The Pursuit Of Intimacy Shirley Hill Analysis

For this weeks theme of love and happiness one of the readings that stood out to me the most was Shirley A. Hill’s article titled, “Black Intimacies: Love, Sex, and Relationships—The Pursuit of Intimacy.” This article is based, according to Hill’s, the relation between race and class and its role it has on African American intimacy (415). While reading this article, Hill makes an interesting clams in regards to her thesis—the relationship between race and class and its effects on African American intimacy. That is, as follows: African Americans and the gender norms of courtship and legal requisites of marriage have pitted black women and men against each other in patterns of resentment, mutual blame, and denigration, each blaming the other for failing to create successful relationships. (415)
When reading such quote it is interesting to see that Hill is showing us that both men and women of African American descent are blaming each other for having unsuccessful relationships; rather than trying to find a solution and to stop blaming one another for actions that may or may not have effected the relationship—finding an outlet of anger, identifying a small problem and hyperbolizing it into something hysterical—they continue to blame one another. Resulting in the …show more content…
This quote is very confusing/hard-to-comprehend because, is Hill essentially saying that young poor African-American girls can only survive in this world if they marry a man—if a heterosexual relationship—who has money? This to me is kind of outraging because to me it is basically stating that these young women are “gold-digging” and/or becoming prostitutes in-order to come out of their severe economical