k iMBerly a lecia s ingletary Opposing Blackness: Black American Women and Questions of Citizenship in the U�S� Media In March 2010, Nightline , a TV news program on ABC, aired a story entitled “ Nightline Face-Off: Why Can’t a Successful Black Woman Find a Man? ” The program, billed as a serious look into the low marriage rates for black American women, featured statistics and interviews, and footage from a town hallstyle meeting in which two black women and two black men responded to questions from moderators and members of the audience, which featured both men and women - although women constituted the majority - ranging from young professionals to those more advanced in age� On stage, the discussion was moderated by both a man and a woman; the panelists sat in chairs on either side of the moderators on the bare stage� It was hard to tell which kind of woman was the target audience for the show, aside from black women in general� The women on stage and in the audience were of varying height, weight, and skin tone� Some had straight hair, others natural hair� Once the program got underway, however, viewers understood the problem� Black women, the male panelists opined, were too demanding and unrealistic about their own flaws as they pointed out the flaws of their men. They were not able to recognize love. They were inflexible. The black female panelists held their own, refusing to believe that lowering or discarding their expectations was the best way to find a partnership based on equality and respect� As the program continued, black women were explicitly told they were deficient; blame as explanation was a silent theme of the evening. Blame was even embedded within the show’s title question, “Why can’t a successful black woman find a man? ” The title identifies not only the type of woman (black) but also her relationship status (single, not married, and, by default, heterosexual) and socioeconomic class (“successful” is understood to mean that these women are at least middle class; a higher education level is also assumed)� On paper, the program’s title suggests, these women have it all: disposable income, education, career� Nightline does so much work portraying black women as accomplished in all other aspects of their lives that it neglects to include important contextual information about the impact race and class may have on their romantic lives� As Melissa Harris-Perry argues, Nightline failed to call on any sociologists, psychologists, historians or therapists who could have contributed context, statistics or analysis about the ‘marriage crisis’��� Instead, these delicate and compelling issues were addressed by comedians, actors, bloggers and journalists� It is hard to imagine Nightline assembling a panel of actors and comedians to discuss the economy, the war in Iraq, the Catholic Church or any other relevant issue� 200 k iMBerly a lecia s ingletary What Harris-Perry expresses is not an expectation that all the respondents should have been experts, but rather that not one expert was called upon to analyze what is a deeply unsatisfactory situation for some black women� The program did not encourage viewers to engage critical thought and reduced a complex issue - one involving not only birth rates, but also educational and professional opportunities, socioeconomics, and discrimination in the criminal justice system, among other non-mutually exclusive, simultaneously occurring factors - to an occurrence that could be sufficiently explained by laypersons in sixty minutes� Nightline is just one example of the mainstream U�S� media’s portrayal of black women as deficient, preventing them from being understood as “equal to” rather than a “distraction from” the concept of U�S� citizen� I contend that black women become visually disassociated from the ideal image of “American” female personhood by means of their portrayal in the U�S� media, which, I will show, makes it difficult for viewers to empathize and identify with black American women� Exploring visual framing of blackness and whiteness, I argue that images can negatively impact viewers’ perception of black female personhood; interrogating the concept of empathy, I argue that empathy plays a major role in the inclusion of American blacks in the concept of citizen� I conduct three case studies of the media portrayal of accomplished black women - Gabourey Sidibe, star of the Oscar-nominated film Precious (2009) , Shoshana Johnson, a black POW captured by Iraqi forces in 2003, and Michelle Obama, the first black First Lady in the history of the United States. I contend that these media portrayals indicate how black women are visually classified as “flawed citizens,” and subsequently explore the impact this flawed citizenship has on black women. In these three examples, as well as the Nightline program, it is apparent how the narratives of flawed citizenship apply to more scenarios and to more people than just those featured in this paper� For example, the Nightline program was in the format of a town hall meeting, yet the only things the participants had in common was their color and their momentary geographic location� The use of color as an all-encompassing group marker elided the potentially significant differences in linguistic or cultural heritage among participants, who were possibly American, African immigrants, or of Caribbean descent, to name but a few possible ethno-national backgrounds� Color is presented as the town in which all of the participants live, as if blackness were a place where one might settle, rather than a socially constructed designation that often settles what place one occupies� It is ironic that the idea of a town hall meeting connotes citizenship and belonging, yet not only was this a false “town,” the majority of its “citizens” were framed as flawed. Furthermore, the meeting’s classification as a “face-off” connotes battle and disagreement, rather than consensusbuilding� Thus, the show’s title already established that viewers tuned into a program which framed the diverse black population in the U�S� as an indistinguishable (brown) monolith, whose female portion is deficient enough to warrant a “town” meeting to address the “problem�” This problem - black Opposing Blackness 201 women - is explosive enough to be understood as a battle waged between town “inhabitants�” In nearly every respect, complexity and nuance is erased from the Nightline program� To fully understand the program’s reductionisms, however, one