G104 / A199–Themes in Gender Studies

Gndr Section #27709/AAAD-A Section # 29810

Representing Black Women in Popular Culture

T/TH 11:15-12:30 * BH 247 * 3 credits

Instructor: Cierra Olivia Thomas-Williams

e-mail: cthomasw@indiana.edu
Office Hours: T 1:30-4, TH 1:30-2:30 or by app.
Office Location: Memorial Hall M214

This interdisciplinary course uses black feminist theories to study representations of black
women in popular media outlets. It will provide students with a survey of historic and
contemporary depictions of “blackness” and “womanhood” in American visual culture. We will
examine race, class, gender, and sexuality in popular representations of black women and will
consider their mutually constitutive relationship to capital and nation building. Considering the
socially constructed nature of identity formation and belonging, we will consider the effects of
capitalism, advertising, and modernization projects (including slavery) on black women.
Demonstrating the critical value of black women to notions of progress, this course will use print
media as its “point of access” into modernity and will explore other popular media outlets, such
as music, television, and movies. Using colonization and imperialism as our starting point, we
will critically examine not only hegemonic depictions of black women, but will also study the
ways in which black women themselves have historically participated in this globalizing process:
the Diaspora of black womanhood.

Learning Outcomes:
In Representing Black Women in Popular Culture we will explore a wide variety of sociocultural
topics related to capitalism in our (post)modern world. These topics include: representation in
mass media, including consumerism, advertising, globalization, and the commodification of the
black body; black feminist theory; feminist theories of transnational movement and global
problems; racial uplift and black women as agents in their own representation.
• Students will be challenged to stretch and question their assumptions about race, gender,
sexuality, and popular culture to develop critical reading skills.
• Students will begin to understand the importance and impact of popular culture on the
Diaspora of black womanhood.
• Students will strengthen their oral and writing skills and demonstrate their ability to use
critical analysis through successfully completing a variety of written assignments and in
class presentations.
• Students will be introduced to a range of library sources available to Indiana University
students.
• Students will present research projects in a mini-conference format during the final week.

Assigned readings – All readings listed are to be read prior to class on the day listed in the
syllabus. The readings are largely comprised of articles and chapters from various books, which
are located in oncourse/resources/readings. It is your responsibility to print and read these

1|Fall Syllabus for G104/ A199

articles. As a large portion of your grade will come from participation in class discussions, you
will need your reading materials to refer to in class.

Absences – “Stuff happens,” so be sure to let me know when it does BEFORE CLASS if it will
affect any of your in-class assignments. More than three absences will result in a letter grade
reduction as a large portion of the class is graded on participation (including presentations, etc.)

Graded Work – In order to pass the class, you must complete all of the assignments. All grades
will count and no extensions or incompletes will be granted. Your grade on individual
assignments will be calculated by adding up the points and then dividing by the total possible
points to give you your percentage, while your course grade is weighted (see below).

Plagiarism - Remember to give credit where credit is due. Students who present another
writer’s words as their own or who neglect to cite proper bibliographical information when
referring to material published on-line, in reference books, or in a journal or book of any kind are
subject to disciplinary procedures as outlined by Indiana University’s Code of Student Rights,
Responsibilities and Conduct. If you have any questions regarding this policy, please consult
said publication at http://campuslife.indiana.edu/Code/.

I will be using oncourse to keep electronic files of your work this semester to ensure the
academic integrity of the essays written in this course. As such, you will be required to turn in
all formal writing via oncourse and in class (hard copy) on the day it is due.

Assignment and Requirements:

1. Attendance and Class Participation (15%) –Pursuant to departmental regulations, more
than three absences will result in the reduction of one letter grade due to the
discussion format of the course. To be sure we understand the assigned reading
materials and how they might apply in our lives, we will discuss them at length
during class; therefore, be sure to bring your readings and reading notes to class
each session. You will need to be ready to discuss key concepts, arguments, terms,
any critiques the author had of previous works, plus any criticisms you may have for
the writer.
2. Quizzes/Tests (5%) - The in-class pop quizzes will cover the critical concepts learned
from the assigned materials. These are designed as an “incentive” to keep up with the
readings. The format of the quizzes will be fill in, true false, or multiple choice. On
these quizzes you may be expected to use the terms introduced in class (vocabulary
terms, etc.) to analyze visual texts and current events shown in class. The dates I
assign a quiz will be random and will never be announced in advance, so keep up
with the readings.
3. Generative Papers (30%)– Four of these shorter papers are required over the semester.
This series of assignments asks you to present evidence in analyzing aspects of race
and gender specifically applying the ideas we will be studying this semester to a
chosen issue, problem, or aspect of race and gender relations in representations of
black women. The generative papers are designed to help you prepare all semester
for one final project that will serve as the comprehensive exam for the course. You

