Ali & Silverman/Subjugated Voices, 1.Honoring “Our Mothers’ Gardens”: The Integration of Spirituality and Social Justice

In her essay, Arisika Razak discusses the important, yet often overlooked, intersection between spirituality and social justice. She starts her essay by discussing Western society’s depiction of the “divine feminine,” an idealized goddess woman who is not representative of every woman as society depicts her using unachievable beauty standards and abilities. Instead, Razak advocates for the “divine feminist,” calling on the reader to recognize the divinity of every woman in every feminist. This divine feminist accepts, acknowledges, and integrates secular feminism, religious studies, and ethnic/indigenous studies. To elaborate on the concept of the divine feminist, Razak draws on artists, activists, teachers, and scholars, some widely known and some unknown, from the African, Native, Queer, Latinx, and Islamic communities. For the divine feminist, drawing on spirituality and secularism when pursuing social justice is empowering.