must critically engage issues surrounding black women’s visual representation in the mass media; race may be a social construct, but it is culturally positioned as a real entity and used to categorize and diminish certain groups of people� In this paper, I employ the concept of being raced, which indicates a fixity, an entrenchment of a category that has less to do with the process of becoming racial as indicated by the term racialized, and more to do with the inability to escape the categorical bindings that make race into a wholly unchallenged concept despite the ways it shape-shifts and demonstrates its innate flexibility, changing its visual definition in each country, region, and culture� In many instances, the popular media is the sole means by which we engage with or come to know another group and those initial interactions can have long-lasting effects on how we regard other groups� 1 For instance, the popularity of rap music, a cultural product of U�S� origins, in many parts of the world, has been well documented, despite language and cultural barriers that would seem to make U.S. rap music difficult to relate to outside the U.S. context. Yet rappers and their songs have influenced musical styles, fashion, and popular culture in countries far from U�S� shores and far from the communities and experiences which inspired those songs� 2 Films are another example of what I will call here “cross-cultural distance learning,” which has less to do with an official academic course than with gaining knowledge about another culture or people without the privilege of prolonged personto-person interaction� Predominantly, people have learned and continue to learn about the United States not through an extended stay in various regions of the country, but through films about American culture, which highlight linguistic idiosyncrasies, youth culture, and/ or the life experiences of certain racial or immigrant groups. Apart from films, there are a myriad of other means of seeing Others that almost any person can access at almost any time. We are, and have been for quite some time, firmly entrenched in a visual culture that informs much of our everyday lives� Although Cara Finnegan maintains that a solid definition of a visual culture has not surfaced just yet, referencing W�J�T� Mitchell she argues, “at base, the concept of visual culture recognizes that visuality frames our experience and acknowledges ‘that vision is a mode of cultural expression and human communication as funda- 1 See Wilson and Gutierrez (1995) for a discussion dealing specifically with the U.S. media and Georgiou (2010) for a discussion on international media� 2 Condry (2007) provides an ethnography of “yellow B-Boys” in Japan and how Japanese youths have used U�S� hip-hop culture to address political issues, express pride in Japanese culture and history and manipulate linguistic forms of Japanese to achieve the proper “flow” for a rap song. Covell Waegner (2004) discusses the popularity of music, literature, fashion trends, television shows and films produced by or significantly featuring American blacks in Germany, which she attributes to what she has deemed “cultural adulation�” 202 k iMBerly a lecia s ingletary mental and widespread as language�’” (33)� The integral role vision plays in the lives of millions of people calls for increased attention to the intricacies of how and what images communicate, on how many levels, and to how many different types of people� There are positive aspects of using media to learn about others as well as serious issues relating to the ways people of different racial groups are visually defined for a viewing public. Even as portrayals of American blacks become more varied, for instance, American whites have consistently been presented as the ideal American� “[T]he ideal white American self, which is constructed as good-looking, powerful, brave, cordial, kind, firm, and generous: a natural-born leader worthy of the loyalty of slaves or subordinates of another color” (Vera and Gordon 2), has remained a staple “character” in U�S� visual culture, a character against which others are compared� Images act as polysemous texts in that they can represent more than one meaning to more than one viewer� But it is not the case that a polysemous text can be read in any way by any audience members� Rather, “polysemy indicates a bounded multiplicity, a circumscribed opening of the text in which we acknowledge diverse but finite meanings” (Ceccarelli 398). In other words, readings of images must relate in some way to the existing conduit of knowledge, so as to remain tethered to the objects and people which are pictured� The readings of images in this paper are of a group which is both gendered and raced in a country that subscribes to the rhetoric of colorblindness, in which one’s color is purported to be a non-factor in the social, political, or economic opportunities one has - this rhetoric is at odds with the everyday experiences of people of color, however, and the desire to avoid discursively acknowledging color may have resulted in unchecked inequality (Bonilla-Silva 2003; Lewis, Chester and Formen 2000)� But that discussion goes beyond the scope of this paper� For now, in this paper’s discussion, I aim to illustrate that certain kinds of visual representations procure narratives about black female personhood which belie the claim that color is not a factor in contemporary U�S� society� Ariella Azoulay argues, “A solitary image cannot testify to what is revealed through it, but must be attached to another image, another piece of information […] An image is only ever another statement in a regime of statements” (191)� An image of a black American, then, would naturally be “read” in relation to the regime of statements already in existence� When those images have historically been tainted by prejudice, I argue, it becomes more difficult to see a contemporary image in isolation from all previous image statements� Viewers may consider themselves savvy media consumers, but when an image is presented as real, accurate, or a mirror-like representation, it seems all the more difficult to scrutinize the message of this image, especially if the image reinforces our current beliefs� 3 For instance, someone watching a movie or reality TV show that negatively frames black people may be able 3 Derrida (2002) provides a related discussion on the role of religion in the U�S� media; Lutz and Collins (1993) discuss how National