94 Search results for "black womanhood"

When people defraud the world by impersonating Black womanhood
I always think of Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956) whenever someone pretends to be a Black woman or disingenuously evokes our aesthetics. While there are many who outright pretend to be Black women, there are also those convinced that they can somehow actually become Black women and others who simply benefit from appropriating our […]
Learning to love my androgynous and masculine Black womanhood
I have always wanted to be strong. Not strong as in a Strong Black Woman™—an expectation of impossible emotional and spiritual fortitude against a world imbued with misogynoir. Strong as in twenty three-time Grand Slam Champion Serena Williams. Powerful as in Olympic Shot Putter and gold medalist Michelle Carter. Formidable as in the Dora Milaje […]
I’m not bipolar, I’m just traumatized: What I learned about Black womanhood from my misdiagnosis
By Ashley Young A narrative was erased for me in the summer of 2017 when I was informed by a new doctor that I had been misdiagnosed with bipolar disorder. It was my mental illness narrative, one with which I had become so strongly identified that, when it was stripped away, it occurred more as […]
On Revolutionary Black Womanhood
It’s an odd experience when two seemingly unrelated stories subtly and symbolically collide. In one corner, Michelle Obama wowed audiences with her speech at the Democratic National Convention two weeks ago. In the other, Karen Lewis, head of the Chicago Teachers’ Union, led Chicago Public Schools teachers into a fight with Mayor Rahm Emanuel, when […]
We are more than just good or bad: How the God of the Binary fails Black people
By Itoro Udofia I grew up under the tutelage of The God of the Binary. He was forever in opposition to a ubiquitous outside force. He was the Good opposed to Evil. The Strong opposed to Weak. Right opposed to Wrong. There I stood, an eager and inquisitive girl child, making mistakes and looking for […]
#UnderHisEye and the erasure of Black women in the carceral system
This essay contains discussions of racialized sexual violence and mentions r/pe and molestation. by Mekleit Dix The Handmaid’s Tale is a wildly popular American Television show based on a novel of the same name by Margaret Atwood. It portrays a dystopian nightmare: sterility in women becomes a widespread epidemic resulting in a break down of […]
Reflecting on “The Photograph” and Black mother-daughter relationships
by Kui Mwai Full bodied, multilayered, complex Black mother-daughter relationships are rarely captured on screen. It wasn’t until I watched Stella Meghie’s “The Photograph” that I realized just how much I was craving to see something akin to my mother and I’s relationship on film. “The Photograph” invites its viewers into characters Mae (Issa Rae) […]
How TikTok is ushering in yet another way for youths to don “Digital Blackface”
by Cosima Smith By now many of you will have heard the term “Digital Blackface” a term defined loosely as the movement or expansion of Blackface minstrelsy to the new-age digital platforms we frequent. The “tradition” of minstrelsy dates back to the early 19th century and began as a form of entertainment at the expense of […]
Maybe Black men protect white women because we see ourselves in them
by Donnie Moreland My crushes, in high school, were all white girls. I used to fantasize about asking them out, kissing them, fucking them. It was about the only way by which I judged my social value—by how many of them I was of interest to. In fact, the first girl to ever hear the […]
‘Set It Off’ and the Black feminist lessons it still holds for us
This essay contains spoilers for Set It Off, and discusses sexual exploitation and state violence “Women respond to racism. My response to racism is anger. I have lived with that anger, ignoring it, feeding upon it, learning to use it before it laid my visions to waste, for most of my life. Once I […]
Black women speak to being socialized to fear their own pleasure, & what we can do about it
By Caroline Colvin For a subset of society whose bodies are so sexualized, so desired, and so sought-after, Black women and femmes as a whole feel a substantial amount of shame when it comes to our sexuality. When you’re a Black woman or femme, pop culture encourages you to be the video vixen — or, […]
What I learned from studying my Black mother’s pedagogy of love
Editor’s Note: April is Black Women’s History Month. Throughout this month, Black Youth Project is celebrating Black women. This month is also National Minority Health Month, Autism Awareness Month, Sexual Assault Awareness Month, Child Abuse Prevention Month. We are interested in publishing works that address these topics and the things surrounding them. by Donnie Moreland […]