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 have approximately one month to complete each assignment, therefore, I expect them
handed in on time. See “Generative Papers” handout in oncourse resources for the
details of each assignment.
Paper #1 is due 9/25
Paper #2 is due 10/23
Paper #3 is due 11/21 online, 11/24 in class
Paper #4 is due 12/4.
4. Research Paper (40%) - During weeks 3 or 4 students will be expected to pick an
exploratory research paper topic and obtain instructor approval before pursuing said
interest. In November a firm project proposal is due. She or he will be expected to
research and write an original and provocative paper about blackness, representation,
and black women in a popular cultural form of her or his choice. This assignment
will be include the presentation, thus the whole final project will total 50% of your
grade. Essays will be in standard academic format 12 point font, default margins,
with separate title page and Chicago style references cited pages (neither of which
count in page total).
5. Final Presentation (10%) – During the final week of class, students will present their
research projects in a group mini-conference open format. (The audience will be your
classmates and me.) Part of this grade includes the work you did for Generative
Paper #4 (outline).

Required Books:

Rooks, Noliwe M. Ladies' Pages: African American Women's Magazines and the Culture That
Made Them. New Jersey: Rutgers University Press, 2004.

Required Chapters and Articles (in oncourse resources):

Anderson, Margaret L. and Collins, Patricia Hill. “Conceptualizing Race, Class, and Gender,” in
Margaret L. Anderson and Patricia Hill Collins (Eds.) Race, Class, and Gender: An
anthology, 5th Edition. Belmont, CA: Wadsworth/Thompson Learning, 2004, selections.
Bundles, A'Lelia. On Her Own Ground: The Life and Times of Madam C.J. Walker. New York :
Scribner, 2001.
Cloud, Dana L. “Hegemony or Concordance? The Rhetoric of Tokenism in ‘Oprah’ Winfrey’s
Rags-to-Riches Biography, Critical Studies in Mass Communication, 13, 1996, 115-137.
Collins, Patricia Hill. “The Past is Ever Present: Recognizing the New Racism,” in Patricia Hill
Collins. Black Sexual Politics: African Americans, Gender, and the New Racism. New
York, NY: Routledge, 2004, p. 53-86.
Collins, Patricia Hill. ““Why Black Sexual Politics?,” in Patricia Hill Collins, Black Sexual
Politics: African Americans, Gender, and the New Racism. New York, NY: Routledge,
2004, pp. 25-54.
Gross, Kali N. “Roughneck Women, Pale Representations, and Dark Crimes: Black Female
Criminals and Popular Culture,” in Colored Amazons: Crime, Violence, and Black
Women in the City of Brotherly Love, 1880-1910. Durham: Duke University Press, 2006,
pp. 101-126.

