Fatness and Uplift: Not a Post about Push Up Bras
Although this post focuses on my being a fat woman of color, I’m going to begin by talking about my dad. My father’s way of thinking about life was deeply influenced by W.E.B. Du Bois and ideas of racial uplift and the talented tenth. His parents were part of the Great Migration and ended up in Indianapolis. His grandfather had fled GA with a heavily pregnant wife, because of an altercation with a white man in town. When my father’s parents bought their house, they were the first black family to own in the neighborhood (only semi-legally, since the deed to the house specified it could not be sold to negroes). My father’s parents emphasized education as the path to freedom. Their views were part of a general belief in racial uplift. By working hard, educating oneself, and generally setting a good example to other black people, we would help all of us get ahead.
Racial uplift wasn’t just about educated black elites giving other black people a helping hand, but also about showing white people that blacks were not a collection of negative stereotypes. The people at the forefront (the talented tenth) had to be smart, neat, clean, articulate, and above all they couldn’t get angry about racism. Instead, dressed in your best suit, you presented carefully constructed arguments against racism, knowing that any misstep would be taken as proof that blacks really were inferior.
Presenting oneself well, in the best suit, was an important aspect of being the stereotype breakers. In order to have a chance of being taken seriously, you had to look clean and put together from head to foot. Your hair had to be neat (and for women carefully straightened) because frizzy hair made you look like a “bush person.” The best way to describe the look is “controlled.” If negative stereotypes about black people were about them being savage, flighty, ruled by emotion and lacking reasoning, then the way to counter that was to look modern, tailored, and never have a hair out of place.
When I think about how this applies to me, I look to my father’s mother and his sisters all of whom are fat black women. My grandmother died when I was young, so my memories of her aren’t very clear. Looking at pictures of her, she is always carefully and neatly dressed with matching hand bags. Even when she had to ride the bus for over 2 hrs to get to the office she worked at, she always dressed carefully. No one could accuse of her being sloppy or lazy, and the same for her children. Her daughters, my aunts, dress more casually but with an emphasis on looking “pulled together.” Their clothes always fit nicely, their hair is neat, and nothing is scuffed or worn out. One of my aunts has cancer, and even though she is dealing with chemo, she is still putting together stylish outfits. When she was visiting my family she came down to breakfast wearing silk PJs with an abstract gold print, a cocoa colored silk wrap, and had wrapped a purple silk scarf attractively around her head.
Being concerned about looking “presentable” is an issue many people face, but it has particular relevance for fat black women. The image that we are fighting back against is the popular — and powerful — image of black women as mammies.
Mammies are fat and happy all the time. Mammies have dark, shiny/greasy skin, rolling white eyes, gleaming white teeth and a kerchief tied over unruly hair. Mammies are never attractive, and they are also de-sexualized. Mammies just love to engage in menial labor for white people. Mammies are humble and grateful for what they have, and don’t think of overreaching themselves to do better. Mammies don’t want to rock the boat. Mammies are the opposite of what that those seeking to better themselves want to be.
Because mammy figures are such a potent image, fat black women have to put in extra effort to not fit into the stereotype. This is why my aunts always paid careful attention to what they wore to work, erring towards professional rather than casual. Why they have steadfastly gone after promotions. Why they joined service organizations and to help their communities. This is why they would never dream of leaving the house with a kerchief wrapped around their hair (the silk scarf my aunt knotted around her head was too elegant to be called a kerchief, and besides she was with family). For myself, I’ll run to the corner store in PJs, but you’ll never see me with a red kerchief wrapped around my head.
I’m my father’s daughter, and he raised me with these ideas of uplift and doing better both for myself as an individual, but also as a member of the black community. It’s one of those things that was never explicitly discussed in my home, but pervaded everything. In the suburbs where I grew up, my father was the only black adult in the area. It wasn’t until eighth grade that there was another black student in my grade. Despite the lack of other physical black bodies, the presence of the stereotypes was always there. For better or worse, I mostly got “you’re not like those black people” or “I don’t think of you as black” which well. I was too young to really know how to respond to the racism embedded in both statements. I was succeeding in not being a stereotype, but instead of breaking down stereotypes about black people, my background ended up being erased.
It was in college that the importance of having an appropriately positive body really came home for me. I went to an ivy league school. Contrary to what people think about the school, the black community around me wasn’t just rich black elites: plenty of us were on financial aid with significant student loans. We were united in the belief that we could better ourselves through education.
