“The Transformation of Silence into Language and Action”—Audre Lorde’s Zami: A New Spelling of My Name

This paper explores how Audre Lorde’s Zami can be read as a narrative of the transformation of silence into language and action, with a focus on lesbian selfhood and linguistic power. Lorde situates her narrative within the context of Black lesbians in 1980s, who were marginalized within the second-wave feminist movement. As a Black feminist, Lorde positions herself at the intersection of various oppressions and simultaneously fights against multiple forms of domination, with particular attention to homophobia in America. In both “The Transformation of Silence into Language and Action” and “Uses of the Erotic: The Erotic as Power,” Lorde argues that women must reject the words of white fathers and speak for themselves. She attributes women’s silence to a fear of acknowledging their differences and lesbian identities. Zami is shaped by the articulation of lesbian sexuality, challenging the rigidity of gender identity. Throughout Zami, Lorde presents her narrative not only as a “Bildungsroman,” or “a portrait of the artist as a Black lesbian,” but also insists that lesbian identity is continually intersected and influenced by shifting elements of difference.