The Intersection of Race, Gender, and Generation on Representation.

In adding to the growing body of literature on intersectionality and Black women's political preferences, this paper advances evidence of a generational shift between Black women legislators who were born after 1960 and their older counterparts. Specifically, the paper finds that younger Black women have different policy preferences, vote differently, and/or articulate representation differently than Black women born prior to 1960 on anti-domestic violence legislation. However, there is not such a noticeable divide among Black men. Interestingly, the Black women legislators all negotiate the decision making processes and racing-gendering of the legislature similarly. Consequently, the paper finds that the Black women legislators' intra-group differences are only around policy preferences on social bills. The observed generation difference between Black women born before and after 1960 can be attributed to the growing ideological divide between the civil rights generation and feminist generations with the post-civil rights and post-feminist generation. I posit that third wave Black women state legislators are committed to racial and gendered issues. Their understanding of political phenomena is informed by their generation's privileged background of benefiting from the civil rights and feminist movements. Therefore, this vantage point leads younger Black women legislators to view public policy differently than their civil rights and feminist generation counterparts. The third wave Black women legislators are more likely to pursue an encompassing political agenda that understands the intersections of race and gender but is not built or sustained around identity alone. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]