thirdspace: a journal of feminist theory & culture, volume 2 issue 1 (November 2002) Inescapable Essentialism: Bisexually-Identified Women's Strategies in the Late 80s and Early 90s Susan Pell Essentialism is both challenged and incorporated within sexually marginalized groups and politics. [1] Closed communities that seek political reform and the extension of human rights to all groups,will tend to rely on essentialist or ethnic [2] notions of identity. The rationale is that by claiming an identity politic, in the form of distinct group membership, a united and unified front can be established in order to build communities, challenge marginalization, fight oppression and produce change (Highleyman 74-75; Rust "Politics of Sexual Identity" 366-367; Paul 28). Essentialist explanations, in this case, provide the basis for naturalizing the group's identity, suggesting that change is not an option because the behaviour is rooted in part in human essence (i.e. sexuality is not a preference, choice or vice that needs to be corrected), and therefore this community needs to be extended the rights and protections that comes with being a unique peoples. Yet accompanying an essentialist identity politic are assumptions of universalism and fixity that can function to exclude and deny access to the identity and community based on definitional and behavioural disparities. This aspect of essentialism makes it possible for some people to become displaced through the tightening of the definition for the group's membership, identity, and community. Bisexual women within North America, during the eighties and early nineties, are an example of a group of people who were dislodged and expelled from some lesbian communities due to the establishment of an essentialized lesbian identity politic. [3] These bisexual women were seen as a threat to lesbians personally, politically and socially (Klein "Bisexual Option" 41; Ault "Hegemonic Discourse" 205; Rust "Politics of Sexual Identity" 368). The feelings and experiences of segregation and alienation from some lesbian communities, paralleled with the suppression of bisexuality under heteronormativity, culminated in the necessity for some bisexual women in the west to start politicising, organizing, and theorizing their sexual identities. In this paper, I will suggest that bisexual women, in North America during the eighties and ninties, predominantly utilized two strategies to combat experiences and feelings of alienation from within and outside of sexually marginalized communities. One avenue was the politicization of the identity "bisexual," which was pursued through the formation of communities and a Pell http://journals.sfu.ca/thirdspace/index.php/journal/rt/printerFrie... 1 of 18 14-05-28 10:52 AM