Blog Number Two

Molly Mundell

COMM Communications and Culture

Sept. 26, 2017

“Why should we be concerned with inaccurate recognition when injustices of distribution seem so much more pressing? Shouldn’t we focus on the unequal social, economic, and political structures that profoundly and disproportionately affect black women’s material circumstances and opportunities?” (Harris-Perry, 41)

This quote brought up a really thought provoking point that could be pointing out how our focus should be on the actual injustices that black women have to face economically. The article mentions how Nancy Fraser is “critical of the ways that a focus on recognition can silence concerns about economic redistribution” (Harris-Perry, 42). Does she mean that the need for recognition is a distraction from serious struggles that black women face that is not a topic of hot-debate? I believe that recognition and equal distribution of resources are both topics that deserve to be discussed. Neither is less important.

The stereotypes that are enforced upon black women create a distance between themselves and the outsiders looking into their social groups and communities. When people from the outside are only familiar with the stereotypes that they believe to embody a certain category of people, the people from these communities and cultures almost get dehumanized and are seen shallowly.

I also found it interesting that the women were represented as over-sexualized or completely asexual in these stereotypes. The “Mammy” is seen as not interested in sex whatsoever while the “Jezebel” is obsessed with sex. I have witnessed these stereotypes in portrayals of black women in film. The first “Mammy” stereotype I remember seeing was from Hattie McDaniel in Gone With The Wind, where she waits on the white lady the whole time. The woman would realistically have a life of her own but in this role she is an extension of the white woman’s existence and isn’t portrayed as an individual. She is a comical character and is not respected as an independent figure from her relationships with the O’Hara’s she is employed by.