The other thing that united the black students was not looking “ghetto” (and yes, there is internalized prejudice there that I don’t want to get into right now). No “extreme” hair, no big jewelry, baggy jeans, exposed curlers or loud attitudes. And definitely no jiggling flesh on display. Being fat was something you needed to control. Fatness was more often talked about in the context of the endemic problems of diabetes and high blood pressure in the black community, than in a positive affirming way.
While the black students didn’t look like they fell out of a J. Crew catalog, even at breakfast the black students tended to be more pulled together than their white compatriots so it was clear they weren’t the hired help. We disassociated ourselves from anything that would make white students forget we were there to labor with our minds not our bodies. Having a fat body that reminded people of a servant lacing up Scarlett O’Hara didn’t fit the cultivated image of the educated elite. We didn’t want the white students and faculty around us to forget that we were budding elites too.
The situation makes me think of Lena Horne’s father who, in the 1950s, said he hired maids for his daughter, and she wasn’t going to play one in the movies (with the NAACP’s backing, this was written into her film studio contract). This, of course, is in contrast to Hattie McDaniel who played almost nothing but maids and mammies during her film career. Lena Horne’s image as a glamorous, talented, successful black woman was also built on her slim body and pale skin. She was the opposite of a fat, dark mammy figure. Horne’s sleek tailored look, and beautifully controlled voice, made her someone the NAACP could stand behind.
It frustrates me when I hear white women in the fat acceptance community talk about how fat positive the black community is and express bitterness/jealously that “their community” isn’t, when they’ve never talked to a fat black woman about what her experience of fatness is like. The existence of the song “Baby Got Back” or the popularity of Queen Latifah are presented as proof of how fat accepting black people are. However, those examples are taken from black pop culture white people like, and are chosen without looking at the complexities of what fat black female bodies have meant both historically and in the present. “Baby Got Back” is not actually about fat women. It’s about women with “an itty bitty waist/and a round thing in your face” and who look like Flo-Jo, the Olympic athlete. On a related note, Sir Mix-A-Lot’s line “Cosmo ain’t got nothin’ to do with my selection/36-24-36? Ha, only if she’s 5′3″” is a reference to the 1970s funk song by the Commodores “Brick House.” In “Brick House,” the singer rhapsodizes about a big stacked woman; however her measurements are given as “36-24-36, what a winning hand!” These songs are about women with big boobs/butts and a defined waist, not necessarily someone with an overall large body. If I were going to pick a song that is fat positive, I’d go with Sista Big Bones by Anthony Hamilton. He selected Mo’Nique to be the star of the video.
My experience of being a fat black woman has not been a fat acceptance wonderland. I don’t feel like I have been shamed for my body, but I have felt pressure to have a more socially acceptable body size. I do worry about presenting myself well. Because of the history and attitudes in my community, I feel a responsibility to act in a manner that adheres to a strict code of conduct. Part of the code is hiding its existence from mainstream white culture. I struggle with those pressures when I don’t feel like pulling myself together, when I want to toss a scarf over my messy hair and grab some milk at the store, when I want to snarl at someone rather than do racism 101 for the umpteenth time. Being told by white women that I have it easy when it comes body image dismisses all of the complexities and difficulties of my identity and reduces them to “Cosmo says you’re fat. Well I ain’t down with that!” Making assumptions about someone’s identity and culture based on fragments of pop culture is dehumanizing. An important part of understanding the world beyond yourself, not just asking questions but also listening closely to people who have criticisms of your beliefs. Sometimes what you think is fact is based upon false premises. Black women do not live in a fat acceptance utopia and you’re making racist assumptions if you assume they do.
Notes
Link to more information about Mammy figures. Also, see Sapphire for related stereotype that Mo’Nique often embodies. This post was part of the Women of Color and Beauty blog carnival and International Blog Against Racism Week.
edited to add
Also, the way I primarily self identify is as someone who is mixed race (black and Swedish). I talk about being black in this essay, because that is an identity I also inhabit. I don’t “look mixed” or having passing privilege. When it comes to societal expectations and race, I’m black.
Awesome post. That is all.
Thanks for that post, it was very informative.
I think what sometimes gets lost or forgotten in discussions like this is that men’s preferences aren’t the be all end all in body image issues. I hear people bring up how “black men like big women” and - aside from your point about how liking a woman with a small waist & shapely butt is not the same as liking fat women - so what if they do? I mean, when a man comes into a feminist fat acceptance community saying things like: “It’s okay, guys don’t like skinny chicks anyway” or “I like a woman with some meat on her bones” they get told where to go because the fat acceptance struggle isn’t about male preferences. It’s about a society that devalues fat bodies. And black women have to live in that society too, as well as having to deal with the way their black bodies are devalued and the way the two intersect.