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Hall, Stuart. “What is this "black" in black popular culture? (Rethinking Race),” Social Justice,
Spring-Summer 1993 v20 n1-2 p104(11).
Harris, Laura Alexander. “Queer Black Feminism: The Pleasure Principle,” Feminist Review,
No. 54, Contesting Feminine Orthodoxies (Autumn, 1996), pp. 3-30
Higginbotham, Elizabeth and Lynn Weber. “Moving up with Kin and Community: Upward
Social Mobility for Black and White Women,” Gender and Society, Vol. 6, No. 3, This
Issue Is Devoted to: Race, Class, and Gender (Sep., 1992), pp. 416-440.
hooks, bell. “Revolutionary Attitude,” pp. 1-7 and “Loving Blackness as Political Resistance,”
pp. 9-20, and “The Oppositional Gaze: Black Female Spectators,” pp. 115-131 in Black
Looks: Race and Representation. New York: Routledge, 1992.
hooks, bell. “Spending Culture: Marketing the black underclass,” p 169-179 and “Seeing and
Making Culture,” 193-201, and “Back to Black: Ending Internalized Racism,” 202-213
from Outlaw Culture: Resisting Representations, New York: Routledge, 1994.
Kelley, Robin D.G. “Countering the Conspiracy to Ignore Black Girls,” in Anderson and Collins
(Eds.) Race, Class, and Gender: An anthology, 5th Edition. Belmont, CA:
Wadsworth/Thompson Learning, 2004, pp. 287-295.
Labennett, Oneka. “Reading ‘Buffy’and ‘Looking Proper’: Race, Gender, and Consumption
among West Indian Girls in Brooklyn,” in Clarke, Kamari Maxine and Deborah Thomas
(Eds). Globalization and Race: Transformations in the Cultural Production of Blackness.
Durham: Duke University Press, 2006, pp. 278-29.
Lofton, Katheryn. “Practicing Oprah; or the Prescriptive Compulsion of a Spiritual Capitalism,”
The Journal of Popular Culture, Vol. 39, No. 4, 2006, 599-621.
Lorde, Audre. “Age Race, Class, and Sex: Women Redefining Difference,” pp. 495-503, in
Margaret L. Anderson and Patricia Hill Collins (Eds.) Race, Class, and Gender: An
anthology, 5th Edition. Belmont, CA: Wadsworth/Thompson Learning, 2004.
Morgan, Jennifer L. “Some Could Suckle over Their Shoulder”: Male Travelers, Female Bodies,
and the Gendering of Racial Ideology,” in Laboring Women: Reproduction and Gender
in New World Slavery. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2004, Chapter 1
(12-49).
Morgan, Joan. “Fly-Girls, Bitches, and Hoes: Notes of a Hip-Hop Feminist.” Social Text, No.
45 (Winter, 1995), pp. 151-157.
Nelson, Stanley. Two dollars and a dream [videorecording]. New York, N.Y. : Filmakers Library,
c1987, 1 videocassette (60 min.)
Sharpley-Whiting, T. Denean. “Sex, Power and Punanny,” Pimpin’ Ain’t Easy, But Somebody’s
Got to Do It,” “I see the Same Ho: Video Vixens, Beauty Culture, and Diasporic Sex
Tourism,” and “Too Hot to Be Bothered: Black Women and Sexual Abuse,” in Pimps
Up, Ho’s Down: Hip Hop’s Hold on Young Black Women, New York: New York
University Press, 2007, pp. ix-84.
Springer, Kimberly. Third Wave Black Feminism? Signs, Vol. 27, No. 4 (Summer, 2002), pp.
1059-1082.
Springer, Kimberly. “Divas, Evil Black Bitches, and Bitter Black Women: African American
Women in Postfeminist and Post-Civil Rights Popular Culture,” pp 249-276, in
Interrogating Postfeminism: Gender and the Politics of Popular Culture, (Eds). Yvonne
Tasker and Diane Negra. Durham: Duke University Press, 2007.
Wallace-Sanders, Kimberly. “The ‘Mammyfication’ of the Nation: Mammy and the American
Imagination,” and “Bound in Black and White: Bloodlines, Milk Lines, and Competition

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 in the Plantation Nursery,” in Mammy: A Century of Race, Gender, and Southern
Memory, Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2008 pp.1-12, 32-58.
West, Cornel. “Black Sexuality: The Taboo Subject,” in Anderson and Collins (Eds.) Race,
Class, and Gender: An anthology, 5th Edition. Belmont, CA: Wadsworth/Thompson
Learning, 2004, pp. 455-461.
White, Deborah Gray. “The Cost of Club Work, the Price of Black Feminism,” in Nancy Hewitt
and Suzanne Lebsock, eds., Visible Women: New Essays on American Activism, Urbana:
University of Illinois, 1993, pp. 247-269.
White, Deborah Gray. “Chapter One, Jezebel and Mammy: The Mythology of Female Slavery,”
Ar’n’t I a Woman? Female Slaves in the Plantation South Revised Edition. New York:
W.W. Norton & Company, 1999.

Provisional Course Schedule

Subject to change, be sure to check oncourse,
Be sure your reading for the week is completed
by each Thursday’s session to be prepared for in-class discussion.

Part One: Developing Theoretical Frameworks and Grounding Ourselves

Weeks 1-2 Class introductions and exploring race, class, and gender through a feminist
lens

Week 1
Anderson, Margaret L. and Collins, Patricia Hill, 2004 (Section II), “Conceptualizing
Race, Class, and Gender,” 75-117 and from 1992 edition, Audre Lorde, “Age Race,
Class, and Sex: Women Redefining Difference,” pp. 495-503.

