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Brielle Nicole Williams is an avant garde, post modern curator with a focus on self perception through fashion and art. She has overseen several solo visual projects including Winter 2015's Coldest Winter Ever and Spring 2017's #WhoButABlackWomyn. She can be found on Instagram at @angrybrownfemme or reached by email at Brielle...@yahoo.com.
Femme has many different meanings, and often refers to a person of queer gender expression that embraces, reclaims, or subverts their culture's understanding of what it means to be feminine.[1][2] Femme is often associated with the lesbian community, although it has also been used by bisexuals, gay men, and genderqueer people, among other groups.[1][3] It can describe gender presentation[4][5] on an occasion or be a term related to a person's gender identity. Some variations are "hard femme," an edgy or hard-rock expression of femininity, and "high femme", usually an extreme expression of the aesthetic aspects of femininity.[4]
Some time after June 27, 2017, and before December 3rd, 2017, the Tumblr blog noodle posted a seven-striped femme flag design.[7] Purple was specifically chosen to match the vibrant orange of the butch flag. It also took inspiration from the pink and red lesbian flag.[7]
Although working class butch/femme culture was not a simple imitation of heterosexuality, that assumption led to stereotyping and dismissal by many lesbian feminists, the medical establishment, and more affluent gays and lesbians. The dominant discourse of feminism and lesbian feminism in the 1970s and early 1980s regarded butch/femme communities as incompatible with feminism and marginalized them in lesbian history. From that perspective, butch/femme roles were criticized as reproducing patriarchy and hierarchies within women's relationships; they were not seen as being distinct, transformative, or a form of resistance to the oppression of women.[6]
However, femmes continue to not be considered as large a part of the queer narrative as others due to not being visibly queer. They are often left out of stories of LGBTQ+ activism, similar to how it was predominantly POC and trans people who began and spearheaded the movement in the 1960s, yet only received cultural credit for it in recent years.