Gender (Counter)Stereotypes in Contemporary Black Culture: Representation and Resistance

Abstract

African Americans have historically been the target of stereotypical representations of gender identity, and degrading and contradictory images of black femininity and masculinity have been used for centuries to legitimize slavery and racial segregation in the context of a society shaped, at least theoretically, around the concepts of democracy and meritocracy. As a consequence, black sexuality has often been portrayed as the deviated counterpart of white normative sexuality, and black families have been deemed to be dysfunctional in that they often do not conform to the white patriarchal family model. Aim of the article is to discuss the work of contemporary African American visual artists who are representing black sexual politics that are alternative to the patriarchal system but constitute nevertheless viable and empowering ways of living one’s sexuality and gender identity. In a corpus of two cinematic texts and several visual arts projects I analyze how non-traditional representations of black masculinity and femininity are used to show both the groundlessness of stereotypes on black men and women and the flows of the patriarchal system.