Geographic magazine reinforces U�S� middle-class values and solidifies stereotypes about the Third World. Opposing Blackness 203 to dismiss what he or she sees as fictional because the images are located in the realm of entertainment� But if similar images appear in the news, those images have more credibility, if not the aura of reflecting the truth. Writing toward the end of the twentieth century, Clint Wilson and Felix Gutierrez argue, “As the twenty-first century approaches, there remains increasing fear among media critics that oversimplifying news coverage of people of color contributes to racial polarization, making them scapegoats for the nation’s problems and fueling White fears and hatred of other racial groups and lifestyles” (154)� Yanick St� Jean and Joe R� Feagin echoed this statement a few years later when they argued, “Many videotapes of movies and television programs portraying black Americans in a negative light are shown around the world every day of the week� In this way, people across the globe who have never met an African-American pick up the hoary racist stereotypes crafted in America” (119)� One might be tempted to argue that eleven years into the twenty-first century those fears have much less foundation, but as Feagin notes in a separate, more recent account, The white-controlled mass media play a central role in making the dominant racial framing widespread and making it appear apparently ‘normal�’ The subtle or overt goal of many whites with influence in the media, schools, and other whitecontrolled institutions is to reduce the resistance to persisting racial inequalities and discriminations by Americans of color (189). In effect, prejudices that have existed for centuries still are in play today, although they are perhaps better concealed these days� When Gabourey Sidibe began garnering extensive media coverage, for instance, attempts to hide her from view were attributed to factors such as an abundance of talented actresses, rather than an overabundance of melanin and body weight� Hidden in Plain Sight On its face, Sidibe’s rise to fame is the stuff of true Hollywood legend� A New York City college student, Sidibe had never before acted, but became an overnight sensation after being cast in the lead role for Precious (2009), a film about a sexually and emotionally abused obese illiterate teenager, the eponymous Precious, who uses her imagination to escape a world in which she is treated as anything but precious� The actress Sidibe’s life was a far cry from that of her character� Funny and vivacious, with a ribald sense of humor, Sidibe was the cool new Hollywood “it girl”, albeit with certain key exceptions: dark-skinned and obese, Sidibe looked far different than other top actresses her age - who were overwhelmingly thin and overwhelmingly white� The mainstream U�S� media seemed unable to embrace Sidibe as much as they had embraced Precious � In Vanity Fair ’s “Young Hollywood 2010” issue, nine up-and-coming actresses, all white, all thin, all pale, were featured on the cover; Sidibe was mentioned inside� As journalist Dodai Stewart notes about the traditional young Hollywood starlet, 204 k iMBerly a lecia s ingletary her ‘All-American’ good looks meant that she was a WASP (white Anglo-Saxon Protestant) or a fresh-faced farmgirl. Certainly not black, definitely not fat, and never both� Looking at the March 2010 [ Vanity Fair ] issue, has anything changed? Even [ Vanity Fair editor] Evgenia Peretz’s descriptions of the actresses - ‘Ivory-soap-girl features,’ ‘patrician looks’ ‘dewy, wide-eyed loveliness’ - reinforce the idea that a successful actress is a pretty, aristocratic-looking (read: white) actress� Peretz’s characterizations of the actresses adorning the magazine cover reference long-circulating narratives relating to a mid-nineteenth-century idea about “ideal” femininity� I maintain that the Vanity Fair cover reflected a visual narrative that followed closely to the nineteenth-century ideal of womanhood and that Sidibe’s inability to match that ideal - in both color and size - led to her exclusion from the cover� The concept of an ideal femininity, its central pillars being piety, purity, submissiveness, and domesticity, may seem outdated, especially as the idea came to fruition in antebellum America, but the “Cult of True Womanhood,” as outlined by Barbara Welter (21), could be understood as instrumental in distinguishing American white female personhood from American black female personhood� The descriptions and images of U�S� femininity presented black and white women as “diametrically opposed” (Jewell 37)� bell hooks argues, “[Nineteenth-century white women] were extolled as the ‘nobler half of humanity,’ whose duty was to elevate men’s sentiments and inspire their higher impulses” (hooks 1999: 31)� Black women, on the other hand, “were naturally seen as the embodiment of female evil and sexual lust� They were labeled jezebels and sexual temptresses and accused of leading white men away from spiritual purity into sin” (ibid� 33)� Coincidentally, these ideas came into vogue around the same time print culture began to be mass produced in the United States� 4 Sidibe may not be considered a sexual temptress by some, but her large size and her dark skin represent excess, thus positioning her at a far distance from traditional definitions of femininity such as dewy, patrician, or dainty� According to Nicole Fleetwood, “[B]lack female corporeality is rendered as an excessive over-determination and as overdetermined excess” (9)� Vanity Fair did not explicitly express that Sidibe was unworthy of inclusion in their “Young Hollywood” cover because of her color and size; it is entirely possible that there were so many young, talented actresses that editors made tough choices and the result just happened to be a bevy of thin, pale white women� It is the photo that appeared in December 2009, however, shortly after Precious hit movie theatres, that is most telling in terms of the way the magazine conceptualized Sidibe, which was in obvious opposition to the feminine ideal visually expressed on the “Young Hollywood” cover, which appeared just four months later� 4 Paul Starr argues that in the mid-nineteenth century, “growing numbers of women, young readers, working-class as well as middle-class adults, and new immigrants as well as some free blacks,” made up a growing reading public in the United States (114)� Coupled with the creation of roads, railroads and new