Black feminism, a term not recognized by many, is a form of feminism that fights to include African-American women in the conversation of women equality and explain how our race, gender, class and other identity markers shapes our experience with societal institutions. Patricia Collins, an African-American woman who encourages intersectionality, discusses suppression of black feminism, and believes social change can only occur through uniting women, and men, of all walks of life to work towards one common goal. We will examine two pieces of literature and put it into conversation with Collins perspective of symbolic and institutional dimensions of oppression. Hip Hop, a genre of music with the stigma of being a male dominated industry that
…show more content…
In other words, stereotypes of Black women rationalize the unjust treatment towards them. Collins provides examples of some stereotypes, ranging from Jezebel to the modern-day welfare queens. These images continue to perpetuate our culture today and be tied to the ideological Black woman. Having promiscuity being seen as an inbred characteristic, leads to men viewing all women as such and treating them as toys for their pleasure than as a respectable person. This connects back with Latifah’s incident of being sexually harassed by a man, but clearly miss Latifah is not one who condones such sexist act as we can see in the following lines where she raps, “Huh, I punched him dead in the eye and said ‘Who you calling a bitch?’” …show more content…
It is a narrative about an African-American woman named Dina attending Yale who is content with being a loner, but is soon befriended by a white, Canadian girl named Heidi. It describes their journey as friends and delves into Dina’s past. When describing her childhood in Baltimore, she paints herself as an outsider who isn’t accepted in her community, even though her neighborhood is predominately Black. Dina is obviously an intelligent young woman for she was able to get into an ivy league school, but it was her intellect and passion for reading that separated her from her community. She said, “It [reading] meant you’d rather submit to the words of some white dude than shoot the breeze with your neighbors” (Packer 13). This statement, along with Dina not fitting in, brings up the question of what is Blackness? The community is associating books to only white people, in particular men. By thinking books are for only whites, they are discounting all women, Blacks and other minority authors and are unknowingly perpetuating the idea that Blacks are illiterate. Based on Dina’s statement, the community is participating in what Collins calls dichotomous thinking. Collins defines it as, “Persons, things and ideas are conceptualized in terms of their opposites” (Towards a New Vision 27). By associating books, wealth, and intellect with whites, you
In other words, stereotypes of Black women rationalize the unjust treatment towards them. Collins provides examples of some stereotypes, ranging from Jezebel to the modern-day welfare queens. These images continue to perpetuate our culture today and be tied to the ideological Black woman. Having promiscuity being seen as an inbred characteristic, leads to men viewing all women as such and treating them as toys for their pleasure than as a respectable person. This connects back with Latifah’s incident of being sexually harassed by a man, but clearly miss Latifah is not one who condones such sexist act as we can see in the following lines where she raps, “Huh, I punched him dead in the eye and said ‘Who you calling a bitch?’” …show more content…
It is a narrative about an African-American woman named Dina attending Yale who is content with being a loner, but is soon befriended by a white, Canadian girl named Heidi. It describes their journey as friends and delves into Dina’s past. When describing her childhood in Baltimore, she paints herself as an outsider who isn’t accepted in her community, even though her neighborhood is predominately Black. Dina is obviously an intelligent young woman for she was able to get into an ivy league school, but it was her intellect and passion for reading that separated her from her community. She said, “It [reading] meant you’d rather submit to the words of some white dude than shoot the breeze with your neighbors” (Packer 13). This statement, along with Dina not fitting in, brings up the question of what is Blackness? The community is associating books to only white people, in particular men. By thinking books are for only whites, they are discounting all women, Blacks and other minority authors and are unknowingly perpetuating the idea that Blacks are illiterate. Based on Dina’s statement, the community is participating in what Collins calls dichotomous thinking. Collins defines it as, “Persons, things and ideas are conceptualized in terms of their opposites” (Towards a New Vision 27). By associating books, wealth, and intellect with whites, you