Separatism
Separatism is any movement for different groups of people to live separately or apart from one another.
One of the most commonly portrayed separatist movements in SF is gender-based separatism, often feminist separatism or lesbian separatism.
In the women's movement of the 1970s (plus or minus a few years), "feminist separatists" argued that women should politically and economically separate from men, because the patriarchy was an energy- and resource-sink for women. The argument was that women could best help the women's movement, and other women directly, by committing their energies, time, money, etc., to other women; to do otherwise was to support the patriarchy. Some women consequently advocated political lesbianism, as well.
Lesbian separatism is closely related to feminist separatism. However, lesbian separatism is not precisely equivalent with political lesbianism: lesbian separatists are not necessarily to be inferred to be with other women solely or primarily for political reasons.
Novels may be classed as "lesbian separatist" works because they portray a (fictional) movement of lesbian separatists. However, they may also be classed as "lesbian separatist works" because they portray a common fantasy of lesbians or lesbian separatists: a woman-only world.
In terms of nationalism, "separatist movements" are movements which seek national independence, often of an ethnic subgroup or a colonized part of the nation.
Ethnic separatism is separatism on the basis of ethnicity or race. White separatists have achieved political power in numerous Western and Western-colonized societies, including South Africa (the apartheid regime) and the US (the "Jim Crow era"; aka "separate but equal" era; aka "segregation era", lasting for about a century from the 19th to 20th century). In the US as a response to white supremacy, Latino and African-American separatist movements have also organized.
Ethnic or cultural separatism is also a de facto practice in many communities, supported by cultural and economic practices, and sometimes legal rules and community violence -- as in the original Jewish ghettos or modern inner-city ghettos.
Separatism can lead to ghettoization, with all its attendant consequences. Separatists often develop a separatist media as part of a pride movement, or simply to meet the needs of their community.
See
Further reading
- Dana R. Shugar, Separatism and Women's Community (1995) (ISBN 0-8032-4244-1) (reviewing the women's separatist movement of the 70s and 80s, including theorists and the experiences of various separatist collectives)
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