Deconstructing the myth of the Strong Black Woman
CVK
There’s a excellent post over at the blog Diary of a Mad Kenyan Woman that deconstructs the myth of the Strong Black Woman (SBW). I’ve always had an issue with the over-use of this term but have never really been able to verbalize what I thought was problematic about it. Mad Kenyan Woman breaks it down brilliantly.
By the way, this post is part of the first edition of the Racial Women of Color Carnival, celebrating the identity and experiences of blogging women of colour. There’s lots of great stuff from other bloggers there so check it out.
Essentially, this whole Strong Black Woman myth is part of the same old set of racist myths created during the slavery era to justify white oppression. Like, black men didn’t have the emotional capability to love their wives and children the way white men did, thus it was okay to split up families and sell them off to different plantations. Like, black women weren’t quite human and thus, no sexual relations with them could possibly be considered rape. The myth of the Strong Black Woman is just a modern update of that dehumanizing stereotype only today, black women have bought into it. Mad Kenyan Woman argues that they need to reject this myth:
The greatest achievement the rest of the world ever achieved was convincing black women that SBW existed, and that our job was to grow up into one such, subsequently to be one in the most exemplary fashion possible, and faithfully to remain one without pause or rest until the grim reaper relieved us of the burdens of our mortality…
It is really terrifyingly, astonishingly and ineffably well-crafted, this myth. Insofar as, so long as we are kept either desiring, or believing ourselves actually to be, Strong Black Women, there is no amount of pure nonsense, abuse, overwork, ingratitude, exploitation, underappreciation, and just plain shit that we will not put up with. You see, SBW, of course, can make ten dollars stretch into meals for a week, clothes for everyone, payment of bills, and school fees, etc.,— this is just a well known and, indeed, required characteristic of SBW. SBW are, by nature, ready, nay, eager to work five jobs at a time so as to feed and clothe their nearest and dearest without expecting, and more properly, absolutely rejecting any help. One has, after all, one’s pride as a Strong Black Woman. SBW are also expected to give command performances as free, endlessly sympathetic and reliable therapists, counselors, substitute mothers, and wise women, who willingly provide free emotional and mental labour to everyone else…
SBW, it is understood, do not suffer emotionally as much as the other, more fragile and helpless non-SBW population: because they ARE strong, and thus, better able to endure… Whence, in addition to everything else, comes the ugly fact that SBW are granted less time for grieving, assumed to have less sense of loss and suffering and required to have a faster recovery time from trauma than everybody else, so that they can go and take care of the anguish and malaise of others. Well, naturally. It is an SBW thing: you wouldn’t understand and are very careful not even to try.
The problem with the myth of the SBW is this. It falsely supposes that SBW have powers, skills and capacities beyond those of ordinary mortals (sort of like super heroes) so that their achievements are a) not as difficult to attain as they would be for others and b) somehow inhere in the very quality of SBW-ness, itself. When you look at this logic for long enough, it becomes pretty obvious that we don’t need to thank SBW or even to congratulate them. After all, they have only achieved what their innate SBW-ness allows, nay, compels them to achieve. Where is the agency of these women here? How do we honour them by making their achievements banal by not contextualizing them in human frailty?
Merq wrote:
AMEN!
Posted 03 Feb 2006 at 6:01 pm ¶
Ben wrote:
So let me get this straight - the achievements of black women are underappreciated because people have come to expect great things from them?
This strikes me as a gravely defeatist attitude, and I have a hard time believing that a community that overcomes centuries of slavery, sexism, and racial discrimination would waste time trying to convince people that less should be expected of them.
Posted 04 Feb 2006 at 10:03 am ¶
Anonymous wrote:
Ben:
I think the problems is that because historically (and often today) it is the stereotypical “strong black woman” that holds the family together, goes to church, does service activities, holds 1-2-3 jobs, etc. that can be dangerous because:
1) black women may be LESS likely to ask for help, becuase they’re SUPPOSED to be tought and be able to handle anything (I’m thinking things like depression and other mental illnesses that carry stigma throughout US society, but doubly so in the black community, or not getting physical screenings or illnesses seen to, because that’s not important)
2) others assuming that black women in particular don’t need as much help because they can take care of “their own”
3) abusive situations being tolerated longer for fear of breaking the family apart.