transportation routes, a national market for print developed� Opposing Blackness 205 While the starlets on the 2010 “Young Hollywood” cover are sitting with legs curled underneath them, in soft pastels and lightweight, sheer fabrics, the sun glowing softly behind them, Sidibe’s photo in 2009 is shot in stark black and white, a knee-length black sheath pulled up to her mid-thigh, drawing attention to her girth� She lies on the ground while Precious director Lee Daniels sits on a low cushion next to her� Daniels, the thin, winsome director does not escape negative racial framing, either� The cushion on which he sits is so low that at first glance it seems as if he is sitting on his plus-sized screen siren� His legs are splayed open; as one reads the images from left to right, the eye is drawn to his pelvic area which is almost at the same level with Sidibe’s pelvic area� The image is infused with sex� Sidibe’s right arm is fully extended and her wrist hangs limply in the air; the eye is drawn to Sidibe’s oversized arm, which is even with the height of Daniels’ eyes� It is difficult not to compare her arm with those of other actresses. If true womanhood involves resisting the pleasures of the flesh by remaining pure, yet alluring, Sidibe looks as if she offers her body willingly to the camera, less allure than wholesale consumption� One of her bare legs curls behind Daniel’s pant legs and she is propped up on her elbow, her head resting on her left hand� She looks bored, as if she is tired of waiting for someone to take the bait, someone to call her name� In this photo, Daniels, who seems to sit patiently, waiting for someone to make the next move, is reminiscent of a pimp, allowing Sidibe to put her body on display, but blocking that one part of her, that small portion of her legs, so we know to whom she belongs� Sidibe, in the end, is framed as a jezebel, the bad black girl who “reinforces cultural stereotypes regarding the hypersexuality of the African-American female, who yearns for sexual encounters” (Jewell 46)� Thus, the entire image is infused with sex; the black man, historically a figure associated with sexual brutality, and the black woman, historically associated with sexual deviance, pose together daring the viewer to think of anything other than fornication� It seems that the magazine’s inability to make Sidibe match the editors’ definition of beautiful resulted in her hypersexualization - as far from purity, piety, submissiveness, and domesticity as one can get� Sidibe has often commented on journalists’ inability to see her as socially and physically desirable� “[The media] try to paint this picture that I was this downtrodden, ugly girl who was unpopular in school and in life, and then I got the role and now I’m awesome� But the truth is, that I’ve been awesome and then I got this role” Sidibe has said (Murphy)� There is nothing in her photo with Daniels, however, that highlights Sidibe’s personality� The raw intensity or heart-melting sensitivity Sidibe needed to play her character in Precious are missing� Even as a cover model, Sidibe is not celebrated for who she is, but subjected to attempts of making her more visually palatable to viewers� In the case of Elle magazine, visual palatability came in the form of lightening Sidibe’s skin� As one of four cover models of a crop of twenty-five accomplished women in their twenties to commemorate Elle ’s twenty-fifth anniversary, Sidibe was by far the most unnatural-looking� Unlike the other three, white actresses on the cover who were shot from the knees up, Sidibe was shown from the chest 206 k iMBerly a lecia s ingletary up, indicating that editors sought to hide Sidibe’s whole body from sight� While the other cover models had hair that seemed to move effortlessly, Sidibe’s weave looked fake, which is the exact opposite effect a hair weave should have� Perhaps most jarring, however, was the fact that Sidibe’s skin was significantly lighter in the photo than in real life. Although Elle editors insisted Sidibe’s photo had no more retouching than any other cover model’s - and it is entirely possible that the studio lights used to photograph Sidibe were unusually bright - the fact that the magazine’s editors did not think to color-correct her skin color so it would be more reflective of its natural tone, indicates that they considered lighter skin as better-looking� “The fashion industry clearly gets flummoxed by any women whose body and skin color are outside American society’s narrow definition of beauty,” writes Julianne Hing, referencing Sidibe’s Elle cover . When Sidibe appeared on the cover of Ebony, a magazine catering primarily to American blacks, in their March 2010 issue (the same month Vanity Fair chose ten other up-and-coming actresses for its cover), Sidibe’s entire body was pictured, her clothing flattering, her hair well styled, and her face well lit; Ebony, like Elle , also uses studio lights� Sidibe’s cover treatment in Elle is reminiscent of the controversy surrounding Beyonce Knowles’ advertisement for L’Oreal’s “Feria” hair care line in 2008, in which the singer’s skin appeared so light she looked almost unrecognizable� Sidibe’s physical traits were not expressly mentioned as reasons for her questionable coverage� But those images still connote stereotypes and assumptions that degrade black women� What Sidibe’s coverage in the mainstream media alerts viewers to extends far beyond Sidibe herself, and into a larger discussion about the ways in which images can reinforce the perception that blackness, and even more so: overweight blackness, is undesirable to the point that excluding it or hiding it are justified actions (cf. St. Jean and Feagin 73-98). Saving Shoshana Like Sidibe, Shoshana Johnson found herself hidden from the public eye, but in contrast, Johnson’s problem was not related to her physical attractiveness; rather, it was the media’s ignoring of her story� When Johnson was captured, tortured and held captive for 22 days by Iraqi forces in 2003, she became the first black female Prisoner of War (POW) in American history. Americans were riveted as they watched Johnson and other POWs in video feeds sent to the United States from their captors� Upon Johnson’s homecoming, she fell largely out of public view as the media overwhelmingly directed their attention at Jessica Lynch, another member of Johnson’s unit, who was also captured but spent half the time in captivity as Johnson� Lynch’s story was headline news for