I
decided to examine African American women. The main single story I found was
that black women are making progress, but it’s not nearly enough. This photo is an old one, but I feel that similar stories are being circulated today about African American women.
What I mean by that is it seems that most people emphasize the discrimination still faced by African American women, often by saying it outright. This is a negative single story because it ignores all the good things that have been accomplished by black women in the United States and rather focuses on how they continue to be oppressed, which is clearly limiting.
What I mean by that is it seems that most people emphasize the discrimination still faced by African American women, often by saying it outright. This is a negative single story because it ignores all the good things that have been accomplished by black women in the United States and rather focuses on how they continue to be oppressed, which is clearly limiting.
The damage of this single story is that it
propagates a completely negative view of African American women. It depicts
them as weak and unable to succeed in an intolerant society. Rather than emphasize their
strengths, it holds these women to unfair ideals. After all, who can say when the
anti-discriminatory progress is enough? Is it when the single story of African
American women is synonymous with the single story of white women in the United
States? Who makes that decision?
What I found most interesting about my artifacts is that
most of them were made/written by African American women. I thought it was fascinating that these women were promoting a single story about
their own group of people. Perhaps they feel that in order to advocate change,
they need to emphasize the single story to get others to see the extreme of
their situation. While many of the artifacts mentioned the discrimination and oppression
of black women in the United States outright (the ones produced by African American women), there were some that mostly
hinted at it with context and statistics, without actually saying the words. These
artifacts were the ones not produced by African American women. I also found
that interesting. It almost seemed like these creators were trying to make
their point without seeming discriminatory or oppressive. Either way, the single story was
continuously supported, whether it was stated plainly or disguised with political correctness.
Here are the artifacts I found:
Here are the artifacts I found:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gFtot6he7No
Wow, that's so interesting that you found most of their own writing is committed to that single story. I liked your analysis of it.
ReplyDeleteIt's interesting about the african-american women emphasizing their single story so that people will see the extreme. So that people will actually listen, right? I feel like that's a common factor in many stories that deal with race and social class. Things have to be crazy and different in order for people to pay attention. Just look at the media!
ReplyDeleteThe fact that most of your artifacts were produced by African American women reminds me of the Ted Talk we watched. When Ms. Adichie wrote stories that were set in Africa, her professors and other people claimed they were not "authentically African" simply because she did not conform to this practice of perpetuating a single story about one's own demographic.
ReplyDeleteI think this is a really relevant group especially considering the recent events in Ferguson and Baltimore. But even those events have only focused on the struggles mainly of black males and not black women.
ReplyDeletemy big question with this is: is this really a single story about how African-American women are depicted, or is this just a rallying cry for help?
ReplyDelete