Black feminist texts, presences, methods: a dialogue

Abstract

Feminist Review (FR) editors Nydia A. Swaby and Amber Lascelles met at 198 Contemporary Arts and Learning, Brixton, London in February 2023 to record a conversation exploring Black feminism as an 'object' (Lewis, 2020) in our writing and research. This dialogue reflects on the journal's Black feminist genealogies, our reasons for joining the editorial board, FR's move to 198 Contemporary, how we navigate Black feminist epistemologies and how community and care influence the journal and shape our writing. We sat in the new office, surrounded by FR journal back issues and inspiring Black feminist texts. Quotations from these Black feminist texts, and others we think with, are interspersed throughout the piece to act as a 'presence' (Lewis, 2017). declarations of presenceHere then is a declaration of presence, not just an unwanted independence, through the double and inseparable vectors 'black' and 'female' proclaimed as a desire for recognition and space in a multitude of struggles that have a history of erasing, marginalising and even denouncing some aspect of who she is and might become.