Sunera Thobani

Last updated

Sunera Thobani
Born1957 (age 66–67)
Tanzania
CitizenshipCanadian
Alma mater
Occupations
TitlePresident of the National Action Committee on the Status of Women
Term1993–1996
Predecessor Judy Rebick
Successor Joan Grant-Cummings

Sunera Thobani (born 1957) is a Tanzanian-Canadian feminist sociologist, academic, and activist. Her research interests include critical race theory, postcolonial feminism, anti-imperialism, Islamophobia, Indigeneity, and the War on Terror. She is currently an associate professor at the Institute for Gender, Race, Sexuality and Social Justice at the University of British Columbia. Thobani is also a founding member of Researchers and Academics of Colour for Equality/Equity (R.A.C.E.), the former president of the National Action Committee on the Status of Women (NAC), and the director for the Centre for Race, Autobiography, Gender, and Age (RAGA).

Contents

Early life and education

Thobani was born in 1957 in Tanzania to parents of South Asian descent. [1] After spending her childhood in East Africa, she attended Middlesex University in England, completing her bachelor's degree in 1986. [2] In 1989, Thobani received a master's degree from University of Colorado in the United States. [2] Deciding to further her education in Canada, Thobani later went on to earn a PhD in sociology from Simon Fraser University in 1998. [2]

Academic career

From 1996 to 2000, Thobani taught women's studies at Simon Fraser University. [3] During her stay at Simon Fraser, she also served as the Ruth Wynn Woodward Endowed Professor and Chair. [4] Thobani has also previously lectured at Evergreen State College, a liberal arts college in Olympia, Washington. [5] Since 2000, she has been teaching at the University of British Columbia. [5] She is currently an associate professor at the Institute for Gender, Race, Sexuality and Social Justice. [3]

Activism

Early activist work

Thobani was an avid activist throughout her undergraduate and graduate career. Since the 1980s, she has been associated with the anti-racist movement, anti-apartheid movement, third world solidarity movements, and various women's movements. [6] As an undergraduate student living in the United Kingdom, she worked with different South Asian women's organizations. [6] Thobani also spent a year volunteering in Palestine. [6] Furthermore, as a graduate student in the United States, she was involved in anti-nuclear, peace, and Palestinian solidarity movements. [6]

After arriving in Vancouver in 1989 as a doctoral candidate, she quickly became affiliated with the National Action Committee on the Status of Women (NAC)—then the largest feminist organization in Canada. At the same time, she continued to work closely with women of color activists in Ontario and Quebec. However, Thobani quickly gained national prominence after the Women of Color caucus within NAC nominated her for a presidential run. In 1993, Thobani was elected as the 12th President of NAC—the first woman of color in the organization's history. [7] Securing the blessing of her predecessor—socialist feminist Judy Rebick—Thobani focused on making the organization a more inclusive space for women of color. [1] She served as president for three years; and in 1996, she was succeeded by another woman of color, Joan Grant-Cummings. [7]

Later activism

From 2008 to 2012, Thobani became the Director for the Centre for Race, Autobiography, Gender, and Age (RAGA). [8] Working collaboratively with other community organizations for equity and social justice, RAGA focuses on the importance autobiography and oral histories. [9]

Alongside feminists Sherene Razack and Yasmin Jiwani, Thobani also co-founded Researchers and Academics of Colour for Equality/Equity (R.A.C.E.). It is a collaborative coalition of First Nations, Inuit, Métis, Non-status Indians, people of color, and white allies who are engaged in the production of critical academic and activist knowledges. R.A.C.E. is a non-profit committed to anti-racist, anti-colonial, and feminist scholarship and praxis. [10]

Speeches and controversies

NAC presidency

Thobani's academic and activist work has garnered both support and backlash. Her 1993 appointment to the office of NAC president outraged some Canadians. Notably, on 23 April 1993, Tory MP John Alexander Frances MacDougall (Timiskaming) questioned Thobani's citizenship status in the House of Commons of Canada—referring to her as an "illegal immigrant." [11] His comments sparked outrage. Acting NAC President, Judy Rebick, labelled MacDougall's line of questioning "irresponsible and reprehensible," as well as "sexist and racist." [12]

However, MacDougall's concerns did resonate with some Canadians. For instance, some white Canadian women viewed Thobani's NAC appointment as divisive. One particular woman—identifying herself as a fifth-generation white Canadian—wrote to the Toronto Star in order to express her doubts about Thobani's ability to represent "women whose forebears built this country." [11]