weeks; she received a major book deal, a made-for-TV movie, and instant celebrity status� It was speculated that Lynch, who later said that the government embellished the story of her capture, was being used as the face of an unpopular war in order to garner public support� “[W]ith her good Opposing Blackness 207 looks and compelling story, Lynch looked like a figure from Central Casting at a time when the Pentagon desperately needed one,” wrote William Douglas� Many Americans felt that Johnson’s lack of media attention was attributable to her color, and even Johnson, who was reluctant to cry racism, said she thought the physical differences between her and Lynch made a difference� Stocky and dark-skinned with her hair in braids at the time of her capture, Johnson noted in an interview: “If I’d been a petite cutesy thing, [the coverage] would’ve been different” (ibid�)� I argue that it was Johnson’s status as a black single mother which impacted audiences’ ability to empathize with her, and as a result impacted the amount of media attention she received� Unlike Sidibe, Johnson’s job did not require time spent on a press junket or posing for photo shoots; her job involved much more personal sacrifice than a few hours out of the day to speak to reporters� But it is the absence of images of Johnson that is important in this regard, especially given her service to the nation and in comparison to Lynch’s ubiquitous photos� I contend that the difference between Lynch and Johnson is, again, related to those pillars of womanhood� It is harder to ascribe purity, piety, domesticity, and submissiveness to a single mother who works outside of the home� Add to this that as a black woman, Johnson is already positioned as unable to attain those characteristics� Lynch, on the other hand, had the blonde hair and blue eyes, pale skin, and patrician features that reflected the image of femininity in place since the nineteenth century� Of course it is possible that Lynch’s story would naturally be the more compelling one� Ten years Johnson’s junior, Lynch had a lifetime of adventures ahead of her; she joined the army at eighteen, coming from a West Virginian family that could not pay for her elder brother’s college education, much less for hers� Her physical stature was often noted, as “she was pale, skinny, with thin, straight legs that look as if they would be easy to snap” (Gibbs), which only reinforced the idea that Lynch was a girl who was so determined to protect her country that she gave her all, even if it exceeded her physical capabilities� In contrast, Johnson was a Panama-born, second-generation Army veteran� In contrast to Lynch’s, Johnson’s story is that of an immigrant who came to the U�S�, created a life there, and was willing to risk her life for her adopted country� Both stories are compelling, both fit into traditional American narratives about working one’s way to prosperity despite humble or foreign beginnings� And yet, Johnson’s story was largely absent from the news until 2010, when she published a memoir, I’m Still Standing: From Captive U.S. Soldier to Free Citizen , which she promoted on a press tour� Note that the title of her memoir stresses her position as an American soldier and later as a free citizen , as if to reinforce that she was fighting for, and was a lawful citizen of the United States when captured. That such clarification is even necessary highlights the potential that Johnson could be mistaken as non-American� In one telling incident, when a guest on the former evening news talk show Larry King Live , Johnson questioned JAG Officer Tom Kenniff’s knowledge of the effects of post-traumatic stress disorder on ranking officers in the military� Kenniff responded by telling her he spent a year in Iraq and 208 k iMBerly a lecia s ingletary asked sarcastically if she had ever been to Iraq� Johnson responded, “I was a POW� I got shot�” 5 That even a fellow former soldier could forget Johnson so quickly perhaps indicates that viewers could not muster the same amount of empathy for her as for Lynch� As Janine Jones argues, motivation can be a significant factor in whether one chooses to empathize with another, i.e. to “attempt to comprehend either positive or negative [mental] states of another” (68). What motivates one to empathize can be related to a range of factors� Johnson’s status as a black single mother may have prevented some from empathizing with Johnson� As Patricia Hill Collins notes: Women are differentially evaluated based on their perceived value to give birth to the right kind of children, pass on appropriate American family values, and become worthy symbols of the nation� African-American women encounter differential treatment based on our perceived value as giving birth to the wrong race of children, as unable to socialize them properly because we [African-American women] bring them into bad family structures, and as unworthy symbols for U�S� patriotism (230)� The stigma attached to black motherhood underscores the differential treatment in the media� Whereas Johnson might have been a mother who is willing to sacrifice her life for her country, the stigma of being a bad black mother renders her a woman who abandons her child for work� “The independent role black women were obliged to play both in the labor force and in the family was automatically perceived as unladylike” in U.S. society (ibid. 78). White women are perceived differently in this regard� As hooks notes, “when white women enter the workforce today it is seen as a positive step, a move toward gaining independence” (hooks 1999: 83). This same narrative plays out in the differing media coverage Johnson and Lynch received, which lauded Lynch’s decision to join the Army, “because she wanted to see the world” (Gibbs)� While Lynch’s youth certainly could have influenced her coverage, it cannot be assumed that Lynch’s youth played a more significant role than Johnson’s being a black single mother� In 2010, Alexis Hutchinson refused deployment for Afghanistan because she could not find a suitable child-care option, which led her to face court martial� Although Hutchinson ultimately avoided a court martial, the damage to her image was already done� Hutchinson’s portrayal in the media not only emphasized her single motherhood, but also her mother’s single motherhood� Even the headline “Single Woman Avoids Court Martial” emphasizes Hutchinson’s lack of a husband� Wrote journalist James Dao in The New York Times , “Specialist