So very well said. Thank you for doing so. Having gone to a private, mostly white southern university, I completely understood “not looking ghetto”, the necessity of having to differentiate yourself from “the help”, and the sad (inevitable) sexual invisibility of being fat AND black in a predominantly white school: doubly unattractive to both black *and* white men. Nice enough to have as a friend (or tutor), but certainly not ‘fine’ (thin) enough to date. The fallacy of “black men like big women” should be exposed for the tripe it is. African American women not only live in a world that despises fat, but tells us we aren’t as beautiful as white women — no matter what our weight.
Thank you, Julia, this is a great post.
I do think people confuse pockets of acceptance with across the board liberation in many cases. Some fat white people note that thin white people often have less of a negative visceral response to an image of a fat black woman than they do to an image of a fat white woman, and that having a healthy body image at a larger size is not the total haystack-needle rarity that it is among white women, and conflate that with thinking “black people are all about size acceptance.” That’s a little like thinking gay-bashing isn’t something LGBTs ever have to worry about, since it’s so hip and groovy to be LGBT in big liberal cities.
Julia, thanks for posting this! I can’t wait to dig into this juicy stuff even more at NOLOSE.
@Meowser: “Some fat white people note that thin white people often have less of a negative visceral response to an image of a fat black woman”
It’s also important to note that this phenomenon happens because of racism, and not because fat black bodies are more “acceptable” to white folks. To many/most thin white folks, a fat black person’s body isn’t valued, and therefore that body is not worthy or attractive. Hence, seeing someone who had little worth in the first place become even less desirable because of fat is of no loss. A fat white person, however, is inherently valuable by virtue of their race because of racism, and therefore seen as a big loss and a failure when they don’t succeed at meeting the white standards of beauty invokes the visceral reaction.
Um, my last sentence should read:
A fat white person, however, is inherently valuable by virtue of their race because of racism, and therefore seen as a big loss and a failure when they don’t succeed at meeting the white standards of beauty. Hence, the visceral reaction.
Damn that trigger finger!
Thank you for this post. Though I feel like I knew about all the details you brought up, I had never connected them in such a meaningful way. I learned a great deal reading it.
This is an awesome post. Thank you.
Thank you so much for writing and sharing this post.
Thanks TariRocks!
@Becky
“Because the fat acceptance struggle isn’t about male preferences. It’s about a society that devalues fat bodies. And black women have to live in that society too, as well as having to deal with the way their black bodies are devalued and the way the two intersect.”
Yes! Excellent point. Another issue with the “but men like women with meat on their bones” is that it also devalues women with smaller bodies. Ditto for “real women have curves.” Real women comes in many varieties, and devaluing a group of them is not OK.
@ginagate
“and the sad (inevitable) sexual invisibility of being fat AND black in a predominantly white school”
Yup. My mom (who is white) commented once that she thought it sucked that growing up in a predominately white school system, meant I was sexually invisible and thus nothing resembling dating with fellow students. BUT that it also meant I wasn’t able to get myself into sexual situations when I was too immature to deal with them.
Thank you for this awesome post, and for this point in particular: Because of the history and attitudes in my community, I feel a responsibility to act in a manner that adheres to a strict code of conduct. Part of the code is hiding its existence from mainstream white culture. I had a lightbulb moment when I read that; it crystallized a lot of thoughts I’d had from reading various writing about beauty from POC but couldn’t articulate. I’m sorry I’m not articulating my response very well; it just clicked for me in an important way.
Thank you for this post. Lots to say but it all sounded stupid when I’ve written down, so I’ll just repeat, for now, thanks.
Great post. And as noted, ginagate hits another nail on the head: “and the sad (inevitable) sexual invisibility of being fat AND black in a predominantly white school”
a million and one thank yous, julia for this post!
i truly believe that the non-POC members of the FA community “just don’t get it”….
hey tarashuai….definitely “dig into this juicy stuff” at NOLOSE!
unfortunately, i won’t be there this year, but i’ll be cheering you on from a distance….and, here’s another log to throw onto the fire: the automatic masculinization of queer WOC…..
if i had the time and resources available, i’d be all over that subject!
@Meowser
Some fat white people note that thin white people often have less of a negative visceral response to an image of a fat black woman than they do to an image of a fat white woman, and that having a healthy body image at a larger size is not the total haystack-needle rarity that it is among white women, and conflate that with thinking “black people are all about size acceptance.
