The Other Box: Intersectionality and the O.J. Simpson Trial
![handle is hein.journals/haswo6 and id is 247 raw text is: The Other Box: Intersectionality and the O.J.
Simpson Trial
Jami Floyd*
My mother's sister, she's black, and she used to say to me, 'You're
going to have to decide what you are, if you're going to be black
or white.' I remember all these Christmas things with her, like if
I wanted to get a black Baby That Away, or a white Baby That
Away .... My parents.., got me this Sasha doll from London
that you couldn't tell if it was black or white ... she has kind of
my color skin and brownish hair and she could be Italian or Greek
or black, who knows?'
The Other Box Dilemma
Can we talk?2 I want to talk about the Other Box. The Other
* Upon graduation from law school in 1989, Jami Floyd served in the California
Supreme Court as a law clerk to the Hon. Allen E. Broussard. Thereafter, she joined the
California law firm of Morrison & Foerster and began a civil and criminal law practice.
In 1993, Ms. Floyd left Morrison & Foerster to join the Office of the San Francisco Public
Defender where she continued her work as a trial attorney. Later that same year, she was
selected to serve as a White House Fellow in the office of Vice President Al Gore. During
her fellowship year, Ms. Floyd worked for a brief time in the First Lady's health care
War Room before moving up to the Vice President's Domestic Policy Office where she
spent the majority of her time advising the Vice President on issues of crime, violence and
criminal justice. She also advised the Vice President on affirmative action, education and
technology issues. Currently, Ms. Floyd is serving as a Spaeth Fellow at Stanford Law
School.
1. BLACK, WHITE, OTHER 25, 134 (Lise Funderburg ed., 1994) (interview with Nya
Patrinas) [hereinafter BLACK, WHrrE, OTHER].
2. This essay is about many issues. It is intended to be a dialogue, a conversation with
the other contributors to this Symposium and with the reader. My essay is an attempt to
demonstrate (through the discussion of a sampling of issues) the inner conflict of mixed
race persons when viewing the O.J. Simpson trial and other events of social significance.
The issues include, but are not limited to, body image, Supreme Court appointments, police
brutality, and the meaning of Shakespeare's Othello. I sincerely hope this essay contributes
to an ongoing dialogue on the issues of race, class, gender, and more, by recognizing that
we each have a unique contribution to offer to that dialogue, coming to it, as we do, from
different worldviews.
HASTINGS WOMEN'S LAW JOURNAL](ViewImageLocal?handle=hein.journals/haswo6&div=21&collection=journals&method=preview&ext=.png&size=3)
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The Other Box: Intersectionality and the O.J. Simpson Trial
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