[tentative thoughts on the announcement of The 2025 Gabby Awards – “Goddesses in our Mist” (June, NYC)]
Written with multiple audiences in mind, including of course researchers working on the question of gender, class, and ethnic intersectionality
I read about the upcoming 2025 Gabby Awards. This year the event centers on the “telling [of] a fascinating story of Goddesses in our Midst and recognizing a pantheon of 20 dynamic women from throughout North America our very own modern day goddesses who strive for excellence in all they do and work tirelessly to make the world around them a better place. We are telling a story of 20 ordinary women whose impact is EXTRAORDINARY.”
https://greekamerica.org/gabbyawards2025/?fbclid=IwY2xjawNc8RpleHRuA2FlbQIxMQABHlW7ZhAErezFH6v_C3aaN6dkhqtWI42szZZXwgbSTJSrVqlTzm3ocw7csOgJ_aem_NGtzM1U2Vfly6SUARqtXiA
This is a black-tie event, the general individuals ticket costing $1,000. There are several titles of sponsors ranging from between the highest 250,000 (the Title Sponsor [one left]) to the lowest 5,000 (Bronze Sponsor). I have listened to speeches from past events celebrating a range of inclusions. But this caters exclusively to the Greek American professional middle/upper middle class and those who afford to aspire to belong to it.
https://greekamerica.org/gabbyawards2025/?fbclid=IwY2xjawNc8RpleHRuA2FlbQIxMQABHlW7ZhAErezFH6v_C3aaN6dkhqtWI42szZZXwgbSTJSrVqlTzm3ocw7csOgJ_aem_NGtzM1U2Vfly6SUARqtXiA
This is a black-tie event, the general individuals ticket costing $1,000. There are several titles of sponsors ranging from between the highest 250,000 (the Title Sponsor [one left]) to the lowest 5,000 (Bronze Sponsor). I have listened to speeches from past events celebrating a range of inclusions. But this caters exclusively to the Greek American professional middle/upper middle class and those who afford to aspire to belong to it.
I (re)read the values guiding the sponsoring organization of this event, the Greek America Foundation: its “firm mission [is] to emphasize ideals such as philanthropy, the pursuit of excellence and innovation — all core components of the Greek existence.” The now ubiquitous philotimo is also highlighted.
I recall the narrative that equates philotimo with the “Greeks doing the right thing” in history. The right thing for this class of Greek Americans is charity, philanthropy, the pursuit of excellence, philanthropy toward vulnerable populations in Greece.
What is this event all about? At the most basic level, certainly, the identity construction of a group around shared ideals. It brings together class (middle/upper middle), cultural identity, gender. An example of intersectionality, an academic would put it.
My thinking veers to certain Greek American realities––more accurately issues––that the introduction to this Gala refrains from addressing.
Soaring real estate prices hurting working class and lower-middle class Greek Americans, particularly in New York City where the gala takes place. (and benefitting multiple home owners and those in the real estate business.)
Intra-ethnic divisions along US political affiliation. I assume that the attendees represent a wide spectrum of party affiliations. Do they understand philotimo and philoxenia and doing the right thing in the same manner? An educated guess is they do not. What does making “the world a better place” mean for the various attendees? What is the price paid for this kind of construed unity?
I think of intra-ethnic exploitation, newly arriving immigrants in need being vulnerable to it. Also, of class-arrogance among nouveau rich Greek Americans toward their poorer relatives in the Bay Area, all well documented. Real practices do not correspond to the touted ideals.
As I noted, in the advertisement of the event we witness the normative construction of ethnicity/diaspora as shared ideals. At the same time, the narrative refrains from connecting the ideals it celebrates with real problems confronting sectors of Greek America. The event refrains from taking positions and working toward systemic solutions.
As it is often noted, to gain acceptance and appeal to members of the assimilated middle-class, ethnicity is depoliticized, hiding its internal tensions and conflicts, refraining from acknowledging socioeconomic hierarchies which charity might somewhat (and temporarily) alleviate but cannot (or is unwilling to) solve.
Reproducing dominant values (philanthropy, socioeconomic success, innovation, creativity, resilience, entrepreneurship self-determination) couched in cultural terms, ethnicity becomes yet another building block of assimilation, this time into middle-class interests which seeks to secure.
But an important step is due: probe carefully the cultural work of the honorees and explore what kind of nuances and complexities might bring to both the idealizations of the event and this initial commentary.
Yiorgos Anagnostou
May 8, 2025