Hammonds seems reasonable throughout her writing. She makes concrete, understandable points and argues them plainly. A few questions arose for me as I read the text. What do you think?
1. At the beginning, Hammonds writes particularly personally about her own experience. She says, "Do I have to start by adding another adjective to my already long list of self-chosen identities? I used to be a black lesbian, feminist, writer, scientist, historian of science, and activist" (1). This made me think of my own self-imposed titles and agencies. How do you label yourself?
2. It was extremely interesting to me when Hammonds explained where the "politics of science" originally stemmed from. Hammonds writes, "This 'plitics of silence,' as described by historian Evelyn Brooks Higginbotham, emerged as a political strategy by black women reformers who hoped by their silence and by the promotion of proper Victorian morality to demonstrate the lie of the image of the sexually immoral black woman (262)." (3). What do you think of this original tactic? Hammonds argues that the silence was a purposeful silence. Do you think this was a smart tactic?
3. On the fourth page of her article, Hammonds includes Ann duCille's notes that, "Mass culture, as hooks argues, produces, promotets, and perpetuates the commodification of the Otherness through the exploitation of the black female body. In the 1990s, however, the principal sites of exploitation are not simply the cabaret, the speakeasy, the music video, the glamour magazine; they are also the academy, the publishing industry, the intellectual community (592)." I thought this quote was striking because it basically says that black women were exploited in all walks of life. What other realms are there other than the music, writing and academic worlds?
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Nice post. I'm going to try to answer your questions in order, since each other deserves a proper answer.
ReplyDelete1. Hammonds' section about self-imposed labels made me reflect back on my own identities. Prevalent throughout the article was Hammonds' insistence that sexuality is define by two extremems; what it is and what it isn't. It was startling to me that what sexuality is is marked by whiteness and anything else is non-white. As an Asian female, I find it troubling that my sexuality can be placed in the context of either white and non-white. Given the history surrounding Asians, and the "model minority" myth, its difficult to separate Asianess from the context of 'white'. However, I strongly believe that I am colored, marked just as strongly as the black female body. It is society that deems my female body as acceptable due to, as mentioned before, the "model minority" stereotype that follows Asians.
2. It is difficult to see silence as a means of representation. Given the nature of the black female body and its political and social ties, silence brings back to me as more of a means of representation. "Corregidora" served as a book to remind us of the important of bearing witness and bringing forth to further generations. However, to combat the sexually implict black woman, silence was seen as a means of dispelling that belief. However, silence can as be seen as a function of acceptance and brings forth the idea of acceptance of misrepresentation and abuse, as in the sexual crimes of white men to black slaves.
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ReplyDeleteIt's interesting that as a black heterosexual woman with no children and who works for a black-owned organization and lives in a predominately black/Latino neighborhood, situations in which I need to label myself occur less frequently than when I worked and lived in a predominately white city. More often than not, people assume what I think or know, which I think adds another element to "otherness." I found that when I worked at a newspaper in a predominately white city in upstate New York, people more subtely made assumptions about me. I think the points that Hammonds raises in her essay bring light to the fact that labels can be both empowering and divisive. My labels in my current situation often suggest to my colleagues, neighbors, and clients that I should act, speak, and think a certain way. My labels in my previous situation suggested to my former colleagues and sources that my experiences and skills were limited. I am empowered by the notion that I have the ability to breakdown stereotypes, while I am also familiar with the feeling of disappointment at having to explain why I know what I know or think what I think because my labels, whether I assert them or not, have certain connotations.
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