Political commentator, author, and professor, Melissa Harris-Perry combines her academic perspective with seemingly universal life lessons of black womanhood, to present Sister Citizen: Shame, Stereotypes and Black Woman in America. Sister Citizen follows in the footsteps of her first work, Barbershops, Bibles, and BET: Everyday Talk and Black Political Thought, to discuss the political socialization of African Americans. This time with a concentration on the interplay of the lives of African American women and their sense of citizenship. Harris-Perry’s grounding in African American politics and unique perspective as a woman of color, allow her the creative license to lean on the literary expertise of other authors that identify as women
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As first lady, Michelle Obama maneuvered the public gaze and, a great many carefully placed stereotypes about her including: being Barack’s ‘baby-mama’ and the oversexualization of her body by none other than another Sister. She even dodged white feminist’s that critiqued her decision to take a step back from her career to raise her children during Obama’s administration, as their attempts to shame her were the product of a long history of white women’s reliance on ‘Mammy’ to solve their problems. Doing so effectively rejected the demand for her to become a national mammy figure that would nurture white feminist agendas. Though, like all black women, Michelle receives criticism from the world that views her decision to stand straight in the crooked room as dastardly. She does so with full knowledge that her racial and gender identity allow her the platform to represent black womanhood in public way that was virtually unheard …show more content…
Whether those shortcomings were caused by subjective bias or not, the general assumption can be that the author’s personal life experiences influenced her work. In the spirit of scholarship, I will offer some critiques of the author’s argument, methods of providing evidence, and the tones of elitism that I encountered during my reading.
The major argument presented, pertains to the stereotypes projected by others onto black women. Harris-Perry fails however, to show how African American women perpetuate some of those stereotypes as positive extensions of their own personal character. For example, the ‘myth of promiscuity’ allows little room for messages of sexual positivity that are championed by Tricia Rose and other scholars.
Regarding the methods of providing evidence and support, the author essentially pairs her analysis with an all-star literary line-up. The compilation of the pieces from Shange and Elizabeth Alexander’s Inaugural Poem, were artfully curated to accent Harris-Perry’s agenda. I also especially appreciated Zora Neal Hurston’s features and how, the author was able to apply feminist rhetoric and make the personal, political. Before reading Sister Citizen, the book, Their Eyes Were Watching God, never registered as a political commentary, but its juxtaposition with Hurricane Katrina greatly supplemented the themes of the reading
As first lady, Michelle Obama maneuvered the public gaze and, a great many carefully placed stereotypes about her including: being Barack’s ‘baby-mama’ and the oversexualization of her body by none other than another Sister. She even dodged white feminist’s that critiqued her decision to take a step back from her career to raise her children during Obama’s administration, as their attempts to shame her were the product of a long history of white women’s reliance on ‘Mammy’ to solve their problems. Doing so effectively rejected the demand for her to become a national mammy figure that would nurture white feminist agendas. Though, like all black women, Michelle receives criticism from the world that views her decision to stand straight in the crooked room as dastardly. She does so with full knowledge that her racial and gender identity allow her the platform to represent black womanhood in public way that was virtually unheard …show more content…
Whether those shortcomings were caused by subjective bias or not, the general assumption can be that the author’s personal life experiences influenced her work. In the spirit of scholarship, I will offer some critiques of the author’s argument, methods of providing evidence, and the tones of elitism that I encountered during my reading.
The major argument presented, pertains to the stereotypes projected by others onto black women. Harris-Perry fails however, to show how African American women perpetuate some of those stereotypes as positive extensions of their own personal character. For example, the ‘myth of promiscuity’ allows little room for messages of sexual positivity that are championed by Tricia Rose and other scholars.
Regarding the methods of providing evidence and support, the author essentially pairs her analysis with an all-star literary line-up. The compilation of the pieces from Shange and Elizabeth Alexander’s Inaugural Poem, were artfully curated to accent Harris-Perry’s agenda. I also especially appreciated Zora Neal Hurston’s features and how, the author was able to apply feminist rhetoric and make the personal, political. Before reading Sister Citizen, the book, Their Eyes Were Watching God, never registered as a political commentary, but its juxtaposition with Hurricane Katrina greatly supplemented the themes of the reading