Bootylicious made it’s way into the Oxford dictionary, Fleek made it’s way to Dictionary.com, and now Intersectionality may be on its way into the Merriam-Webster dictionary. The term coined in 1989 by Kimberlé Crenshaw was used to culminate and understand the effects of all forms of oppression (racism, sexism, classism) on an individual, specifically black women.
Intersectionality—the complex, cumulative manner in which the effects of different forms of discrimination combine, overlap, or intersect
Nearly 30 years after Crenshaw’s essay that pushed the envelope on feminist theory, the term has become prevalent in daily discourse and of course the Twitter debates that we’ve all had ringside seats to on various occasions. And now that Merriam-Webster says the term is on its “words we’re watching list” soon all you’ll have to say is, “Check the dictionary, beloved.”
The term ‘intersectionality’ was coined in a 1989 essay by legal scholar Kimberlé Crenshaw: https://t.co/2fu3nhJE0i pic.twitter.com/1wTJuDMjnc
— Merriam-Webster (@MerriamWebster) February 23, 2016
Let this be a lesson: you make the language, the language doesn’t make you.
What word(s) need to be added to the dictionary that haven’t yet? Share below!