Thobani, herself, responded to MacDougall's speech—ultimately perceiving it as "an attack on all immigrants—that our presence is not valued here." [13]

9/11 speech

On 1 October 2001, Thobani gave a speech at the "Women's Resistance: From Victimization to Criminalization" conference concerning the September 11 attacks. [14] This speech—which rejected an ahistorical framing of the recent attacks—launched a firestorm of controversy. In it, she stated that:

"U.S. foreign policy is soaked in blood. And other countries of the West including "shamefully" Canada, cannot line up fast enough behind it. All want to sign up now as Americans and I think it is the responsibility of the women's movement in this country to stop that, to fight against it." [14]

Many Canadians regarded Thobani's speech as inflammatory, "anti-American," and too soon after such a great tragedy. [15] As a result, she was accused by an anonymous resident of a criminal hate crime, an allegation investigated by the police. [15] RCMP Corporal Michael Labossiere observed that "Normally, people think it's a white supremist or Caucasians, promoting hate against visible minorities…We want to get the message out that it's wrong, all around." [15]

Yet, others sympathized with Thobani's plight, viewing it as a "McCarthy-style witch-hunt." [15] For instance, Murray Mollard—lawyer and executive director of the British Columbia Civil Liberties Association—reflected that "We need to have an open debate about our response to Sept. 11." [15] He did not think that freedom of speech and public academic dissent should be curtailed.

Soon, members of the Canadian public were demanding that Thobani be fired from the University of British Columbia for her comments. She also began receiving menacing phone calls, copious amounts of porn, and hate mail from both Canadians and Americans. [15] In response to the hate crime allegations and the intense national scrutiny, Thobani maintained that "This is just pure harassment.... They are trying to silence dissent in this country." [15]

About three weeks later Labossiere offered an apology for his media statements against Thobani, [16] and police said they would not charge her with a hate crime. [17] A version of her speech, "War Frenzy," has since been incorporated into the Great Canadian Speeches anthology, initially published in 2004. [18]

Selected publications

Books

See also

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Christina Hoff Sommers</span> American author and philosopher (born 1950)

Christina Marie Hoff Sommers is an American author and philosopher. Specializing in ethics, she is a resident scholar at the American Enterprise Institute. Sommers is known for her critique of contemporary feminism. Her work includes the books Who Stole Feminism? (1994) and The War Against Boys (2000). She also hosts a video blog called The Factual Feminist.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Transfeminism</span> Branch of feminism

Transfeminism, or trans feminism, is a branch of feminism focused on transgender women and informed by transgender studies. Transfeminism focuses on the effects of transmisogyny and patriarchy on trans women. It is related to the broader field of queer theory. The term was popularized by Emi Koyama in The Transfeminist Manifesto.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Mary Ellen Smith</span> Canadian politician

Mary Ellen Spear Smith was a politician in British Columbia, Canada. She was the first female Member of the Legislative Assembly (MLA) in the Legislative Assembly of British Columbia, and both the first female cabinet minister and the first female Acting Speaker and the first woman cabinet minister in the British Empire.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Peter A. Allard School of Law</span> Law school of the University of British Columbia

The Peter A. Allard School of Law is the law school of the University of British Columbia. The faculty offers the Juris Doctor degree. The faculty features courses on business law, tax law, environmental and natural resource law, indigenous law, Pacific Rim issues, and feminist legal theory.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Larissa Lai</span> Canadian writer

Larissa Lai is an American-born Canadian novelist and literary critic. She is a recipient of the 2018 Lambda Literary Award for Lesbian Fiction and Lambda Literary Foundation's 2020 Jim Duggins, PhD Outstanding Mid-Career Novelist Prize.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">National Action Committee on the Status of Women</span> Canadian womens rights organization

The National Action Committee on the Status of Women was a Canadian feminist activist organization that existed from 1971 to 2007.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Shahrzad Mojab</span> Iranian academic

Shahrzad Mojab is an academic activist and professor, teaching at the Department of Leadership, Higher and Adult Education and Women and Gender Studies Institute, at the University of Toronto. Shahrzad has been living in Canada since 1986 with her lifelong partner, colleague and comrade, Amir Hassanpour, and their son, Salah.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Elaine Bernard</span>

Elaine Bernard is the executive director of the Labor and Worklife Program at Harvard Law School and a member of the Democratic Socialists of America. She is also a member of the interim consultative committee of the International Organization for a Participatory Society which she describes as offering "an opportunity to reach across borders, time zones, organizations, communities, and individual interests and grow solidarity".