I think your comment needs a lot of unpacking. For instance, less negative visceral reactions to fat black women can be summed up in one word: mammies. I do think one can say that the bar of “acceptably fat” is set differently for many black people. That doesn’t equal fat acceptance. I also think ideas of what is considered beautiful is different among black people than white people. Again, that is not fat acceptance. I also think you’re not looking at the ways in which racism affects this situation.
What I’m getting from your comment mostly is that you still want to say most of the black community is fat accepting. Why do you think that was an appropriate comment to a 1800 word essay about why that was not my experience as a fat black woman?
@occhiblu
I’m glad I could help pull things together for you.
@sweetmachine
You should check out the WOC and beauty carnival coming soon to http://community.livejournal.com/yennenga/ I’m super excited for it.
@DiosaNegra1967
“here’s another log to throw onto the fire: the automatic masculinization of queer WOC…..” Oohhh yes. Makes my head hurt. If you ever get the energy to take that on, I woudl love to read your thoughts on it.
i once did about eight weeks’ consulting work in this place:
http://www.jointcenter.org/index.php/about_the_joint_center
…which was founded and run by a black man so conformed, as you describe, that he forbade the organization to study problems of obesity among black women. because that would be ugly.
i was appalled.
and that’s not the only unbelievable sexist policy he was responsible for.
Your post triggered a very strong memory for me - one that will be 30 years old this autumn. I’m not sure what it means, but if you think it is not relevant, please delete it. It is just by way of letting you know that your post did get in there pretty deep. That autumn I was a freshman at an Ivy League (actually a Seven Sisters) college. I had grown up (daughter of missionaries in Central America) listening to gospel music. So when a woman I had palled around with for a day or two suggested trying out for the Gospel Choir, I thought -”yeah.” We went and auditioned together - there were two women auditioning us, one at the piano, and the other giving instructions. I sang my heart out, and we both were offered a place on the choir, and I was delighted. But, it was when we left the room, that my “pal” turned to me and, with an eye roll at the room we had just left, said, “you know, I think we should go for the Chapel Choir.” And all of a sudden the penny dropped. I felt exposed, like Adam and Eve realising they were naked. Whereas a minute before I had been one of four women, who were all about music, in a room, I suddenly “looked and saw” that I was WHITE. And I understood that my “pal” was implying that the Gospel choir was too black for the likes of her and me. Together with that realisation came the guilt, the shame and the weight of centuries of wrong that I had no idea how to put right. So what did I do? I took the coward’s way out that day, and joined the much whiter Chapel Choir. I could never speak to “the pal,” again, but, also effectively chose to cut myself off from what could have been a source of learning, companionship, challenge, (and, since to this day I still love gospel music, from a source of joy and accomplishment). How does the memory feel? Well, it’s one of the ones that makes you squirm and try to activate the fast forward function, because it sure doesn’t paint you in a good light. But I’m trying to stay with it for awhile. And I should say, the two women who were conducting the auditions were, that day, exactly as you describe the “talented tenth” - nothing but courteous, elegant and welcoming.
Belated thanks and admiration for this post, cause I’ve been out of town. What’s fascinating to me is why it’s apparently so psychologically important for white women to interpret the drive to present oneself well as a freeing one, not a constricting one. When we see a fat black woman dressing and acting with confidence, for instance, why do we want that to mean that she loves herself effortlessly when we can’t, when in fact she’s working hard to avoid the mammy stereotype? It’s not just exoticizing black culture or engaging in generalization, though there’s that. Well, no, I guess it is a subset of exoticizing black culture… we feel like we want to preserve this imaginary cultural space where the particular oppression we experience doesn’t exist, which of course requires ignoring not only the reality of that particular oppression but all the other oppressions operating in that group. At least, that’s what I think I see happening.
Anyway, this post should be FA required reading.
Julia, you already know how much I like this post.
@fillyjonk
” why do we want that to mean that she loves herself effortlessly when we can’t, when in fact she’s working hard to avoid the mammy stereotype?”
Yes I am fascinated by this too. But it’s not just weight. apparently supposed to be sassy ladies attributed with all kinds of awesome powers of “toughness,” imperviousness to physical and emotional pain, “strength” and the like.
It’s tedious and a complete fantasy, but a very beloved fantasy.
@meowser
” Some fat white people note that thin white people often have less of a negative visceral response to an image of a fat black woman than they do to an image of a fat white woman”
Yes, it’s called the Mammy stereotype. Hardly something to be pleased with.
@deosanegra
“here’s another log to throw onto the fire: the automatic masculinization of queer WOC…..”
Or just WOC that (white) people want to assume are queer…