9/2/08 Course Introductions and why study popular culture?

What is a feminist lens?
Introduce Key Terms and Concepts
Diaspora, Representation, Popular Culture, Gender, Race, etc.

9/4/08 Discussion of Key Terms and

Developing critical reading skills:
o Reading materials for content, argument, etc.
Week 2
Hall, Stuart. “What is this "black" in black popular culture? (Rethinking Race),” Social
Justice, Spring-Summer 1993 v20 n1-2 p104(11).

and
Springer, Kimberly. “Divas, Evil Black Bitches, and Bitter Black Women: African
American Women in Postfeminist and Post-Civil Rights Popular Culture,” pp 249-276, in
Interrogating Postfeminism: Gender and the Politics of Popular Culture, (Eds). Yvonne
Tasker and Diane Negra. Durham: Duke University Press, 2007.

9/9 & 11 Lecture and Discussion of Key Concepts.

Weeks 3-4 Black Feminist Thought on Sexuality, Feminism, Blackness, and

Womanhood
Week 3 Readings
hooks, bell. Black Looks, intro and Chapter one - “Revolutionary Attitude,” pp 1-7 and
-“Loving Blackness as Political Resistance.” pp 9-20.

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 and
Collins, Patricia Hill. Black Sexual Politics, Ch. 1 and 2
- “Why Black Sexual Politics?,” pp. 25-54.
- “The Past is Ever Present: Recognizing the New Racism,” pp. 53-86.

9/16 & 18 Lecture and Discussion of Key Concepts.

Week 4 Readings
West, Cornel. “Black Sexuality: The Taboo Subject,” from Anderson and Collins, 2004,
pp.455-461.

and

Harris, Laura Alexander. “Queer Black Feminism: The Pleasure Principle,” Feminist
Review, No. 54, Contesting Feminine Orthodoxies (Autumn, 1996), pp. 3-30; and

9/23 & 25 Lecture and Discussion of Key Concepts. GENERATIVE PAPER #1 (DUE 9/25)

Part Two: Grounding Representations of Black Women in U.S. History

Weeks 5-6 Colonizing the Black Body, Sexualizing the “Savage,” and Representing the
“Roughneck”
Week 5 Readings
Morgan, Jennifer L. “Some Could Suckle over Their Shoulder”: Male Travelers, Female
Bodies, and the Gendering of Racial Ideology, Chapter 1 (12-49); and

White, Deborah Gray. “Chapter One, Jezebel and Mammy: The Mythology of Female
Slavery,” Ar’n’t I a Woman? Female Slaves in the Plantation South Revised Edition.
New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 1999, pp. 27-61.

9/30 & 10/2 Lecture and Discussion of Key Concepts.

Week 6 Readings
Wallace-Sanders, Kimberly. “The ‘Mammyfication’ of the Nation: Mammy and the
American Imagination,” pp.1-12; and

Wallace-Sanders, Kimberly. “Bound in Black and White: Bloodlines, Milk Lines, and
Competition in the Plantation Nursery,” Mammy: A Century of Race, Gender, and
Southern Memory, Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2008, pp. 32-58; and

Gross, Kali N. “Roughneck Women, Pale Representations, and Dark Crimes: Black
Female Criminals and Popular Culture,” Chapter 4 (101-126).

10/6 & 9 Lecture and Discussion of Key Concepts.

Weeks 7-9 Black Womanhood, Racial Uplift, and the Politics of Beauty
Week 7 Readings Higginbotham, Elizabeth and Lynn Weber “Moving up with Kin and Community:
Upward Social Mobility for Black and White Women,” Gender and Society, Vol. 6, No.
3, This Issue Is Devoted to: Race, Class, and Gender (Sep., 1992), pp. 416-440; and

White, Deborah Gray. “The Cost of Club Work, the Price of Black Feminism,” in Nancy
Hewitt and Suzanne Lebsock, eds., Visible Women: New Essays on American Activism,
Urbana: University of Illinois, 1993, pp. 247-269.
10/13 & 16 Tues.: Lecture and Discussion of Key Concepts.

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 Thurs. : Two dollars and a dream [videorecording]. New York, N.Y. : Filmmakers
Library, c1987. 1 videocassette (60 min.), Stanley Nelson.

Week 8 Readings selections from

Bundles, A'Lelia. On Her Own Ground: The Life and Times of Madam C.J. Walker. New
York : Scribner, 2001, 60-99 and 251-277.

