Our Sisterhood

On any given day in the mall, grocery store, school, library, hair/nail salon, via social media, cell phone, or even walking down the street black women having a special way of bonding. Our sisterhood is rooted in our array of heights, widths and lovely rainbow shades of color. We pride ourselves on the differences we see on the outside but relish the inherent ties we have historically. Our sisterhood knows no depths on doing what we gotta do and at the same token we respectfully know how to sit a sister girl down and keep it real.

All great relationships and associations have challenges. The black woman’s plight is not always easy but once we wrap our minds, body, spirit and soul onto something, there is no letting go. From the way we feel spiritually, nurturing our children, working towards a professional/educational goal to the men we hold to our hearts so dearly; we love unrelenting. Roberta Flacks, Blue Lights in the Basement and The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill are a few pretty good examples of what I’m talking about in terms of trying to get a grasp on our eclectic yet solid background to understand our sisterhood.

When you know that you know that you know; nothing else seems to matter. We know that if we see one of our sister girls acting a fool on television, at home or otherwise, there is a chance that she maybe a little out of touch with what it means to be born into the rich legacy of our sacred sisterhood where lives were sacrificed and lost paying the price for us. Here is a friendly list with some popular names and a few personal favorites of mine in our sisterhood lineage:

Sheryl Mizell , Marian Anderson, Michelle Obama, Maya Angelou, Josephine Baker, Denise Bolds, Latoya Taitt, Elite Williams, Joyce Bradley, Brooklyn Williams, Shalon Davis, Bessie Blount, Marita Bonner, Bessie Coleman, Dorothy Dandridge, Oprah Winfrey, Jessie Redmon Fauset, Althea Gibson, Billie Holiday, Lena Horne, Alberta Hunter, Zora Neale Hurston, Harriet Jacobs, Mae Jemison, Marjorie Stewart Joyner, Coretta Scott King, Nella Larsen, Toni Morrison, Rosa Parks, Leontyne Price, Condoleezza Rice, Bessie Smith, Maria Stewart, Debi Thomas, Harriet Tubman, Sojourner Truth, Ethel Waters, Ida Wells-Barnett, Phillis Wheatley, Cathay Williams and Helen Craft.

Leslie Detouche is a certified literary concierge and freelance writer based in New York. Please join the Your Black World Coalition by visiting YourBlackWorld.com