Alexis Hutchinson, a 21-year-old Army cook and single parent, was days from deploying to Afghanistan last fall when her mother backed out of an agreement to take care of her 10-month-old son for the duration of her one-year tour.” Dao tells readers in the article’s first sentence that Hutchinson is young, is a single mother, and waited until the last minute to 5 A full transcript of the conversation can be found on the Crooks and Liars website, http: / / videocafe�crooksandliars�com/ heather/ shoshanna-johnson-calls-out-jag-tomkennif� Opposing Blackness 209 inform her employers that she could not fulfill her contract. Not only do readers understand Hutchinson as a bad mother, we are meant to understand her mother as the source of Hutchinson’s bad mothering� Hutchinson falls victim to media framing which diminishes her attempted public service and desire to be a strong parental figure, and highlights her deficiency at both. Harris- Perry argues, “As a volunteer soldier in wartime, she ought to embody the very core of American citizen sacrifice. Instead she is a bad black mother. Hutchinson has failed to marry a responsible, present, bread-winning man who would free her of the need to labor outside of the home� [H]er parenting is presented as disruptive to her duties as a citizen” (Harris-Perry 2009)� Furthermore, Hutchinson’s mother is presented as shirking her responsibilities to her grandson, forcing Hutchinson to shirk her responsibility to the government. Deficiency, it is implied, is hereditary. While other single mothers, soldiers who are parents, and a range of other people might have been able to identify and empathize with Hutchinson, the story is framed so as to suggest that her problem is specific to black culture and that black culture is to blame for bringing about this situation� Hence, empathy from white audience members is not to be expected� According to Jones, “[E]mpathy is a mapping of one’s experience onto the situations, goals, and emotions of another� [The Goodwill white] may not choose to look for a mappable experience if she is not motivated to do so� And without seeing you, seeing what you feel, she may make a judgment about you” (78). As was the case with Sidibe, the coverage Johnson and Hutchinson received was affected by stereotypes and assumptions about their color and gender� As Collins argues, “Even when the initial conditions that foster controlling images disappear, such images prove remarkably tenacious because they not only subjugate U�S� black women, but are key in maintaining intersecting oppressions� African American women’s status as outsiders become the point from which other groups define their normality” (70). If ideas about femininity are based on a model that over values whiteness, a woman’s blackness prevents her from ever fully matching that model� Images of black women, then, reflect far more than just the individual in the picture’s frame. Managing Michelle The First Lady, regardless of her color, is conceptualized as a reflection of the American woman� She is a perfect living model of the pillars of womanhood. But until Barack Obama assumed the presidency in 2008, no black woman had ever held the position, leaving the implicit conflation of “ladylike” with “white” intact. In two prominent examples - the July 21, 2008. New Yorker magazine cover and Obama’s official photo taken in the Blue Room of the White House - created just before and just after she became FLOTUS (First Lady of the United States), Obama’s color, not her official position is highlighted. In the first example, a caricature of Barack and Michelle Obama stresses their “foreignness” as a would-be First Family� Michelle’s portrayal is 210 k iMBerly a lecia s ingletary grossly exaggerated, but reinforces long-standing stereotypes about the “Angry Black Woman; ” the image also reinforces a cultural stereotype that natural hairstyles on black women are improper and unprofessional, allowing for the (false) ideal of womanhood to remain intact� In the second example, Obama’s color is center stage, but the image subtly suggests that ideals are goals, not necessarily realities� When Obama became First Lady, there was unchecked excitement at Obama’s youth and her sartorial choices, which led to her being somewhat forcefully compared to Jackie Kennedy; there was also enthusiasm bordering on hysteria surrounding Obama’s communicative relationship with her husband and outspokenness in general� However, most media coverage of Obama contained an uneasiness about her person, a titter of both excitement and fear� Some critics saw Obama’s pride in her blackness as a detriment and questioned her ability to adequately represent Americans� 6 Even the National First Ladies Library was concerned about Obama’s ability to reconcile her blackness with her official position: Even though she will be the first African-American First Lady, Michelle Obama will represent all of the people of the United States …While certainly there may be particular organizations she will work with or support that will seek to aid African-Americans, it is certain she will not do so exclusively (National First Ladies Library)� The Library attempts to assuage fears that Obama is not a Black Nationalist by referencing other First Ladies who were different because of their religion or a disability: “The press and public became accustomed to the novelty of these rare elements of their personal lives, and it eventually wore off” (ibid�)� The Library’s rhetoric links color, a non-mutable physical trait, to a “rare” characteristic others learn to tolerate like a deformity or personality flaw. The Library does not make the same color-based disclaimers for other First Ladies� For example, website visitors are not told that white First Ladies managed to represent all Americans even though they were white� The focus on Obama’s blackness as being the major barrier to her ability to represent (white) Americans illustrates that blackness is conceptualized as opposed to the ideal of womanhood� Obama, an educated, dedicated mother and savvy businesswoman who supported her husband’s dreams even as she followed her own, meets a couple of the criteria central to the ideal of womanhood� The only difference is that she meets these criteria as a black woman� The Library assumes that people are necessarily worried that Obama will purposefully not represent anyone other than black Americans, and by playing into that assumption transforms it into a