V57.0661
Black Women in America
Spring 2008
Tu & Th 11:00 a.m. to 12:15 p.m.
Location: TBD
Office hrs: Tuesdays, 2:30-4:00 p.m.
(and by appointment)
Professor Michele Mitchell
Department of History
511 King Juan Carlos Center
michele.mitchell@nyu.edu
212.998.8611
As an exploration of African American women during the twentieth century and
into the twenty-first century, this course seeks to explore varieties of experience—
class, ethnicity, sexuality, and region—as it provides an historical framework for
analyzing overarching issues facing contemporary black women in the United
States. We are going to discuss black women’s relationships to both intraracial and
broader communities; we shall consider how the nexus of race, gender, and class
has influenced black women’s work, activism, political involvement, and creative
output. And, given the thrust of much historical and contemporary discourse, we
will examine what has been commonly referred to the “crisis in African American
gender relations.” A major goal of the course is to complicate “race” as well. At the
same time that we assess the rigid yet arbitrary practices of racial segregation
(“Jim Crow”), then, we shall also endeavor to discuss racial dynamics in the United
States beyond binary notions of black and white.
Whereas this course is structured as a history course, it takes an interdisciplinary
approach to black women’s lives: readings will draw from memoir, sociology,
women’s studies, film studies, legal theory, and, in some cases, the popular press.
Throughout the semester we shall discuss black feminism as well. Not only does
black feminist theory contain salient observations on the interplay between race,
gender, class, and sexuality in the United States, but the very issue of feminism has
also been a critical—and often divisive—issue for any number of African American
social movements.
Course Requirements:
Successful completion of the course is contingent upon appropriate preparation for
each class meeting. While I do understand that not everyone is a “talker,” I do need
to see evidence that you are actively engaged in some way, shape, or form. And,
since each session builds upon previous meetings, regular attendance is absolutely
critical. Similarly, careful reading of assignments is both expected and required
given that informed discussion is a vital part of this course. Written requirements
include completion of two reading comments (2-3 pages), one five-page essay, a
midterm examination, and a final examination.
Black Women in America—Spring 2008 (Mitchell)
2
The reading comments, participation, and attendance will count toward 20% of the
final grade. The essay shall count 25%; the midterm examination will count 25%
and the final examination 30%.
Required Texts:
Deborah Gray White, Too Heavy a Load: Black Women in Defense of Themselves,
1894-1994 (New York: W.W. Norton, 1999)
Gerda Lerner, ed., Black Women in White America: A Documentary History (New
York: Vintage, 1992)
Beverly Guy-Sheftall, ed., Words of Fire: An Anthology of African-American
Feminist Thought (New York: New Press, 1995)
Bettye Collier-Thomas and V.P. Franklin, eds., Sisters in the Struggle: African
American Women in the Civil Rights-Black Power Movement (New York: new
York University Press, 2001)
Johnnetta Betsch Cole and Beverly Guy-Sheftall, Gender Talk: The Struggle for
Women’s Equality in African American Communities (New York: One
World/Ballantine Books, 2003)
Laurie Kaye Abraham, Mama Might Be Better Off Dead: The Failure of Health
Care in Urban America (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1993)
Lorene Cary, Black Ice (New York: Vintage, 1991)
Veronica Chambers, Mama’s Girl (New York: Riverhead Books, 1996)
Please note that additional course readings will be available as handouts, on
Reserve, and/or in the course pack.
Assignment Calendar:
2/12
3/6
4/10
4/24
5/8
reading comment on “matriarchy” & pathology in The Negro Family
midterm examination
paper on Cary & Chambers (5-7 pp.)
