From “Perspectives: The Status of African-American Women”
by Dr. Julianne Malveaux - Article - Diverse: Issues in Higher Education

“Through the lens of the third burden, aspects of African-American women’s depiction in popular culture become partly understandable, though wholly unacceptable. The rap music artists who insist on portraying African-American women as sexual objects, as “-itches” and “hos” seem to have a seething resentment for African-American women that is partly rooted in the economic realities described in the paragraphs above. References to “gold diggers” and images of credit cards swiped through a woman’s buttocks demean women to a beat so enticing that other women dance to the sounds of their debasement. When the talk jock Don Imus broadcast hateful words to describe a graceful group of Rutgers women basketball players, African-American people around the nation exploded in rage. The conversation was quickly hijacked in both productive and destructive ways. On one hand, the conversation about Imus quickly became a productive conversation about images of African-American women in media. On the other hand, the conversation about Imus also attempted to equate rap music artists, some with very limited distribution, with the power that an Imus, with tens of millions of viewers and listeners, had. In some ways, the conversation became one in which segments of the African-American community seemed to turn on each other, with younger hip hop artists pitted against older, more established leaders and scholars. It became a conversation much like the prevailing political conversation—are you supporting your race or supporting your gender, as if the two can be separated.

Interestingly, the attention focused on the depiction of African-American women in popular culture has barely touched on indelible images of African-American women on public assistance and in public housing, and the demeaning images invoked by members of Congress in the 1996 welfare reform debate. While changes in the way that public assistance is delivered and our society’s shift away from the poverty debate have blunted sharp images of African-American women as lazy and dependent, those women who still receive public assistance, and those who attempt to use education as their escape from poverty while on public assistance find that demeaning images often shape their ability to find jobs and opportunities. White women are more likely to be allowed to attend college while on public assistance than African-American women are, partly because caseworkers have some discretion in making exceptions to rules governing college attendance and images of African-American women too often influence willingness to make exceptions.

 

 

Nearly a year after the Imus flap, the image of African-American women in popular culture has only barely improved. The bastion of Sunday morning pale, male talking heads shows little more diversity than it did a decade ago. The gyrating, undulating images of African-American women in rap music videos and, by extension, on cable television is as prevalent as ever. And though African-American women have organized in response and in resistance to these images, conducting conversations and negotiations with entertainment industry executives and also elected officials who might regulate decency in the absence of its natural occurrence, the progress toward depicting African-American women positively in media has been slow.

 

Media imagery invades the mind and spirit and is at least partly responsible for the unequal, and often dismissive, treatment that African-American women face in the labor market and in society. There is bountiful anecdotal evidence that while African-American women have been climbing the corporate ladder, images of Black women in popular culture are an ankle-weight that slows the climb. Thus, while economic issues such as workplace discrimination and equal pay must interest those who are concerned with the status of African-American women, issues of image may well have an impact on economic status. In this context, it is important to note the many powerful images of African American women that exist at the other end of the spectrum. Dr. Dorothy Height, Dr. Maya Angelou, Oprah Winfrey, Susan Taylor, and Michele Obama are among the many African-American women whose names and images invoke strength, dignity, and grace, and are an antidote to the demeaning images that so often prevail.”

Question for the People:

How can we use our economic power and cultural influence to change the media and combat negative and inaccurate depictions of Black women?