10/21 & 23 Generative Paper #2 due 10/23

Week 9 Readings Selections from

Rooks, Noliwe M. Ladies' Pages: African American Women's Magazines and the Culture
That Made Them. New Jersey: Rutgers University Press, 2004, Sections 1-3, pp. 1-109.

10/28 & 30 Lecture and Discussion of Key Concepts.

Part Three: Representations and Resistances

Weeks 10-11 Black Women and The American Dream
Week 10 finish with selections from
Readings
Rooks, Noliwe M. Ladies' Pages: African American Women's Magazines and the Culture
That Made Them. New Jersey: Rutgers University Press, 2004,Sections 4-5, pp. 110-
151; and

Cloud, Dana L. “Hegemony or Concordance? The Rhetoric of Tokenism in ‘Oprah’

Winfrey’s Rags-to-Riches Biography, Critical Studies in Mass Communication,
13, 1996, 115-137.

11/4 & 6 Lecture and Discussion of Key Concepts.

Week 11
Readings hooks, bell. “Spending Culture: Marketing the black underclass,” p 169-179 and “Seeing
and Making Culture,” 193-201, Outlaw Culture: Resisting Representations,
New York: Routledge, 1994; and

Lofton, Katheryn. “Practicing Oprah; or the Prescriptive Compulsion of a Spiritual

Capitalism,” The Journal of Popular Culture, Vol. 39, No. 4, 2006, 599-621.

11/11-14 Lecture and Discussion of Key Concepts.

Weeks 12-15 Black Women in Film, Music, and Television

Week 12 (Film)
Readings hooks, bell. “The Oppositional Gaze: Black Female Spectators.” Black Looks: race and
representation. New York: Routledge, 1992. Pp 115-131 (PDF with
Week 3 readings) ; and
Collins, Patricia Hill. “Very Necessary: Redefining Black Gender Ideology,” ?,” in
Patricia Hill Collins, Black Sexual Politics: African Americans, Gender, and the
New Racism. New p 181-214.
11/18 & 20 Tues.: View Movie Clips: Boys on the Side, Go Fish
Thurs. 11/20: Guest Lecturer on Black Women and Sexuality in Film, Josie Leimbach,
Department of Gender Studies

Week 13 Class Cancelled This Week – work on your final projects, GENERATIVE PAPER#3

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 Readings due to oncourse by Friday 11/21, paper copy due in-class 11/24.

Week 14 (Music)
Readings
Morgan, Joan. “Fly-Girls, Bitches, and Hoes: Notes of a Hip-Hop Feminist.” Social
Text, No. 45 (Winter, 1995), pp. 151-157.

Springer, Kimberly. Third Wave Black Feminism? Signs, Vol. 27, No. 4 (Summer,
2002), pp. 1059-1082.

Selections from

Sharpley-Whiting, T. Denean. “Sex, Power and Punanny,” Pimpin’ Ain’t Easy, But
Somebody’s Got to Do It,” “I see the Same Ho: Video Vixens, Beauty Culture, and
Diasporic Sex Tourism,” and “Too Hot to Be Bothered: Black Women and Sexual
Abuse,” in Pimps Up, Ho’s Down: Hip Hop’s Hold on Young Black Women, New York:
New York University Press, 2007, pp. ix-84.

12/2 & 12/4 Lecture and Discussion of Key Concepts.

GENERATIVE PAPER#4 due 12/4

Week 15 (Television)
Readings
Labennett, Oneka. “Reading ‘Buffy’and ‘Looking Proper’: Race, Gender, and
Consumption among West Indian Girls in Brooklyn,” in Clarke, Kamari Maxine and
Deborah Thomas (Eds). Globalization and Race: Transformations in the Cultural
Production of Blackness. Durham: Duke University Press, 2006, pp. 278-29; and

Kelley, Robin D.G. “Countering the Conspiracy to Ignore Black Girls,” in Anderson and
Collins (Eds.) Race, Class, and Gender: An anthology, 5th Edition. Belmont, CA:
Wadsworth/Thompson Learning, 2004, pp. 287-295.

12/9 & 11 Wrapping up the semester, lecture and discussion of Key Concepts.

12/11 – First Day of Final Presentations

Week 16 FINALS
12/18 Final Presentations and Mini-conference on Representation, Thursday, 5:00-7:00 p.m.

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