with many organizations on the issues of reproductive rights, domestic violence, the care and protection of endangered children, urban sustainability issues affecting food access in poor and working-class communities, and a host of other important issues affecting communities of color. She has been an organizer and architect behind the scenes of many movement initiatives including the Chicago Black Panther Party’s Breakfast Program, Jane Collective, and more. After receiving her JD from Northeastern University, Frazier contributed to local and national campaigns for gender and racial justice. For more on Demita’s extraordinary activist journey, please see Keeanga–Yamahtta Taylor’s, How We Get Free: Black Feminism and the Combahee River Collective. She has been a consistent advocate for the unequivocal freedom of Black women so that we can get on with the urgent business of freeing the world.
About Barbara Smith: Barbara Smith is an author, activist, and independent scholar who has played a groundbreaking role in opening up a national cultural and political dialogue about the intersections of race, class, sexuality, and gender. She was among the first to define an African American women’s literary tradition and to build Black women’s studies and Black feminism in the United States. Her career is documented in Ain't Gonna Let Nobody Turn Me Around: Forty Years of Movement Building with Barbara Smith (SUNY Press). Born in Cleveland, Ohio, she and her twin sister, Beverly, began participating in civil rights protests in the 1960s. In 1974 Smith co-founded the Combahee River Collective in Boston, Massachusetts, and in 1977, she co-authored the Combahee River Collective Statement, with Beverly, and Demita Frazier.
Smith taught her first class on Black women’s literature in 1973 at Emerson College and has taught at numerous colleges and universities. She co-founded Kitchen Table: Women of Color Press, the first U.S. publisher of books for women of color, in 1980. One of the books edited by Smith, Home Girls: A Black Feminist Anthology (1983), broke new literary ground by integrating black lesbian voices with those of other Black women. In 2005, Smith was elected to the Common Council in Albany, New York. She was nominated for a Nobel Peace Prize that same year. Smith’s essays, reviews and other work has been published in The New York Times, The Black Scholar, Ms., The Guardian, The Village Voice, and The Nation, among others.
About Anastácia Flora Oliveira: Anastácia Flora Oliveira is the inaugural Dandara dos Palmares Black Feminist Internationalist Fellow for Black Women Radicals. A native of São Félix in the Recôncavo region in Bahia, Brazil, she draws strength and identity from her roots, fueling her passion for photography and social activism. From a young age, Anastácia was captivated by the family photo album, meticulously cared for by her paternal grandmother, Mariínha, in recognition of its significance as a repository of cherished memories for their Black family in the Recôncavo. Her grandfather, Demó, also played a role in shaping her love for photography through his enthusiasm for capturing moments and striking poses.
