Schism

I recently wrote an essay for my memoir class about being black and issues with self-image. In it, I asserted something that made my teacher call foul. In an effort to move away from the top-heavy exposition that dogs many of my first drafts, I didn't bother to qualify my statements, but I think what I was getting at was something honest that needs to find some sensitive, yet ballsy way to be said.

In my essay, I expressed that black women had two images with which to be identified: angry or sexually loose. I went on to say that white women were not dogged by the same limited spectrum--perhaps I thoughtlessly expressed that they weren't dogged by archetypes at all. What I'd meant to say, and should have taken explicit care to say, is that they didn't seem to me to be pigeonholed in the same way, for the same reasons, and that any stereotypical representations that might exist didn't seem to exist to dehumanize them.

My prof, who is white, helpfully pointed out that my explanation makes things clearer, but that it's still impossible to speak to someone else's intimate experience and that perhaps such comparisons should be avoided.

The following link gets at a little of this issue. Read what one black woman blogger had to say when one white woman journalist looks at Michelle Obama through the lens of what she thinks the First Lady should be doing:

http://blacksnob.com/snob_blog/2009/5/22/someone-needs-to-tell-bonnie-erbe-to-let-it-go-rants.html