If anyone is claiming that balck women, by virtue of simply being black, are more resilient or have less needs, then the danger is that black women will be seen as something less human, less equal than other women. Oh wait, historically, that’s already happened.
And that’s why the myth must die.
Posted 04 Feb 2006 at 11:45 am ¶
Ben wrote:
Thanks for breaking it down for me, anon.
To suggest that SBW are a myth is to suggest that they don’t exist, and your first sentence contradicts that. I can see how SBW could be stereotypical figures - i.e. assumed to be more prevalent than they really are - but this heads into the tricky realm of deconstructing positive stereotypes.
I can see how some positive stereotypes can be marginalizing. Being good at math or well-endowed are unambiguously positive things in and of themselves, but when the relative worth of an indiviudal is reduced to this one metric, it comes at the expense of the whole person. Strength, however, is a fundamental human characteristic with a much broader scope.
We all have expectations thrust upon us at various times in our lives, many of them inappropriate. But if we as a society must err on one side or the other, far better to expect more than less.
Posted 05 Feb 2006 at 1:14 pm ¶
Lyonside wrote:
ETA: Anon was me again. This is what happens when you clean the cookies off your computer…
Posted 05 Feb 2006 at 8:55 pm ¶
justin wrote:
Hey Ben,
I think this post is more about the way black women are portrayed on television and in movies. The scope of the SBW stereotype is not that wide or generous. The article wasn’t about female weight lifters. You should read the caricature section on Merq’s page.
Posted 06 Feb 2006 at 6:58 am ¶
justin wrote:
I was in advanced math classes until I was 15, I never deserved to be there. I would be much better at maths now if I were taught at the level that I was actually on. I have my school books (they are very empty, full of failing grades and no repercussions ), they wouldn’t make any sense if I didn’t know how racist or naïve my community was back then.
Posted 06 Feb 2006 at 7:15 am ¶
Bertrum says wrote:
Well–I think the point is that the myth is a double edged sword. Obviously not all black women fit the “strong black woman” mold, and are in need of serious help with whatever problem they may face. But because of they have bought into this myth, they believe that they don’t need help, and thus don’t seek it.
Posted 06 Feb 2006 at 10:35 am ¶
Ben wrote:
@justin: Interesting take. I didn’t interpret it as an excoriation of the media… but I find it telling that in her 2000+ words she never really mentioned who was perpetuating the SBW “myth” any more specifically than “the rest of the world.”
So who exactly is responsible for the perpetuation of this “myth,” and what objective evidence exists that shows harm to black women’s self-esteem as a result of it? (I mean, I’d love to examine her facts, but I don’t actually see any… which I guess is what makes this a rant rather than anything we need to take seriously.)
I noticed the MMW edit charitably omitted the end of the rant, where Mad Kenyan Woman exhorts: “Let the Age of the Weak Black Women begin!!!” Seriously? She might as well have said, “Dear society, please expect less of all black women. If any of them tell you otherwise, it’s because they have been brainwashed into believing that they are more capable than they really are. Ignore them.”
Posted 06 Feb 2006 at 5:13 pm ¶
Merq wrote:
OH, DAMN, JUSTIN!
Didn’t know you’d checked out my documentary. Thanks.
Umm… that’s it from me.
Posted 07 Feb 2006 at 1:12 am ¶
Lyonside wrote:
Ben:
Myths are cultural and self-perpetuating. You don’t have to have someone actively screaming it from the pulpit, so to speak, for the idea to become entrenched in culture.
For some black women, they may embrace this kind of idea since it is on the surface positive and can be empowering. Again, positives and negatives can be in the same image.
Despite never being told this verbally by anyone, the idea immediately resonated with me as something familiar. It’s in every Mammy image, every struggling-urban-black-mom image in a sitcom (anyone recall Good Times? 227?), every “lifting oneself up” inspirational story in the paper. It’s like porn: I can’t define it but I know it when I see it.