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Helena Gutteridge</span> Canadian Labour Activist (1879–1960)

Helena Gutteridge was a feminist, a suffragist, a trade unionist and the first female city councillor in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. Helena was recognized for being a pioneer in pushing for women's rights in British Columbia during a time when gender equality was not yet a prominent social movement and discourse.

The history of feminism in Canada has been a gradual struggle aimed at establishing equal rights. The history of Canadian feminism, like modern Western feminism in other countries, has been divided by scholars into four "waves", each describing a period of intense activism and social change. The use of "waves" has been critiqued for its failure to include feminist activism of Aboriginal and Québécois women who organized for changes in their own communities as well as for larger social change.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Jean Swanson</span> Canadian politician, activist, and writer

Jean Swanson is a Canadian politician, anti-poverty activist, and writer in Vancouver, British Columbia. She represented the left-wing Coalition of Progressive Electors on Vancouver City Council as one of Vancouver's 10 at-large city councillors from 2018 to 2022.

Veronica Jane Strong-Boag is a Canadian historian specializing in the history of women and children in Canada. She is a Professor Emerita at the University of British Columbia, where she was Professor of Women's History and the founding Director of the Centre for Women’s and Gender Studies.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Sheila Cavanagh</span> Canadian academic, playwright, and author

Sheila L. Cavanagh is a Canadian academic, playwright, and psychotherapist doing a psychoanalytic formation at the Lacan School in San Francisco. She is a professor of sociology and former chair of the Sexuality Studies Program at York University. Cavanagh teaches courses in gender studies, sexuality studies, feminist theory, psychoanalysis, and queer theory. She is best known for her book Queering Bathrooms: Gender, Sexuality, and the Hygienic Imagination (2010) and for a special double-issue she edited on Trans-Psychoanalysis in TSQ: Transgender Studies Quarterly.

Margaret "Maggie" Lowe Benston (1937–1991) was a professor of chemistry, computing science, and women's studies at Simon Fraser University in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. She was a respected feminist and labour activist, as well as a founding member of the Vancouver Women's Caucus, in 1988, the Euphoniously Feminist and Non-Performing Quintet in 1970, Simon Fraser University's Women's Studies Program in 1975, and Mayworks in 1988. For thirty years, Benston worked locally, nationally, and internationally writing articles, giving speeches, and lobbying politicians on behalf of the women's and labour movement. Benston died of cancer on 7 March 1991.

Sherene Razack is a Distinguished Professor and the Penny Kanner Endowed Chair in Women’s Studies in the Department of Gender Studies, University of California at Los Angeles. As a feminist critical race scholar, her research and teaching focus on racial violence. She is best known for her contributions to feminist and critical race studies about discrimination against Muslim and Indigenous women in Canada, systemic racism in the Canadian justice system, and colonial violence against Indigenous peoples worldwide. She is the founder of the virtual research and teaching network Racial Violence Hub (RVHub). Formerly a Distinguished Professor of Critical Race and Gender Studies in the Department of Social Justice, the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education of the University of Toronto (1991-2016), she relocated to the United States from Canada in 2016.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Chandra Talpade Mohanty</span> Indian-American Feminism and womens studies professor

Chandra Talpade Mohanty is a Distinguished Professor of Women's and Gender Studies, Sociology, and the Cultural Foundations of Education and Dean's Professor of the Humanities at Syracuse University. Mohanty, a postcolonial and transnational feminist theorist, has argued for the inclusion of a transnational approach in exploring women’s experiences across the world. She is author of Feminism Without Borders: Decolonizing Theory, Practicing Solidarity, and co-editor of Third World Women and the Politics of Feminism, Feminist Genealogies, Colonial Legacies, Democratic Futures, Feminism and War: Confronting U.S. Imperialism,, The Sage Handbook on Identities, and Feminist Freedom Warriors: Genealogies, Justice, Politics, and Hope.

Yasmin Jiwani is a feminist academic and activist. In her research, she examines the intersectionality of race and gender in media narratives of violence against women and representations of racialized peoples. Currently, Dr. Jiwani is a full professor in the Department of Communication Studies at Concordia University in Montreal, Quebec. She is the author of Discourses of Denial: Mediations of Race, Gender and Violence.

