Self-reflection and revolution

Monthly Review, May, 2004 by Astra Taylor

But at 21 Dunbar, though sensitive to the issues that would later consume her, was not aware of the full extent of her own oppression and outrage. As though driven unconsciously she enrolls in classes at San Francisco State University and begins a process of intense self-education and information, a path she seems to intuit will lead to her eventual liberation. In the meantime, she remains the perfect wife and becomes the mother to a daughter though she grows increasingly estranged from her husband. It is not until she has had a crucial encounter with Simone de Beauvoir's Second Sex and is safely enrolled in graduate school at Berkeley to study history that Dunbar leaves Jimmy. After this she juggles motherhood with her studies, transfers to UCLA, thwarts licentious academic advisors ("Well now I have you under my control and if I can't fuck you, I'll fuck you"), finds her first real friends, travels across the United States and abroad, and hones her interest in politics and social change.

In 1964, Dunbar participates in electoral politics for the first and last time as a supporter of LBJ's candidacy: she "had become convinced of the 'lesser evil' argument." Though unclear in her account of what caused her to change her mind, after this brief encounter with the Democratic Party Dunbar "vowed never to work on an electoral campaign" again. Instead she would "have to find other means of forcing the United States to change." Outlaw Women documents the many ways that Dunbar attempted to stay true to this promise over the ensuing ten years. Whether through her anti-apartheid work with the African National Congress in Los Angeles and London, by organizing campus conferences on radical topics, or through her later involvement in Cell 16 in Boston and work as a feminist organizer and revolutionary in New Orleans, Dunbar never compromised her radical critique, though she readily questioned how best to put such a critique into action.

Dunbar's short-lived commitment to and ensuing disillusion with electoral politics, recounted in a mere two paragraphs, is key. First, it signals her dedication to complete social transformation and to working outside the system, a commitment that manifests in its most extreme form when Dunbar goes underground with an armed group in Louisiana (though no violent actions are taken, only conceived). Second, and in my opinion more importantly, it illustrates Dunbar's willingness to reevaluate her own viewpoint, to challenge herself, to change her position and not only admit it, but to actually discuss her reconsideration openly. The most compelling and instructive facet of Outlaw Woman is precisely this process of self-questioning and theoretical evolution that Dunbar goes through as she examines and re-examines the positions and ideologies of the New Left and the burgeoning women's movement and thoughtfully interrogates the points of convergence between sexism, imperialism, and capitalism.

This second trait sets Dunbar apart from many other figures who have revisited their sixties selves, those who loudly denounce the folly of their youth after settling into middle age. In contrast, Dunbar's memoir portrays a woman who constantly challenges herself, casting doubt on her past pronouncements and previously endorsed methods, all while the social movements of the sixties ran at full throttle as opposed to after the fact. Though constantly questioning and criticizing her own motivations and those of the movement at large, Dunbar nonetheless remains true to her fundamental idealism and deep-seated desire for social justice.