Marlon Riggs’s documentary, Ethnic Notions, details a number of difficult and disparaging racial tropes, illustrating how cultural representations are created and maintained. For your Moodle post, please select one of the tropes described to discuss the following in a paragraph or two: (1) outline the historical framing offered, paying careful attention to the function of the trope to assert power and oppress African-Americans; (2) consider how that trope continues to be circulated in contemporary popular culture and/or how alternative images/representations have attempted to counter the trope.
The documentary Ethnic Notions by Marlon Riggs follows the chronological evolution of blatant African American caricatures in United States’ media and popular culture to their more pervasive and subtle implementation into society. During the antebellum period, the trope of the mammy came into existence. This caricature was of a jovial, fat, and dark-skinned woman. She is portrayed to always be happy to serve her white “family” better than her own, she is loyal to them. By making her content as a servant the justification can be made for a house servant’s economic exploitation and a black woman’s constraint to domestic work. This stereotype was created by those on the pro-slavery side as a response and attempt at vindication to the claims made against them and slavery by abolitionists. Black people being content with their role in society as servants is depicted in a positive light through the mammy trope.
Not only is the mammy amiable and matronly, but she was also an asexual being so as to not pose a threat to the relationship of the white husband and wife. She is the antithesis of the white woman to dismiss the idea that she could ever hold power over a white person in any sense, including sexually. The mammy cannot seduce the husband and hold this over the wife, it would disrupt her image of being satisfied with merely serving the white family. To instead be viewed as a surrogate mother figure and not an actual or potential mother figure, the mammy is kept in her ascribed subversive position within the household she looks after. No matter how nurturing she is with the children of the white family or how much she is liked, she is still only there to serve and assist them. The impression of how black women should fit in within the white hegemony is instilled through the mammy.
In contemporary media a lesser degree of the mammy trope can be seen when black women, usually also mothers, are made to be charitable, nurturing, and loyal. An example of this is Ruby Hill from the Netflix series Good Girls. Ruby is very sacrificial and lenient when it comes to Beth and Annie, her white childhood friends, which causes stress in her relationship with her husband. It is not until later in the show that she begins to put herself and her own family first instead of worrying about her white friends and their families. While it can be said that Ruby is just a “really good friend,” there is a moment of strife when Annie and Beth make a comment about Ruby not being their real sister since she is not related to them by blood—also implying that she is black and not white like them. While she is not fulfilling the role of a domestic servant, this portrayal contributes to the notion that black women must happily and willingly give to everyone but themselves. Any attempts to counter the stereotype characterize black women as extremely successful, highly educated, or independent which iterates the idea that they can only be one and not the other.
Works Cited
“Ethnic Notions.” Films On Demand, Films Media Group, 1987, https://fod.infobase.com/PortalPlaylists.aspx?wID=103806&xtid=49775.