reading comment (2-3 pp.) on poverty, health, and welfare
final examination
Course Calendar:
January 22—Introduction
Video: “Donahue” segment (1990) on Shahrazad Ali’s The Blackman’s
Guide to Understanding the Blackwoman
Cynthia M. Blair & Christine L. Minor, “We’re Still Waiting,” in
Confusion By Any Other Name: Essays Exploring the Negative
Impact of The Blackman’s Guide to Understanding the
Black Women in America—Spring 2008 (Mitchell)
3
Blackwoman (Chicago: Third World Press, 1990), ed. Haki
Madhubuti, pp. 10-11
Beverly Guy-Sheftall, “Exacerbating the Problem,” in Confusion By
Any Other Name, pp. 26-30
January 24—A “Woman Question and a Race Problem”
Beverly Guy-Sheftall, “Introduction: The Evolution of Feminist
Consciousness Among African American Women,” in GuySheftall, Words of Fire, pp. 1-22
Pauline Terrelonge, “Feminist Consciousness and Black Women,” in
Guy-Sheftall, Words of Fire, pp. 490-501
January 29—“Beyond the Veil”: The History of Black Women in America
White, Too Heavy a Load, chs. 1-2
Documents: Lerner, Black Women in White America
“Defend Black Women—and Die! The Lynching of Berry Washington”
(1919), pp. 188-90
Ida Wells Barnett, “A Red Record” (1895), pp. 196-205
prefatory comments, “The Myth of the ‘Bad’ Black Woman” pp. 163-64
Fannie Barrier Williams, “The Accusations are False” (1904), pp. 16466
[Anonymous], “A Colored Woman, However Respectable, is Lower than
the White Prostitute” (1902), pp. 166-69
Elise Johnson McDougald, “In Defense of Black Women” (1925), pp.
169-71
January 31—“Beyond the Veil”: The History of Black Women in America
White, Too Heavy a Load, chs. 3-4
Documents: Lerner, Black Women in White America
“Married Life of Georgia Peons” (1901), pp. 150-55
“We are Little More Than Slaves” (1912), pp. 155-58
“I Live a Treadmill Life” (1912), pp. 227-29
Emma L. Shields, “The Tobacco Workers” (1921), pp. 252-55
Elizabeth Ross Haynes, “Two Million Women as Work” (1922), pp. 25560
Mrs. Robert M. Patterson, “The Negro Woman in Politics” (1922), pp.
339-42
Black Women in America—Spring 2008 (Mitchell)
Amy Jacques Garvey, “Women as Leaders” (1925), pp. 576-79
February 5—“Beyond the Veil”: The History of Black Women in America
White, Too Heavy a Load, chs. 5-7
Documents: Lerner, Black Women in White America
“Discrimination on WPA” (1935-1941), pp. 398-405
“Organizing at Winston-Salem, North Carolina” (1947-1951), pp. 26574
Pauli Murray, “Jim Crow & Jane Crow” (1964), pp. 592-99
Patricia Robinson, “Poor Black Women” (1970), pp. 599-602
February 7—“A Tangle of Pathology?”: The Black Matriarchy Thesis
Kenneth Clark, “The Negro Matriarchy and the Distorted Masculine
Image,” in Dark Ghetto: Dilemmas of Social Power (New York:
Harper & Row, 1965), pp. 70-74
Daniel Patrick Moynihan et al., The Negro Family: The Case for
National Action, reprinted in The Moynihan Report and the
Politics of Controversy, ed. Lee Rainwater and William L.
Yancey (Cambridge: The M.I.T. Press, 1967), pp. 47-94
February 12—Other Takes on Matriarchy
Angela Davis, “Reflections on the Black Woman’s Role in the
Community of Slaves,” in Guy-Sheftall, Words of Fire, pp. 20018
Jean Carey Bond and Patricia Peery, “Is the Black Male Castrated?,”
in The Black Woman: An Anthology, ed. Toni Cade (New York:
New American Library, 1970), pp. 113-18
Fran Sanders, “Dear Black Man,” in The Black Woman, pp. 73-79
Reading Comment: What, according to Moynihan, is the “tangle of
pathology”? In what specific ways does Davis challenge Moynihan’s
argument? (2-3 pp., due in class, February 12)
