Firstly the historical implications of the ‘gaze’ must be understood to begin to engage in critical commentary around the subject area and to further explore the problems encountered concerning black female directors, in which we find, translates from historical practises to cinematic aesthetics whilst using examples from the set film.
Sojourner Truth died in 1883 but her struggles not forgotten, spending the first twenty nine years of her life as a slave in New York having to endure exhausting physical labour. After a law being passed in 1817 which should have made Truth free, she was still enslaved and ran away to the home of the neighbouring abolitionist family. Truth with the help of her new family, successfully sued for the return of her five year old son, which was perhaps her first taste of justice inspiring her to become an abolitionist and women’s rights advocate later on.
Her most famous speech “Ain’t I a women?” came at a press conference in Ohio in 1851 where all the other speakers were male, despite this she criticized the idea of women being the weaker sex pleading “Look at me! Look at my arm! I have ploughed and planted, and gathered into barns, and no man could head me! And ain't I a woman?” From this and Willis/Krauthamer understanding in Envisioning Emancipation it is certain that Sojourner Truth understood the power of imagery, be it first hand or photo as the now collectable carte-de-vistas distributed by her “were meant to affirm her status as a sophisticated and respectable free women and as a women in control of her image.” Willis/Krauthamer further contends that “Photography was not incidental but central to the war against slavery, racism and segregation in the antebellum period of the 1850’s through the New Deal era of the 1930’s.” This bring forward the importance of representation and their implications and can be translated and applied in terms of film today, as the number of black female directors are few and far apart with not enough films being made to attempt to deconstruct the established imagery of black femininity, which traditionally put forward by Hollywood are through the caricatures of out dated and over sexualised examples of the Mammy and Jezebel. These caricatures were often used as binary opposition to white femininity. Not enough content is directed by black females to reject and modify such stereotypes which were first put forward as a way of maintaining white supremacy.
Alfre Woodard reads "Ain't I a Woman?", a speech delivered by abolitionist Sojourner Truth at the Women's Convention in 1851. Part of a reading from Voices of a People's History of the United
picture of Sojourner Truth... Carte-de-vista
Laura Mulvey explains that “In a world ordered by sexual imbalance, pleasure in looking has been split between active/male and passive/female. The determining male gaze projects its fantasy onto the female figure, which is styled accordingly.” (p. 19) This has been directly critiqued by bell hooks, in Black Looks: Race and Representation as this can only applied to predominantly white women in general there is no particular recognition depicting black female spectatorship in particular, as gender is deconstructed as oppose to race. hooks opens with a first-hand account of her personal experiences “When thinking about black female spectators, I remember being punished as a child for staring, for those hard intense direct looks children would give grown-ups, looks that were seen as confrontational, as gestures of resistance, challenges to authority.” (p. 115) This again reinforces the power of the ‘gaze’ correlating it closely with the importance of the directors role as they have the final decision as to what is seen on screen and ties back to historical events. During the slavery period it was deemed a punishable offence to look at their white masters directly, hooks states “All attempts to repress our/black peoples’ right to gaze had produced in us an overwhelming longing to look, a rebellious desire, an oppositional gaze” (p. 116) therefore the gaze was considered a form of disobedience and confrontation, with Emmett Till being an horrific example.
However when black people gained the right to watch film, for the first time in American history they could fully stare at the white women and unleash their repressed gaze (phallocentric power) without fear of being harmed or lynched. Cinema proved a release, a subtle form of escapism, but it must be noted that black people of the time fully understood that cinema promoted white supremacy and that they were being misrepresented if represented at all. Some black women reacted by boycotting cinema completely, hooks protests “that some of us chose to stop looking as a gesture of resistance, turning away was one to protest, to reject negation” (p. 121) Another reaction was to create independent black cinema with the works of Oscar Micheaux being at the forefront, this was an example of ‘Resurgence of black nationalism as an expression of black people’s desires to guard against white cultural appropriation.’ (p. 33 1992)
Eve Bayou’s (1997) directed by Kasi Lemmons received a great critical response and was nominated for various prestigious awards, it was also the highest grossing independent film within the year of its release and surprisingly according to ‘Trimark’ more than half of Bayou’s audience attracted white people. Andrew Sarris a major film critic says, "To hail Eve's Bayou as the best African American film ever would be to understate its universal accessibility to anyone on this planet." Concluding that the title ‘Best African-American Film’ may discourage potential viewers, confirming that in his opinion African American cinema cannot be linked fully and comply with mainstream cultural products, in other words white popular culture, a hegemonic one. The representation of upper-middleclass black people caused great critical confusion as Lemmon’s far more sophisticated and extravagant characters reject the ghetto-centric themes, which have become tangled with New Black Cinema, the narrative allows for characters to develop instead of offering pre-constructed version offered by Hollywood in the past. She offers a new variety of bourgeois.
Although hooks ‘gaze’ offers racial analysis in addition to Mulvey’s observation of gender, in todays fast moving society man no longer has to be the sole bearer of the look, with equality becoming an intrinsic part of modern day life. In order to transform the negative and out dated stereotypes it is crucial that more films and made by more black female directors more regularly. Following Lemmons example.
Bibliography:
"Ain't I a Woman?", a speech delivered by abolitionist Sojourner Truth at the Women's Convention in 1851. Part of a reading from Voices of a People's History of the United
hooks, b. 1992. Black looks. Boston, MA: South End Press.
Willis, D. and Krauthamer, B. 2013.Envisioning emancipation. Philadelphia: Temple University Press.
Mulvey, L. 1989. Visual and other pleasures. Bloomington: Indiana University Press.
Hooks, B. Eating the Other: Desire and Resistance’
bell hooks, (1992) Eating the Other:Desire and Resistance’
"Ain't I a Woman?", a speech delivered by abolitionist Sojourner Truth at the Women's Convention in 1851. Part of a reading from Voices of a People's History of the United
hooks, b. 1992. Black looks. Boston, MA: South End Press.
Willis, D. and Krauthamer, B. 2013.Envisioning emancipation. Philadelphia: Temple University Press.
Mulvey, L. 1989. Visual and other pleasures. Bloomington: Indiana University Press.
Hooks, B. Eating the Other: Desire and Resistance’
bell hooks, (1992) Eating the Other:Desire and Resistance’