Uncovering Shame and Black Female Voices: Who is Listening? (week 9)

3/2/2015

Develop a 250 word original post by Friday and respond to another student by Sunday. Your original post should include an overview of what you read in Sister Citizen (Chapter 3), an analysis of the two major themes from the reading a conclusion that asks critical thinking questions (open ended questions about the subject matter). These questions will be the prompt to other students to respond to you. Watch the video below to add context to the reading.

9 Comments

Andre Mouton

3/6/2015 06:48:12 am

Negative psychological effects from shame according the M. Harris in chapter 3 is the emotions of African American‘s self-esteem. Harris points outs how people with low-self-esteem tend to focus on the negative information that reinforces social unexceptables. The three elements of the motions of shame was interesting 1) Social, how we don’t feel shame in isolation but only in a social bounty or community expectation, 2) Shame is global, the ideal that your entire person is infected by something inherently bad or contagious 3) Psychological and physical urge to withdraw and think of one selves of being small ashamed.
The fictive kinship is a reality for black people because we all have something in common such racial interest such as the community we grow up in, the food we eat, the political ideologies. The book mentions how if one links itself to a great positive thing it also is the same when linked to something negative. The false narrative that Ronald Reagan did by shaming black woman as “welfare queen” is a good example how the government used black woman to attack the social safety net as if black women are the only ones who use welfare. The social media played into the role of irresponsible oversexed welfare dependent black mothers.
The angry black women stereotype is another shame associated with black women, where humiliation provokes shame. By shunning the negative stereotypes associated with black woman anger is an effective way for self-protection.
In my opinion most black woman doesn’t have the shame that associates them with the social negative stereotypes given by society. I believe that black women for the most part are proud and full of self-esteem despite the negative images and media narratives shown.

Gabriela Hernandez

3/6/2015 01:28:46 pm

Reading chapter three called "shame" really caught my attention because it talked about black woman trying to make there daughters stand straight in the crooked room by telling them inspiring stories and how they want them to know theirs hope and that they can achieve greatness. For example, "they explain that Rosa Parks courageous refusal to give up her seat on segregated city bus launched the civil rights movement and helped her people earn equal rights. They encourage little girls to watch Venus and Serena Williams play tennis and then remind them that Althea Gibson grew up in Harlem living on welfare. But she eventually won at Wimbledon. I feel that having those types of examples and being part of the crooked room are very inspiring and feel that at a younger age can influence their families to strive for a better life that there is hope. I feel that gives them faith, that their can be a better a brighter future and that not only because your in the struggle means you have to stay in the struggle and that being on welfare and getting out of it was a perfect way of showing not to give up. Where there's a will there's a way."This positive racial identity is important to the psychological well being of black adolescents and adults. the flip side of pride is shame, and like racial pride, racial shame is an important political emotion."

Amal Pujol

3/6/2015 01:51:17 pm

In chapter 3 of Sister citizen Perry discusses the ramifications of shame that has been imposed on the African American community and the ways in which this shame continues to affect us today. She also addresses how black women have been ostracized and often the target of racial shaming. The two themes that are brought out in this chapter are shame and fictive kinship. Perry brings out the point that shame is an emotion that has three parts, which are social, global, and withdrawal. We experience shame when feel that we have an audience watching us or judging, and then the global aspect happens because we begin to feel that idea of a malignant self when the guilt of shame plays in. In the final step of withdrawal, shame causes us to feel the need to hide or become more closed off. Perry says, “Shame transforms our identity. We experience ourselves as being small and worthless and as being exposed”. The era of segregation was designed to make black people feel deep levels of shame and unworthiness. The idea of whites sharing space and being in close proximity to blacks was seen as disgusting to many whites. This type of segregation for the comfort of whites basically said to blacks you are not good enough. This idea was also expressed when dealing with women, whereas white women were seen as delicate and treated with the utmost respect, black women were overworked, abused, ridiculed. The idea of fictive kinship works in both a good and a bad way when taking about shame with in the African American community. We see fictive kinship in when we try to tell our children the stories of blacks that became successful and famous or when we take to them about the great accomplishments of those in the civil rights movements. We also see fictive kinship in the way Blacks are held to the mistake and shame as a whole for one person’s actions. We experience this in the form of stereotypes everyday. Black women are constantly the targets of shame. They are reminded by society of the differences in their hair and skin and constantly made to feel undesirable or unwanted. In 1965 the Moynihan report The Negro family: The case for National Action basically pointed to black women’s reproduction as the root of shame. This is still seen by the stereotype of the welfare mothers. What are some visible strategies for resisting racial shame today in the Black community? Which of the strategies are most effective and which are more harmful then good?

Jessica Jaime

3/6/2015 02:36:35 pm

After reading chapter three, it made me thinking about the conversation we were having in our last class. How African American women are constantly the targets of shame and made to feel that the negative stereotypes given to them are what they are and only can be. A women who is over looked, abused and and overworked can cause deeper wounds going back to when they were being brought up. Shame i do believe can be passed down through generations which is a fictive kinship and its up to us to break it! Change the cycle of feeling deep shame and unworthiness and understand that our willingness to have control over our own body mind and soul means more than any role given to us by others.