February 14—Black Women in the Civil Rights Movement
Barbara Ransby, “Behind-the-Scenes View of a Behind-the-Scenes
Organizer: The Roots of Ella Baker’s Political Passions,” in
Collier-Thomas and Franklin, Sisters in the Struggle, pp. 42-57
4
Black Women in America—Spring 2008 (Mitchell)
5
Rosa Parks, “‘Tired of Giving In’: The Launching of the Montgomery
Bus Boycott,” in Collier-Thomas and Franklin, Sisters in the
Struggle, pp. 61-73
Dorothy I. Height, “‘We Wanted the Voice of a Woman to be Heard’:
Black Women and the 1963 March on Washington,” in CollierThomas and Franklin, Sisters in the Struggle, pp. 83-91
Documents: Lerner, Black Women in America
Daisy Bates, “The Ordeal of the Children” (1962), pp. 414-24
Ella Baker, “Developing Community Leadership” (1970), pp. 345-52
Anne Moody, “All I Could Think of Was How Sick Mississippi Whites
Were” (1968), pp. 425-31
February 19—Black Women, Black Power
Cynthia Griggs Fleming, “Black Women Activists and the Student
Nonviolent Coordinating Committee: The Case of Ruby Doris
Smith Robinson and the Student Nonviolent Coordinating
Committee,” in Collier-Thomas and Franklin, Sisters in the
Struggle, pp. 197-213
Farah Jasmine Griffin, “‘Ironies of the Saint: Malcolm X, Black
Women, and the Price of Protection,” in Collier-Thomas and
Franklin, Sisters in the Struggle, pp. 214-29
Tracye A. Matthews, “‘No One Ever Asks What a Man’s Role in the
Revolution Is’: Gender Politics and Leadership in the Black
Panther Party, 1966-71,” in Collier-Thomas and Franklin,
Sisters in the Struggle, pp. 230-56
Video: Black Panther Newsreel
February 21—Social Movements & Sexual Politics
Frances Beale, “Double Jeopardy: To Be Black and Female,” in GuySheftall, Words of Fire, pp. 146-55
Toni Cade, “The Pill: Genocide or Liberation,” in Cade, The Black
Woman, pp. 163-69
Mary Ann Weathers, “An Argument for Black Women’s Liberation as a
Revolutionary Force, in Guy-Sheftall, Words of Fire, pp. 158-61
The Combahee River Collective, “A Black Feminist Statement,” in
Guy-Sheftall, Words of Fire, pp. 232-40
Black Women in America—Spring 2008 (Mitchell)
6
February 26—“Black Macho” and the Politics of Fallout
Michele Wallace, “Anger in Isolation: A Black Feminist’s Search for
Sisterhood,” in Guy-Sheftall, Words of Fire, pp. 219-27
Linda La Rue, “The Black Movement and Women’s Liberation,” in
Guy-Sheftall, Words of Fire, pp. 163-73
Patricia Haden, Donna Middleton, and Patricia Robinson, “A
Historical and Critical Essay for Black Women,” in Guy-Sheftall,
Words of Fire, pp. 175-84
Video: Excerpts from Ntozake Shange’s For Colored Girls
February 28—Hill, Thomas, and Discourses on Black Sexuality
“Statement of Anita F. Hill to the Senate Judiciary Committee,” in
African American Women Speak Out on Anita Hill-Clarence
Thomas, ed. Geneva Smitherman (Detroit: Wayne State
University Press, 1995), pp. 19-24
“Statement of Clarence Thomas to the Senate Judiciary Committee,”
in African American Women Speak Out on Anita Hill-Clarence
Thomas, pp. 25-30
Gwendolyn Etter-Lewis, “High-Tech Lynching on Capitol Hill: Oral
Narratives from African American Women,” in AfricanAmerican Women Speak Out on Anita Hill-Clarence Thomas,
pp. 80-99
Video: segments of Clarence Thomas confirmation hearings
March 4— Reaction to Hill/Thomas
Cole and Guy-Sheftall, “Collisions: Black Liberation versus Women’s
Liberation,” in Gender Talk, pp. 71-101
Nell Irvin Painter, “Hill, Thomas, and the Use of Racial Stereotype,” in
Race-ing Justice, En-Gendering Power: Essays on Anita Hill,
Clarence Thomas, and the Construction of Social Reality, ed.