Bonita Lawrence is a Canadian writer, scholar, and professor in the Department of Equity Studies at York University in Toronto, Canada. Her work focuses on issues related to Indigenous identity and governance, equity, and racism in Canada. She is also a traditional singer at political rallies, social events, and prisons in the Toronto and Kingston areas.

Women in Focus (WIF) was a feminist film and video distribution centre and gallery based in Vancouver, Canada. It operated from 1974 to 1992.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Meghan Murphy</span> Canadian feminist and journalist

Meghan Emily Murphy is a Canadian writer, journalist, and founder of Feminist Current, a feminist website and podcast. Her writing, speeches, and talks have criticized third-wave feminism, male feminists, the sex industry, exploitation of women in mass media, censorship, and gender identity legislation. She is based in Vancouver.

References

  1. 1 2 Aarsteinsen, Barbara (6 June 1993). "After 3 years of making waves, she hands over a steadier ship". Toronto Star Newspapers Ltd. Toronto Star. ProQuest   436863924.
  2. 1 2 3 Thobani, Sunera. "Nationalizing Citizens, Bordering Immigrant Women: Globalization and Racialization of Citizenship in late 20th Century Canada" (PDF). Library and Archives Canada. Retrieved 8 October 2015.
  3. 1 2 "Dr. Sunera Thobani, PhD". The University of British Columbia Institute for Gender, Race, Sexuality and Social Justice. UBC. Archived from the original on 25 April 2015. Retrieved 8 October 2015.
  4. ↑ "Previous Ruth Wynn Woodward Chairs". Simon Fraser University. Simon Fraser University. Retrieved 8 October 2015.
  5. 1 2 Caroll, William K. (Autumn 2012). "Interview Sunera Thobani: A Very Public Intellectual". Socialist Studies: The Journal of the Society for Socialist Studies. 8 (2): 17. ISSN   1918-2821.
  6. 1 2 3 4 Caroll, William K. (Autumn 2012). "Interview Sunera Thobani: A Very Public Intellectual". Socialist Studies: The Journal of the Society for Socialist Studies. 8 (2): 14. ISSN   1918-2821.
  7. 1 2 Collier, Cheryl (2014). "Not Quite the Death of Organized Feminism in Canada: Understanding the Demise of the National Action Committee on the Status of Women". Canadian Political Science Review. 8 (2): 24.
  8. ↑ "Advisory Committee". Race, Autobiography, Gender and Age Studies. UBC. Retrieved 8 October 2015.
  9. ↑ "RAGA". Race, Autobiography, Gender and Age Studies. UBC. Retrieved 8 October 2015.
  10. ↑ "History About R.A.C.E." Researchers and Academics of Colour for Equality/Equity (R.A.C.E.). Researchers and Academics of Colour for Equality/Equity (R.A.C.E.). Retrieved 9 October 2015.
  11. 1 2 Roach Pierson, Ruth; Griffin Cohen, Marjorie; Bourne, Paula; Masters, Philinda (January 1993). Canadian Women's Issues: Volume I: Strong Voices . Toronto: James Lorimer & Company Ltd. p.  207. ISBN   1-55028-414-2.
  12. ↑ "Incoming NAC president not an illegal immigrant, immigration official says". The Vancouver Sun. The Vancouver Sun. 24 April 1993. ProQuest   243284575.
  13. ↑ Bolan, Kim (26 April 1993). "New leader of women's group demands apology for 'racist' remarks". The Vancouver Sun. The Vancouver Sun. ProQuest   243290779.
  14. 1 2 Thobani, Thobani (Winter 2002). "The Speech that Shook the Country". No. 3. Herizons Magazine. Herizons Magazine. Retrieved 8 October 2015.
  15. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 Bohn, Glenn; Bolan, Kim (10 October 2001). "Thobani accused of hate crime against Americans: Complaint sent to Ottawa police 'pure harassment', UBC professor says". The Vancouver Sun. The Vancouver Sun. ProQuest   242563173.
  16. ↑ Bohn, Glenn (25 October 2001). "Hate allegations against Thobani 'unfounded': UBC professor's lawyer says Ontario police have dropped the matter". The Vancouver Sun. The Vancouver Sun. ProQuest   242539071.
  17. ↑ Bantjes, Rod (2007). Social Movements in a Global Context: Canadian Perspectives. Canadian Scholars’ Press. ISBN   9781551303246.
  18. ↑ Gruending, Dennis, ed. (2004). Great Canadian Speeches: Talk of the Nation . Markham: Fitzhenry & Whiteside. ISBN   978-1550419146.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.