Afua Cooper: Constructing Black Women's Historical Knowledge

ABSTRACT This essay, on constructing historical knowledge about African Canadian women, presents an overview of the current state of Black women's history. By exploring historiography, theory, and method, the author suggests new approaches and interpretations for the writing of this history. 

RESUMECet article sur l'elaboration de la connaissance historique des femmes afro-canadiennes, presente un aper<;u de I'etat actuel de I'histoiredes femmes noires. En explorant la theorie, 1'historiographie, et la methode, l'auteure suggere de nouvelles approches et de nouvellesinterpretations pour ecrire cette histoire. 

Is there a need to study Canadian Black women's history? If the answer is yes, then how do we do it? How do we get to it? How do we theorize and construct it? All these questions bring into focus issues of concept, method, and historiography. Ruth Pierson and Alison Prentice remarked that "women, like men, need their history." These scholars argue that women need this information in order to develop a total sense of themselves: "The sense of self depends on having a sense of one's past, and to the extent that modern women have been denied, in the historical canon, all but the faintest glimpses of their own history, they are like victims of amnesia."1 Black women in this country have made history and therefore do have a history. This history must be constructed and made available if we are not to become victims of amnesia. While the two historians just quoted recognize the value of doing women's history, and from a feminist perspective, often what occurs in the writing of this history is that minority women are left out of this construction. White women, mainly of French and British backgrounds, still remain at the centre of historical inquiry.