Toni Morrison (New York: Pantheon, 1992), pp. 200-14
[African American Women in Defense of Ourselves statement], “Black
Women and Clarence Thomas,” Eyewitness: A Living
Documentary of the African American Contribution to American
History, ed. William Loren Katz (New York: Simon & Schuster,
1995), p. 576
March 6— MIDTERM EXAMINATION
Black Women in America—Spring 2008 (Mitchell)
7
March 11— Sexuality
Darlene Clark Hine, “Rape and the Inner Lives of Black Women in the
Middle West: Preliminary Thoughts on the Culture of
Dissemblance,” in Guy-Sheftall, Words of Fire, pp. 380-87
Cheryl Clark, “Lesbianism: An Act of Resistance,” in Guy-Sheftall,
Words of Fire, pp. 242-51
June Jordan, “A New Politics of Sexuality,” in Guy-Sheftall, Words of
Fire, pp. 405-11
Video: Girls Like Us
March 13—More than Mammy, Jezebel, & Sapphire?: Images of Black Women in
Mainstream Popular Culture
Cole and Guy-Sheftall, “No Respect: Gender Politics and Hip-Hop,” in
Gender Talk, pp. 182-215
Video: sequence from Amos & Andy; sequence from Cleopatra Jones;
sequences from popular television sitcoms
March 18—No class: Spring Break
March 20—No class: Spring Break
March 25—Memoir as Commentary on Privilege: Class, Race, Education
Lorene Cary, Black Ice
March 27—Memoir as Commentary on Privilege
Cary, Black Ice
April 1—Memoir as Testament
Veronica Chambers, Mama’s Girl
April 3—Memoir as Testament
Chambers, Mama’s Girl
Paper (5-7 pages): Compare the ways in which Chambers and Cary
discuss education and their respective aspirations; do so by discussing
their analyses of class, race, and gender (due in class, April 10)
Black Women in America—Spring 2008 (Mitchell)
8
April 8—“To Be Young, Gifted, & Black”: Lorraine Hansberry
section on A Raisin in the Sun in Mark A. Reid, Redefining Black Film
(Berkeley: University of California Press, 1993), pp. 57-68
“Breaking Restrictive Covenants” (1948), in Lerner, Black Women in
White America, pp. 410-13
Film: A Raisin in the Sun (1961); with Ruby Dee, Sidney Poitier,
Claudia McNeil, Diana Sands, Louis Gossett, Ivan Dixon
April 10—“To Be Young, Gifted, & Black”: Lorraine Hansberry
Margaret B. Wilkerson, “Lorraine Hansberry,” in Guy-Sheftall, Words
of Fire, pp. 125-27
Lorraine Hansberry, “Simone de Beauvoir and The Second Sex: An
American Commentary,” in Guy-Sheftall, Words of Fire, pp. 12842
conclusion: A Raisin in the Sun
April 15—“Unbought & Unbossed”: Pioneering Women in National Politics
Linda Faye Williams, “The Civil Rights-Black Power Legacy: Black
Women Elected Officials at the Local, State, and National
Levels,” in Collier-Thomas and Franklin, Sisters in the Struggle,
pp. 306-32
Video: Chisholm ’72: Unbought and Unbossed
April 17—The Persistence of Segregation and Poverty
Laurie Kaye Abraham, Mama Might Be Better Off Dead: The Failure
of Health Care in Urban America (Chicago: University of
Chicago Press, 1993), pp. 1-24, 44-92
April 22— The Persistence of Segregation and Poverty
Abraham, Mama Might Be Better Off Dead, pp. 93-110, 146-78
Reading Commentary: How does Abraham assess the constraints
faced by poor women and their families? In what ways do issues
pertaining to age inform Abraham’s analysis? (2-3 pp., due in
class, April 24)
Black Women in America—Spring 2008 (Mitchell)
9
April 24—The Politics of Black Women’s Health
Shirley Chisholm, “Facing the Abortion Question,” in Guy-Sheftall,
Words of Fire, pp. 390-95
Evelynn Hammonds, “Missing Persons: African American Women,
AIDS, and the History of Disease,” in Guy-Sheftall, Words of
Fire, pp. 434-49
Cole and Guy-Sheftall, “Black, Lesbian, and Gay: Speaking the
Unspeakable,” in Gender Talk, pp. 154-81
Video: Skin Deep (entire) and segment from Public Housing
April 29—Taking on the Law: Critical Race Theory
Kimberle Williams Crenshaw, “Mapping the Margins:
Intersectionality, Identity Politics, and Violence Against Women
of Color,” in Critical Race Theory: The Key Writings That
Formed the Movement, ed. Kimberle Crenshaw, Neil Gotanda,
Gary Peller, & Kendall Thomas (New York: New Press, 1995),
pp. 357-83
Regina Austin, “Sapphire Bound!,” in Critical Race Theory, pp. 426-37
May 1—A Crisis in Gender Relations?
Cole and Guy-Sheftall, “Having Their Say: Conversations with Sisters
and Brothers,” in Gender Talk, pp. 31-70
Cole and Guy-Sheftall, “Race Secrets and the Body Politic,” in Gender
Talk, pp. 128-53
Video: Marlon Riggs, Black Is, Black Ain’t
FINAL EXAMINATION: Thursday, May 8, 10:00 a.m. to 11:50 a.m.