I've been living in the UK for over five years now and am still regularly stumped by new words, idioms and social mores in the course of my feminist organizing. How much harder must it be to organize and have impact and influence for anyone further out from the centre than me?

I speak English as a first language, was born and raised in 'western' countries, and am well-educated. I work for a reasonably high profile feminist organization and have access to power brokers as well as those directly in power. My lifestyle, aesthetics and cultural reference points, while 'coloured' and 'classed' as marginal on some levels, are such that I can usually pass well enough as mainstream middle class. Truly, on paper, I'm steeped in cultural capital.

And yet my ability to influence is still undermined by the fact that I did not grow up in the UK. Obviously foreign people have it rougher than natives in lots of ways and there's nothing new about that. But I'm talking about organizing as a feminist with other feminists. I simply did not expect the social justice movements/politics in Britain to be so different from those in Canada. But sometimes it feels like I've come from another planet. And I have landed without guidebook.

How can we cultivate a feminist solidarity across difficult divides when something as subtle as humour, which signals cultural difference, also acts as cultural capital? In England, in the organizing I'm involved in, my wit is as useful to me as my anti-oppression analysis. Who knew?

I'm looking forward to blogging at Feministing to see how it compares with blogging at the F Word
as I continue to be my own experiment in cross-cultural organizing.

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July 14, 2008 3:42 PM

[0+|0-]  wowcabbage said:

I think the best thing to do is to apologize for offense and to keep trying. We all have to keep open minds (including those who are offended) and try to see each other's point of view.

Maybe, if you'te dealing with people physically, a get-to-know-each-other session would help. On the internet, careful wording? It's always harder to communicate in text than it is when you're face-to-face. After all, voice, body language and other gestures can indicate humor where text can't.

In the end, it just has to be an effort made by all involved :)

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