Intersectionality Lens

According to Kimberle Crenshaw (1989), intersectionality is a “metaphor for understanding the ways that multiple forms of inequality or disadvantage sometimes compound themselves and create obstacles that often are not understood among conventional ways of thinking.”

Mental health illnesses in some cases are the results of the collision of the multiple forms of inequalities and disadvantages we experience. Intersectionality acts as a lens to help establish why there are health inequalities.

Looking through an intersectional lens will help you see and understand when someone is at a disadvantage or faced with inequality. The intersectionality lens recognises that identity makers such as race, gender, age, social status, sexuality, religion, and many more may be contributing factors to an individual developing mental health illnesses or can be a barrier to a person seeking help with mental health issues.

An asylum seeker, female, uneducated, single mum, unemployed and a non-English speaker would find it extremely difficult to access and receive adequate mental health treatment than a Caucasian English female. Providing food and a safe shelter for her family would be her priority while her mental health takes the back seat.

Taking a country like Liberia in West Africa as an example, a large proportion of the population lives in extreme poverty. The country as a whole is still recovering from a brutal 14 years of civil war and the ebola virus pandemic. Taking a day off from hustling due to PTSD, depression, stress or anxiety is unthinkable.

In addition to the after-effects of the civil war and ebola, inequality and disadvantages due to social status, educational background, gender, sexuality, age, and tribal differences among others, will have a significant impact on mental health and also whether they would seek help if any were available.  

Within the UK and most Western countries, a black female from a poor social and economic background will be more at a disadvantage in receiving adequate mental health care than a white male from a middle-class background. The differences here in this scenario are race, gender, and status.

How are you impacted by intersectionality as an individual?

I believe personally one can arrive at a place of compassion using the lens of intersectionality because it allows you to see the possible disadvantages and inequalities a person may face.

Reference:

Crenshaw, Kimberle  "Demarginalizing the Intersection of Race and Sex: A Black Feminist Critique of Antidiscrimination Doctrine, Feminist Theory and Antiracist Politics," University of Chicago Legal Forum: Vol. 1989: Iss. 1, Article 8. Available at: http://chicagounbound.uchicago.edu/uclf/vol1989/iss1/8