The Souls of Black Women Folk
by Nikki Lane
Herein lie a sketch; rough in some parts, but proportionate and honest in every. A sketch that if viewed with the same integrity that was used in drafting it, could reveal the peculiar circumstances that have shaped the Black woman’s experience, history, and identity in America. Its reading may lead to an understanding of who She is, and who She isn’t; show where misconceptions of Her personage come from and, in the end, I pray it leads to a deeper understanding of who She has become in these opening years of the Twenty-First Century.
I do not wish to abstract the Black woman or Her experience; She has been an abstraction, a parody, a stereotype, a fraction of Herself for too long. It is important to note, however, that I do not seek to simplify Her either. Controlling images fashioned by the white heteropatriarchy have sought to simplify Her. It is my wish to return Her to Her rightful place in reality where She has been absent from for centuries while conveying the truth about Her past and present complexity and depth. However, this is not an attempt to universalize all Black women’s experience. That is an impossible feat.
W.E.B. DuBois’s The Souls of Black Folk, the book this work is fashioned after, managed to articulate what life was like in a Black body, but I would argue that it did not delve adequately into how gender constructs a different experience in this Blackened body.
This, my humble work, attempts to undo what the Black Nationalist Movement, (middle class white) women’s movements, (racist) white patriarchy, and capitalism have managed to do to Her identity and story, whether in oversight or strategic hostility: erase them both from then and from now.
A profound appreciation for the Black woman serves as the motivation behind my pursuit of this project. While that appreciation finds a way to inform my methodology and my analysis, I should note that I attempt to extract even those parts of Her—myself—that conflict and even disappoint. I do not, and cannot, claim objectivity. In fact, my standpoint as a Black woman—as a racialized individual—does not afford me objectivity. This body, however, does allow me to bring a richer, more robust analysis to this project. Many of us who occupy this particular position in society, somewhere on the margins, somewhere behind the Veil, are forced to show those beyond it its Truths. For when the opportunity arises, the oppressor expects the oppressed to teach him his mistakes (Lorde 114). This project is not me taking up that responsibility because there is something fundamentally wrong with its logic. The oppressor excuses himself from responsibility when he can justify his behavior by saying that he didn’t know he was doing anything wrong. But here I hope wrongs will be righted, rights lefted, and insight granted. So it is my hope that in the end you, Gentle Reader, will come to see the Black woman the way I do: tangible, human.
“I pray you, then, receive my little book in all charity, studying my words with me, forgiving mistake and foible for sake of the faith and passion that is in me, and seeking the grain of truth hidden there.” W.E.B. DuBois from “The Forethought” The Souls of Black Folk
Work Cited...
A Forethought
Herein lie a sketch; rough in some parts, but proportionate and honest in every. A sketch that if viewed with the same integrity that was used in drafting it, could reveal the peculiar circumstances that have shaped the Black woman’s experience, history, and identity in America. Its reading may lead to an understanding of who She is, and who She isn’t; show where misconceptions of Her personage come from and, in the end, I pray it leads to a deeper understanding of who She has become in these opening years of the Twenty-First Century.
I do not wish to abstract the Black woman or Her experience; She has been an abstraction, a parody, a stereotype, a fraction of Herself for too long. It is important to note, however, that I do not seek to simplify Her either. Controlling images fashioned by the white heteropatriarchy have sought to simplify Her. It is my wish to return Her to Her rightful place in reality where She has been absent from for centuries while conveying the truth about Her past and present complexity and depth. However, this is not an attempt to universalize all Black women’s experience. That is an impossible feat.
W.E.B. DuBois’s The Souls of Black Folk, the book this work is fashioned after, managed to articulate what life was like in a Black body, but I would argue that it did not delve adequately into how gender constructs a different experience in this Blackened body.
This, my humble work, attempts to undo what the Black Nationalist Movement, (middle class white) women’s movements, (racist) white patriarchy, and capitalism have managed to do to Her identity and story, whether in oversight or strategic hostility: erase them both from then and from now.
A profound appreciation for the Black woman serves as the motivation behind my pursuit of this project. While that appreciation finds a way to inform my methodology and my analysis, I should note that I attempt to extract even those parts of Her—myself—that conflict and even disappoint. I do not, and cannot, claim objectivity. In fact, my standpoint as a Black woman—as a racialized individual—does not afford me objectivity. This body, however, does allow me to bring a richer, more robust analysis to this project. Many of us who occupy this particular position in society, somewhere on the margins, somewhere behind the Veil, are forced to show those beyond it its Truths. For when the opportunity arises, the oppressor expects the oppressed to teach him his mistakes (Lorde 114). This project is not me taking up that responsibility because there is something fundamentally wrong with its logic. The oppressor excuses himself from responsibility when he can justify his behavior by saying that he didn’t know he was doing anything wrong. But here I hope wrongs will be righted, rights lefted, and insight granted. So it is my hope that in the end you, Gentle Reader, will come to see the Black woman the way I do: tangible, human.
“I pray you, then, receive my little book in all charity, studying my words with me, forgiving mistake and foible for sake of the faith and passion that is in me, and seeking the grain of truth hidden there.” W.E.B. DuBois from “The Forethought” The Souls of Black Folk
Work Cited...
Lorde, Audre. Sister Outsider. Freedom, California: Crossing Press, 1984.
(This is a piece of a work that I'm currently worknig on. I think I'll use my blog for the next few weeks for throwing some ideas and concepts out there that I've been playing with.)
posted by Deep @ Tuesday, March 06, 2007
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