verified certainty. Obama illustrates Azoulay’s concept of a flawed citizen, defined as one who 6 In an article on the website Slate�com, for instance, Christopher Hitchens criticized Obama’s writing ability and intelligence as evidenced by her senior college thesis, and claimed she was influenced by the Black Separatist movement. Fox News once referred to her as “Obama’s Baby Mama,” a derogatory term often used in reference to a black woman who had a baby out of wedlock� Opposing Blackness 211 belongs to an injured population subject “to a differential system of citizenship that discriminates … on the basis of differences in religion, gender, race, class, ethnicity, or language� [F]lawed citizens are more exposed than ‘proper’ citizens to hazards, and risks and their vulnerability is systemic” (36)� Azoulay examines flawed citizenship with “respect to the practices and situations that mark its past exclusion from and contemporary unequal access to the body politic and its inferior share in the advantages and protection of citizenship” (37)� As a well-off, educated woman who now has her own security detail, Obama does not easily lend herself to being understood as a vulnerable individual. But her color has rendered her a flawed citizen who is unable to meet the requirement that she act as a stand-in for all (white) American women, making her vulnerable to criticisms which postulate that her color will keep her from doing justice to her duties as First Lady� As was the case with Sidibe and Johnson, however, critics never explicitly mention Obama’s color as a barrier to acceptance� The New Yorker magazine cover depicting the Obamas in the White House is now no less incendiary than when it first hit the newsstands in July 2008. The satirical cartoon “The Politics of Fear,” drawn by Barry Blitt, depicts President and First Lady Barack and Michelle Obama standing in the Oval Office of the White House looking at each other, giving one another a fist bump, a hand gesture in which two people bump knuckles. As they stand in the center of the room, an American flag is burning in the fireplace behind them; the wall is adorned with a painting of what appears to be Osama bin Laden� President Obama is wearing a turban, sandals, and wide pants and a long shirt - traditional clothing for men in some parts of the Muslim world� He is looking slyly at the camera, as if to say “You never even knew�” The cartoon references accusations that Barack Obama is secretly a Muslim who hates America� Even more jarring, however, is the depiction of Michelle Obama. Dressed in camouflage pants, combat boots, with an AK-47 gun strapped over her shoulder, Michelle stares intently at Barack, her head tilted slightly toward his� The image references critics’ claims that Michelle is angry and ungrateful for her educational and professional opportunities, claims that reached a fever pitch in February 2008 when she spoke at a political event in Wisconsin, and said: “For the first time in my adult life, I am really proud of my country because it feels like hope is finally making a comeback” (cf� Thomas)� Although she later tried to explain that she had referenced her pride at seeing so many people join her husband’s campaign to bring about change, the damage was done� Critics postulated that she - a descendant of slaves and high-powered executive - should be the proudest of all Americans, because her ancestors’ (forced) humble beginnings did not exclude her from achieving a good education and a high-profile job. The New Yorker cover capitalized on those criticisms but added their own twist� The caricature features a gigantic afro in place of Obama’s signature styled and straightened hair� At no point during Barack Obama’s campaign, when most Americans became familiar with Michelle Obama, had she worn anything resembling an afro� In Blitt’s portrait, Obama’s hair acts as an excla- 212 k iMBerly a lecia s ingletary mation point to drive home the idea that Obama, like her husband, is living a secret life� He may be a secret Muslim, but she is a secret militant - just like her critics said� Obama’s hair, as drawn on the New Yorker cover, dredged up old stereotypes about black women being angry and assumptions about the inappropriateness of black hair. The afro does not exist as a neutral signifier in U�S� cultural history� “Afro hairstyles of the 1960s and 1970a were easily decipherable statements of black pride, bold challenges to a white aesthetic that had long made curly and kinky hair a symbol of inferiority,” write Shane White and Graham White (53)� The black hair care industry is a multi-billion dollar industry in the United States, spearheaded primarily by women who straighten, cut, color, weave, and/ or braid their hair into various styles for everyday life and work� For some, it is just a fashion statement, for others, it speaks to a long, painful history in the United States which cast having curly or kinky hair as unclean, unprofessional, or militant� Robin D�G� Kelley notes that in addition to the afro’s political dimension, it was adopted by many women because it was a chic hairstyle (334)� Even when black women began wearing the afro as a fashion statement more so than a political statement, their natural hair retained its political undertones in the larger U�S� society� 7 Women who wore their hair in a natural style were at risk of losing their jobs, and certain hairstyles were banned from workplaces - tactics that punished black women for wanting to wear styles that would compliment and show pride in the specificities of black hair. “While the close-cut ‘fro did not carry as much explicit political baggage as the big ‘fro, conditions rendered the style oppositional� It not only challenged gender conventions in a world where long hair was a marker of femininity, but it was interpreted as a sign of militancy” Kelley argues (349)� It has been through their hair, inter alia, that black women have been made vulnerable, and in the example presently discussed, Obama’s afro renders her the vulnerable, flawed citizen Azoulay describes� What the New Yorker cover does in its attempt to satirize critics’ claims is denigrate black women’s hair and, by extension, black women; by depicting her in this fashion in the crucial months before the 2008 presidential elections, the New Yorker cover postulated that Obama would be an inappropriate First Lady who does not conform to the ideal of womanhood and is thus unfit to represent all (white) American