Aunt Jemima

oppression and embraced the progress towards attaining equality. Focusing on two works in particular, Betye Saar’s iconic The Liberation of Aunt Jemima (1972), and Richard Hunt’s sculpture the Outgrown Pyramid #1 (1973), will help uncover the plight of African American’s at that time. These artists both demonstrate a keen awareness of how their art will operate in their surrounding locations. Saar’s work controls the viewer to experience it from one perspective, while Hunt’s piece is wide open for interpretation and interaction from all sides. In comparing these two works,…

men. The mammy was used to counter anti-slavery sentiments by masking the relationship as a friendly and familial one (Turner 44-45). Aunt Jemima originated as a minstrel show character portrayed by a white man in blackface and drag. Christopher Rutt, co-founder of the ready-to-make pancake mix, used Aunt Jemima to market his product to appeal to his local, southern consumers (Behnken and Smithers 23). Using a mammy figure to sell their product was a success. The image of Aunt Jemima sold the…

One such problematic image is the mammy figure. Alma Jean Bilingslea-Brown discusses "Aunt Jemima," one of the most notorious mammy figures, and notes that Aunt Jemima was seen as the "quintessential mammy, the overweight, heavy-busted, strong, and religious black woman who cooks, cleans, and nurtures," and notes how she became "the representation of the white-identified, black female servant. Good-natured, loyal, and trust-worthy, the Jemima image was first popularized at the 1983 Columbia…

deal with present and past stereotypes in the context of today’s society.” In order to display connections between the past and the present, Charles takes common black stereotypical characters and reinterprets them in contemporary ways. For example, the image of Aunt Jemima, a mammy, which is a black character that is historically known for being the caring house servant for the white family, is a caricature that Charles often critiques in his work. Similar to Charles, Colescott plays upon the…

tears, shudders, and tissues full of snot later I finally mustered the very last of my courage and looked at Tristin eye-to-eye. His eyes were watery but he held them back as to give me all of this moment. He spoke first: “Hannah you are brave. I understand that you wanted to keep this quiet, it means the world to me that you confided in me tearing down your protective barriers and exposing your vulnerability.” I melted into his arms. I felt safe. I felt whole for the first time in over three…

Aunt Jemima (1850) Ad Deconstruction 1.The message this advertisement is proposing is to “wake up” and have a great morning by eating “Aunt Jemima Pancakes”. I can tell this is the message they’re trying to get across to their audience because of the choice of text and pictures. This advertisement represents reality well because pancakes usually do look the way they are shown in the advertisement and people typically do eat pancakes in the morning. It is also proven that eating breakfast makes…

Faith Ringgold was known as a painter, writer, and speaker. She is best known for her quilt art, which told stories about what she has gone through in life and certain problems that society was facing at that time. The piece above is called "Whose Afraid of Aunt Jemima" painted in 1983, done after the death of both her mother and sister. At that time Aunt Jemima was the black feminist hero, she was ridiculed for being fat, black, and having a big nose. Ringgold felt that this was not a way to…

“ I guess we come to this world lonely and spend our lives struggling against it. We must cry for ourselves sometimes. We may have everything in life and still it isn’t satisfying.” (Kono p.4921) -Anshu Dark Sorrows by Juliet S. Kono tells a story of a woman from Kaiwiki, Hawaii. This young woman is Himiko Aoki, who at a young age was faced with life tragedies of losing a father and a lover. And due to her pregnancy was sent to Japan to live with her relatives to save her family shame. There she…

Everybody knows her. Everybody does. That one aunt who is so annoying that walking into the room she is in seems more like a mission than a normal situation. “Oh hey little Henry!” she would always squeal to me. I can’t stand the sound of her voice, the whining just sends ice bullets down my spine. “Hi Auntie Saundra” I would say back, trying to disguise my distinct look of disgust that I had quickly painted on my face upon entering the room. Auntie Saundra is my great aunt on my mother’s side…

As I gazed at my reflection on the fresh marble floor, new faces greeted me. My voice cracked with nerves as I said hello. Something about my new home gave me endless amounts of butterflies. The Guerra’s consisted of six distant cousins, my great Aunt Angelina, and her husband George. They were the wealthiest family in Venezuela, maybe that’s why my parents decided to send me off to live with them. You see, I’m the youngest of nine siblings and my mom and dad decided since they can’t give me the…