In the article, there were many ideas that the author, Yvette Abrahams, discussed. However, what I found the most interesting in this article was the way in which African American bodies were being hyper-sequalized. This was something that was happening not only to women, but also to men.
Abrahams explains that African American women were being hyper-sexualized. She used Sara Bartman's story as an example for this, As she explains, Sara Bartman was put on display because of her large buttocks. Black women were seen as a sexual object and they should differ from middle- and upper-class white women. It is very interesting to see this because I think it's something that really isn't talked about enough. Sara Bartman was known about, but people did not know enough about her. It is interesting to note that writer's wrote about her like if they were the firsts to write about her. Many people find her story interesting; therefore, it is beneficial to be the "first" writing about her.
I think it is also interesting to know that people found her to be so out of the ordinary and be put on display. It was almost like her body of her being a human didn't matter. Abrahams also brings up the idea of the "fair country woman." It seems as if this is the complete opposite of a black woman. It's almost like if being the "fair country woman" was the good side of the scale and being a black woman was the bad side of the scale. Furthermore, the latter is put on display so people will sexualize their bodies.
In real life today, there is still a hyper sexualization of black bodies. I've seen it going on in real life and read about it in writing. In a book, "Hung: A Meditation on the Measure of Black Men in America" by Scott Poulson-Bryant, a black male points out an event in which he slept with a white girl and she made a comment about how she'd thought he'd be bigger because of his race and he never felt that way before. He began to question himself because of that one comment. It is interesting to see what these social constructions of bodies do to an individual's minds. Also, on the streets almost everyday, I hear men cart-calling women who have bigger buttocks. Based on the reading, it seems like the sexualization of bodies, especially black bodies, isn't something that's new in society, but it's been going on for a very long time.
Below is the link for the "Hung" book (the story begins on chapter 1, page 5):
https://books.google.com/books?hl=en&lr=&id=uhoUuzDkjNgC&oi=fnd&pg=PA1&dq=hung+poulson&ots=gDNERGmRjt&sig=MZV-Mi7ZQdBoj-YW3kYLIkmCHSM#v=onepage&q=hung%20poulson&f=false
Also, I found this article to be very interesting on the topic of hyper sexualizing black bodies, if anyone is interested in reading more about the topic:
https://thefemlitmagazine.wordpress.com/2016/09/21/the-sexualisation-of-black-women-in-the-media-isnt-it-time-for-a-change-by-ms-cheryl-diane-parkinson/
I want to end this blog post by asking what I think is a very important question: Is the hyper-sexualization of bodies only happening to lower-classes and minorities (or oppressed) people? Why do you think so?
No comments:
Post a Comment