women. What the New Yorker ’s caricature engenders is a comment on belonging and national identity� As an American black women with all the trappings of success, the unmasking that takes place in the cartoon shows viewers that she does not really belong in the White House or as a representative of the United States� Even though the image is meant to be a satire, the stereotypes and assumptions it references are far from satirical as they still are issues which vex black women as they live and work in the United States today� The problem goes beyond Obama’s social standing and bleeds into a larger issue about black women and national belonging� Referencing T�H� Marshall, Nira Yuval- Davis writes that in thinking of citizenship as a “status bestowed upon those 7 For a detailed discussion on the politics of black hair, see Mercer (1990)� Opposing Blackness 213 who are members of a community,” we are linking citizenship to community membership, not to the nation-state� This allows us, she argues, “to discuss citizenship as a multi-tier construct, which applies to people’s membership in a variety of collectivities - local, ethnic, national and transnational” (5)� This understanding, Yuval-Davis stresses, “enables us to raise the question of the relationship between ‘the community’ and the state and how this affects people’s citizenship” (ibid�)� It is not only the top-down relationship between state and community but also the horizontal relationship between communities that is of importance� Here, Obama represents a horizontal relationship between races, and her portrayal makes bare the continuing distrust some non-black Americans have of American blacks� Obama’s presence discloses how fragile the ideas of womanhood are: either the pillars of womanhood are a false ideal, or the present First Lady and those before her cannot and could not actually represent ideal womanhood� For those ideals and the idea that the First Lady is the best representative of those ideals to remain intact, Obama must be presented as diametrically opposed to both� Her negative media coverage that gained momentum during her husband’s presidential campaign illustrates the conflict some Americans had in broadening the scope of who could be considered “representative” of the American public� Lois Romano references the “awkward early days of the 2008 campaign when opponents portrayed her as unpatriotic, snobby, and a caricature of an angry black woman … Conservative commentators, who carefully steered clear of racial references when it came to Barack, had no such reservations about stirring up racial stereotypes about his wife�” Obama was able to present a challenge to these criticisms, however, soon after she assumed the office of the First Lady and posed for her official White House photo. Michelle Obama is standing in the Blue Room of the White House, wearing a simple black sheath by the American designer Michael Kors, with a double strand of pearls around her neck and pearl studs in her ears� Her left hand is balanced on a table with a vase brimming over with flowers. The photo is elegant and simple, showing off Obama’s fashion sense as well as her much ballyhooed muscular arms� On the wall behind her there is a portrait of Thomas Jefferson� Jefferson, a Founding Father, is revered in U�S� history for being influential in setting the standards and ideals that continue to shape the trajectory of the United States� He also was a notorious slave owner who carried on a relationship with his slave Sally Hemmings for several years� Obama posed for her photo in the Blue Room, a room traditionally used to welcome guests such as foreign dignitaries, and in doing so she claimed ownership of the room and of her explicit right to be the face of all American people� She is standing in front of a painting of arguably the most prominent intellectual and slave owner in U�S� history, implicitly suggesting that ideals are as socially constructed as race, and rather than creating rigid qualifications of ideal personhood, those ideals should remain flexible, lest they prove to be so unrealistic that no woman - or man - can match them� 214 k iMBerly a lecia s ingletary Conclusion Black women’s negative portrayal in the U�S� media has resulted in their denigration - as beauty ideals, as patriotic citizens, as able representatives of the American people� There is an erroneous belief that hierarchies of race and gender no longer negatively impact one’s social standing� When one group is routinely presented as the polar opposite of an ideal American, over time, one is hard-pressed to consider that group as equally American� How could one assume that that flawed group, a group that cannot or will not fit in, is as deserving of the social, professional, and educational benefits of citizen-group membership as someone else who works hard to contribute to the country? This logic, however, does not acknowledge that inter-racial group interactions begin from an uneven playing field. To level that playing field, all those involved must acknowledge the ways they are hindered - or helped - by their particular racial, ethnic, and/ or gendered subjectivities� To really change the game, one must identify and eradicate existing, entrenched racial hierarchies, but in many ways, identifying may be easier than eradicating�Images of black women have by and large represented black women as flawed citizens who are justifiably ignored, or even ridiculed and ostracized. Although the examples chosen in this paper are of women who have, in some respects, become household names either for their talent, their bravery, or their title, this does not diminish the impact negative images have on the average black woman� For if an Academy Award-nominated woman can routinely be subjected to ridicule because she is too dark and/ or too fat, or a POW can fade into oblivion upon her return home, or the First Lady is attacked for not being grateful enough, this indicates that no black woman is safe from being vilified in the public, and that we must be vigilant as to how the representation of black female personhood in the mainstream media can taint the way all Americans regard black women� As Mary C� Curtis notes, “[I]n America, there’s seldom a cost for disrespecting black women�” Perhaps it is time to issue the bill� Opposing Blackness 215 Works Cited Azoulay, Ariella� The Civil Contract of Photography . New York: Zone Books, 2008. 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