It’s not that black women should expect “less” of themselves - it’s that they shouldn’t be seen as self-sacrificing defatigable workhorses. No woman (and no man) should be seen that way either.
Posted 08 Feb 2006 at 10:14 am ¶
tmj wrote:
As a Black woman, I grew up with this myth. I was told, implied and instructed to BE the Strong Black Woman. This included duties without complaint, to help _______, the subjugation of my own wants and needs to do for others, and the shame and feelings of inadequacy that come when you do not subscribe to this ideal. It is VERY REAL for me. Today, I physically have to shake off that mantle to do for me. Sometimes, I cannot. It is deeply ingrained–as it was for my mother, her mother, her mother and her mother before her. It is great to be a strong Black woman. But the Strong Black Woman is a very unhappy lonely individual. Not to mention unhealthy.
Posted 08 Feb 2006 at 2:13 pm ¶
Ben wrote:
Well, the comments in this forum have certainly been more helpful than the original post. :)
The consensus here seems to be that the SBW stereotype fosters, in everybody, unrealistic expectations of black women’s strength. The reason I’ve had such a hard time accepting that is that I interpret “strong black women” as a subset of black women: those who are particularly strong. I never hear it as a statement that all black women are automatically strong; I most often hear it used reflexively by women who are proud of, confident in, and empowered by both their blackness and their womanhood. Seems like that could be a great balancing force to everybody’s implicit negative assumptions about blacks and women.
Perhaps, then, the harm lies not in the stereotype itself, but in how it is applied. As an artificial benchmark by which one measures oneself and other black women, it’s bad. But as a statement of self-affirmation and of collective solidarity, it’s good.
Posted 10 Feb 2006 at 2:10 am ¶
SAUNDRA ELISE TURNER wrote:
THE STUPID RACISM CREATED BY “WHITE” PEPOLE IN WHICH
THEY CLAIM TO BE SUPERIOR, AND BETTER THAN EVERYONE
ELSE DOES NOT PROVE ITSELF.
IF YOU CLAIM TO BE SUPERIOR,
WHY DO YOU NEED TO PUT OTHER PEOPLE DOWN TO MAKE YOURSELF
LOOK BETTER, AND WHY WOULD YOU NEED SOMEONE YOU CLAIM TO
BE INFERIOR TO YOU TO HANDLE YOUR EMOTIONAL PROBLEMS,
AND WORK FOR YOU?
JESUS IS SUPERIOR, AND YOU NEVER HEARD OF
HIM CURSING OR DEFAMING OTHER PEOPLE TO SHOW HE
WAS POWERFUL AND BETTER THAN EVERYONE ELSE,
JESUS BEING SUPERIOR, TURNED WATER INTO WINE,
AND I HAVE NOT SEEN ANY WHITE PERSON DO THAT YET…..
Posted 13 Feb 2006 at 2:12 am ¶
Anti-myth wrote:
Hmmm…It seems that articles like these buy into myths themselves.
1. myth: Relationships between black women and white men during slavery could never be based on mutual attraction, consent or even love.
This would mean that:
-white men cannot simply be attracted to, fall in love with or care about black women
-black women cannot simply fall in love with, be attracted to or care about white men.
-black women are not ‘worthy’ of love or black women are too ‘unattractive’ (both physically and non-physically) to be fancied by white men or other non-black men.
-white men are evil exploiters and don’t have human feelings.
All of this is obviously nonsense.
2. myth: Black women during slavery were more raped by white men than by black men.
It is highly unlikely that just as many black women if not more were actually raped by black men during slavery. Is it ok or less important to be raped if the rapist is of the same race? Obviously not. Spreading these myths is simply propaganda.
3.myth: Every bad behaviour which might eventually occur among black men can always and totally be blamed on ‘white racism’, ‘the white power structure’ and historical slavery. It would seem to me that this is rather a way of not taking responsibiliy for one’s own actions.
Posted 20 Feb 2006 at 1:29 pm ¶