Gabriela Hernandez

3/8/2015 04:14:53 am

Jessica,
I agree with what you said I feel that African American woman are often the targets of shame but I feel that shame shouldn't be passed down just like how you said we should break the cycle and pass down something different other than shame we should pass down something we take pride in to motivate one another.

Marcos Guzman

3/6/2015 03:18:23 pm

African American women inspire younger generations coming up in the crooked room by sharing inspiring stories so they can achieve greatness. For example stories of Rosa Parks, Harriet Tubman, and Serena Williams etc. “Families and educators prepare black children to meet racial hostility through a process of socialization meant to negate harmful images of blackness and replace them with role models of courage, resilience and achievement (Melissa Perry, Sister Citizen) The positive racial identity has a positive psychological influence and are powerful for countering derogatory racial images.

The emotion of shame eats away at self-esteem and transforms our identity. Experienced over many years it tends to have a more dramatic consequences. African American women are structurally positioned to experience more shame frequently than others. Black women tend to be more stigmatized. Black women are more likely to be poor, unmarried, parent children alone, overweight, physically ill and uneducated. “Shame motivates brutal social practices like honor killing, domestic violence, and foot binding. A state that shames its citizens violates the foundational social contract of liberal democracies: government’s commitment to respect individual dignity”.

African Americans deal with shame by fleeing and distinguishing from other African Americans. African Americans tend to pull back from their ethnic racial background by withdrawing from blackness. Racial distancing allows individuals to escape the shape of white constituents. This is a defense mechanism indirectly to escape the shaming of whites. The problem with escaping racial shame is one may risk becoming rootless. Most prefer to stay silent and find a way to cope with a difficult circumstance rather than being exposed and embarrassed for presenting their needs to society.

Theme1: Shame transforms identity. Makes one feel small, worthless and exposed.

Theme 2: Racial distancing. African Americans deny their race in order to avoid shame.

Conclusion: How does the government directly shame African Americans through aversive racism?

Andre Mouton

3/6/2015 11:55:33 pm

Marcos, I see you mentioned where black people inspired each other in a positive images, it replaced the harmful images. I think if we educate each other with positive things it will help us see the crooked room more clearly. Also by doing this it will help black people not want to pull back from being associated with themselves thus "shame" will not overtake their emotions as if those images were negative.

amal pujol

3/22/2015 04:15:25 am

Hi Marcos,
I believe that one of the ways the government shames African Americans is through laws through laws that promote racial profiling such as stop and frisk. These laws allow for law enforcement to racial profile individuals based on a suspected wrongdoing, and "conveniently" most of these individuals happen to be African American males or Hispanic males. It is a shameful practice that truly is unconstitutional and subjects the victims of this legalized discrimination to repeated shame by basing the prospects of them committing a crime on statistics.

Jordan S. Leopold

3/7/2015 08:18:06 pm

In the third chapter of Sister Citizen, Perry covers the concept of Shame and how it is linked to the negative portrayal and stereotypes of Black American's. Perry begun by describing how racial pride is instilled through story tellings of Black excellence and the fictive-kinship. The primary reason people feel shamed is because they feel misrecognized. Shame is linked to field dependence as it felt when one evaluates themselves after they are exposed to the judgement of others. This results in individuals feeling malignant and have thus having a desire to retreat or conform out of fear of further threat. Consistent shaming even has a negative effect on the body and can cause post traumatic syndrome.

Shaming can be constructive or destructive. From a loving context, integrative shaming aims to express disapproval towards anothers actions to strategically develop them to a particular community and their ethics and morals. Stigmatizing shaming aims to label individuals as outsiders because of their perceived action or identity. The complex and effective Jim Crow system and racial terrorization in the North caused stigmatizing shame, asserting that Blacks were malignant and that White Americans needed proper protection from us. Although society saw women as fragile beings that held society’s moral order, Black women were not seen nor treated as so. This shaming towards Black women continues 100 years later as they are seen as lazy and irresponsible “welfare queens” during the Ronald Reagan 80’s. Black women face greater shame than Black men.

One theme in this chapter is “fictive-kinship” and how Blacks can collectively connect and instill pride within one another or "collectively shame” other Blacks for “shamming the race” due to their negative action. She also looks at how Black individuals shame their own race by trying withdraw from Blackness to distinguish themselves from the rest of the stereotypical Black people to reduce the shame they receive from Whites. This racial distancing can spark collective shaming towards that individual, destroying their kinship ties.

The theme of malignancy, is seen throughout the chapter. Malignancy is the state one feels as they are seen as worthless and is a problematic disease that is sought to be eradicated. Constant and systematic shame is sure to evoke a feel of malignancy as one is in constant conflict with society and themselves. Do you think once a person feels malignant or acknowledges the thought that others see them as malignant that they can eventually establish a sense of humanity and wholeness?

Uncovering Shame and Black Female Voices: Who is Listening? (week 9)

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Uncovering Shame and Black Female Voices: Who is Listening? (week 9)

Leave a Reply.

POSCI 3335

Archives

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THE BEAUTYOF BLACKCREATION

ABOUT USJOURNALS​​SUBMISSIONS

THE BEAUTY

OF BLACK

CREATION

ABOUT US

JOURNALS

SUBMISSIONS