Essay On Which Bodies Matter By Zine Magubane

During the 19th century Sarah Baartmann—a Khoikhoi woman—was deprived from her liberty because of her distinct physical appearance. Her voluminous posterior and the abnormalities of her sexual organs were enough to indignantly use her as public exhibition for purposes of entertainment and later on for anatomical dissection. This bewildering act lead immense controversy and opened for discussion and investigations on race and sexuality. In present time, the hashtag #TeacherBae flooded social media, with the story of Patrice Brown, an African American fourth grade teacher in Atlanta, Georgia, who was highly criticized for her “inappropriate” attire. Although centuries have passed since the “Hottentot Venus” (Sarah Baartmann), controversies over race and sexuality—such as Brown’s—continue to emerge because sexuality is a social construction that will remain never standing, although it is always changing, it will continue to be influenced by factors such …show more content…
Brown’s look was compared to other non-black females wearing the same exact dress, but only she received such a negative reaction. This addresses the fact that African American racial negativity is still present. In the article Which Bodies Matter? by Zine Magubane, the author argues that the ways in which bodies are seen and perceived are influenced particularly by social relations. Magubane includes a criticism on Sander Gilman’s work. “By the eighteenth century, the sexuality of the black, both male and female, becomes an icon for deviant sexuality in general (Magubane 2001:817). Patrice Brown was both racially and sexually oppressed because of powerful social constructions. The numerous amounts of negative criticism reached the school system because she is not part of the privileged group. Dominant social constraints hold so much power over certain minority groups, in this situation Brown had to remove her pictures from