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Running head: THE GREAT DIVIDE

The Great Divide:

How Capitalism, Citizenship and Feminism Divided Black Relations

Meika J. Cole

Oakland University

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Abstract

This paper engages in a historical examination of power as sites

of struggle within the African-American collectivity. The focus

of this research is to distinguish the differences in how

citizenship rights were granted to black men and women, and how

they continue to promote disparity in black gender relations.

Since the turn of the century, black women have grappled with the

notion of citizenship and identity. Not only did they have to

define themselves as women within a white hierarchy of

subjugation, they have also had to defend their positions within

the black community. Because of this, relationships between

black men and women are in crisis. The ratio of black men to

black women has been unbalanced, causing a shrinking pool of

available African-American men. As a result, the dynamic of

black families have changed, causing black women to assume the

role of mother and father. As black women become more educated

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and more employable in corporate America, their views on marriage

and their roles as women have begun to take an enormous toll on

how they are perceived by black men. Because of this, issues of

masculinity and femininity remains problematic as blacks try to

form and maintain relationships with each other. Their attempts

usually end in mutual misunderstandings, mainly associated with

the contrasting definitions of what the role of a black woman is.

By following the discourse surrounding the “emasculated black

man” and the “independent black woman”, this paper shows how the

issues of citizenship, racism and the new black feminist thought

plays a major role in how masculinity and femininity are measured

in terms of domination within this community. By analyzing the

roots of this issue, we can show how focusing on gender as a

structure of power that works with race can help us to address

the debate on how African-American men and women proceed toward

heterogeneity, supporting the black community as a whole.

Introduction

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Unlike many black girls in the early 1980’s, my sister and I

were privileged to have been raised in a traditional two-parent

household. Both of our parents worked, but when it came to

matters of the home, my father was definitely the king of the

castle. Dad set all of the rules and we as “women” were

expected to follow them. My father grew up in the south and he

had a strong patriarchal upbringing. Because of this, he had his

own definition of what the role of a woman was. This definition

included meeting his needs, tending to household chores and

raising the children. He felt that every penny that my mother

made should be counted by him and he decided how it should have

been spent. My father believed that his job was being the sole

provider of his family and because of this, I know now that my

mother despised him for his views.

In 1992 when he died, at 35 years old, our mother was left

assuming both roles as man and woman of the house. Over the next

couple of years, I saw my mother evolve. Before my father’s

death, she appeared to be docile, but now she exhibited a new-

found power of identity and self-worth. Our mother emphasized

the notion of “having your own”. She said, “You must never allow

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a man to have total control over you, that’s why you get the

money and education that you want, so no one can ever take it

from you.” With this in mind, we took education seriously. We

made sure that we found jobs that matched our potential. We

worked hard to acquire all of the things we considered as

essentials needed to sustain a good life for ourselves.

As I approached my thirties, I began to sense a growing void

in my life. I had all of this education, all of these nice

things, a great job but no one to share it with. Since I was a

little girl, my goal was to create my own family. I wanted to

experience planning a wedding, having children and growing old

with my handsome black husband. With that being said, I started

to take dating seriously; however, I kept finding that the black

men I dated did not meet my standards. Either they weren’t as

financially stable as I was, they didn’t possess as much

education, or they viewed the role of a black woman just as my

father did.

Finally, I found a guy who I thought was perfect. After

dating exclusively for one year, he finally uttered the words

that no woman (who thinks that she has found her prince in

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shining armor) ever wants to hear. He said “I think we need

space.” After a period of embarrassment and heartache, I

eventually probed him about what happened and he responded,

“You’re too independent and you don’t know your place.” Over the

next couple of years, I struggled with this idea. I began to

question why I wasn’t married. Was it true that I was too

independent? Was I truly unclear of my place as a black woman?

What was wrong with me? As I gained the courage to discuss my

relationship dilemma with other black women in my age group, it

was evident that there was a growing phenomenon. Most of my

friends were educated black women, who, too, were labeled as “too

independent” for a black man.

One of the most controversial issues facing black Americans

in recent years has been the quality of black male-black female

relationships. (Cazenave, 1983). In 2010, Census figures show

that 55.6% of American females between the ages of 20 and 34 have

never married. For African-American women, that figure is 48.3%

(U.S. Census Bureau). Over the last fifteen years, the divorce

rates for African-Americans have also increased. While black men

and woman are noted to be significantly less desirous of marriage

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than their white counterparts, of all groups black men are the

least willing to make this commitment (Franklin, 1991).

When discussing these statistics in African-American forums,

each managed to blame the other sex. Men questioned why black

women were so controlling and women wondered why black men

despised them for wanting to acquire a higher status. In Sister

Citizen: Shame, Stereotypes, and Black Women in America,

political scientist Melissa V. Harris-Perry explores what it

means to be a Black woman and an American citizen when the two

seem diametrically opposed. She posits that misrecognition,

stereotypes and shame circumscribe African-American women’s lives

and influence their political decisions. At the same time, she

shows how Black women resist this mislabeling and strive to

define themselves and their experiences (Harris-Perry, 2013).

In one of the first empirical studies of how black men and

women perceive each other, Turner and Turner (1974) found that

lack college students, generally, were no more likely to make

derogatory evaluations of other blacks than whites. They did

find a greater tendency among black students to view black men as

“no good” and for black women specifically, to see black men as

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being irresponsible. However, the negative evaluations of black

men were limited to work related traits affecting their ability

to function in the larger society over which most had little

control (Cazenave, 1983, p. 342). In my mind, the larger

question was why are blacks at such odds with each other? I

questioned, how did we get here and what would it take to help

correct this issue?

Methodology

While forming and maintaining relationships is a challenge

for men and women, regardless of race, it is especially the

greatest amongst African-Americans. In recent studies, a shift

has been identified, showing that black females have changed

their attitudes about marriage. Most of the debate has been

focused on issues of monogamy and finances, but the most

problematic of all was the concept of power and “the independent

black woman”. The image of African-American women as strong and

overbearing is no less the legacy of the black experience than

the image of the “emasculated” man. Because this representation

is still being circulated throughout popular culture today,

blacks continue to fight against each other in terms of

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maintaining control. One example of this is shown in the Black

Entertainment Television (BET) series, Being Mary Jane. Using

this text, I will examine how black gender relations are

challenged due to topics of racism, patriarchy and gender roles

in African-American themed media. In addition to this, I will

conduct critical discourse analysis using historization to

investigate how the history of slavery, citizenship rights and

the woman’s movement has had an impact on black men and women.

Citizenship and the Black American

A citizen is an individual who lives in nation-state and has

certain rights and privileges, as well as duties to the state,

such as allegiance to the government (Banks, 2008). Citizenship

defines the status and rights of its members. It also provides a

concise set of guidelines that sets the tone for who can and

cannot obtain full membership. Citizenship has become a very

popular subject of debate in the last few years, appropriated

nationally and internationally, Left and Right, as well as

feminists (Yuval-Davis, 1997, p. 4). Citizenship involves three

elements—civil, political and social. According to James Banks,

the civil aspects of citizenship emerged in England during the

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18th century, which allowed citizens the right to freedom of

speech, property and equality. As we move into a more global

society, the definition of citizenship has been expanded to

include both the political and social functions of its citizens.

The modern conception of citizenship merely as a status held

under the authority of a state, has been contested and broadened

to include various political and social struggles of recognition

and redistribution as instances of claim-making and hence by

extension, of citizenship (Isin & Turner, 2002). As early as the

19th century, the political aspect of citizenship gave

individuals the right to exercise political power by

participating in the political process. The social aspect arouse

in the 20th century, assuring its members rights to education,

welfare and health (Banks, 2008). While the impact of social

movements have changed the landscape of citizenship and

individual rights, the issue then becomes who has the right to

declare citizenship and does it affect those who are considered

“the other”. In determining the issue of citizenship and how it

has worked to create an unbalanced paradigm between gender and

race within the black community, one must take into account the

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discourse generated from the ideology of the “west versus the

rest”. The “west versus the rest” is an idea or concept that

functions in four ways:

First, it allows us to characterize and classify societies into different categories. Secondly, it setsan image or sets of images. Thirdly, it provides a standard or model of comparison. Fourthly, it provides criteria of evaluation which other societies are rankedand around which powerful positive and negative feelings cluster (Hall, 1992).

This concept of the West obscures the wide differences among

western peoples presenting them as a homogenous whole. During

colonization, the European, American and African slave traders

engaged in the lucrative trading of humans. Politicians and

businessmen who supported them, did not intend to put into motion

a chain of events that would motivate the captives and their

descendants to fight for full citizenship in the United States of

America. Once colonialism started, European settlers began to

dominate other civilizations and characterized them by these

standards, thus creating a system of representation that would

forever impact blacks. As the colonization of states increased in

Europe, matters of status, access, participation and membership

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became key elements of state- and nation-building, which often

placed minorities in positions which limited the full exercise of

their rights (Powell, 1999, p. 143).

For more than three centuries, the all-embracing system of

American slavery was the defining experience of the vast majority

of blacks in the United States (Franklin, 1991). The slave

system helped regulate husband and wife relations. Instead of

being the head of the household, the husband served as an

assistant and sex partner to the woman and because of this, black

men were viewed as virile and promiscuous. African American

women are forced to combat the dual stereotypes of race and

gender. As women, they realized that they could not presume that

the law would provide sufficient protection for them.

As African American women, they realized that they could not

demand such protection (Bennet & Marilyn, 2000). Over time,

enslavement allowed resentment and distrust to form in the

relationships of Black men and women. As black women were raped

by their slave owners, a new generation of light skinned blacks

emerged. Because of this, lighter skinned women were treated

with more respect than black men. Black men were left feeling

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powerless and black women felt that it was their job to sustain

their family, which shifted the power dynamic away from black

men. Owners debated among themselves the benefits of enslaved

people forming families. Many of them reasoned that having

families made it much less likely that a man or woman would run

away, thus depriving the owner of valuable property.

The Impact of the ISMs: Capitalism, Racism and Sexism

As Black men emerged from slavery in 1863, they were eager

to assert their dominance over their wives and households.

Although they were granted independence, black men still felt

chained to the white man’s oppression. Not only were they viewed

as mere inferiors, they were looked down upon by black women who

seemed to enjoy benefits that they were not entitled to.

According to Patricia Richardson, “the myth in the black world is

that there are only two free people in the United States, the

white man and the black woman.  The myth was established by the

black man in the long period of his frustration when he longed to

be free to have the material and social advantages of his

oppressor, the white man.  On examination of the myth, this so-

called freedom was based on the sexual prerogatives taken by the

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white man on the black female. It was fantasied by the black man

that she enjoyed it, which caused black men to become enraged

which explains why black men grew violent towards black women

(Robinson, 2013).

Well into the 1900’s, black woman were needed and valued by

the white female as domestic laborers. Because of this, tensions

began to arise in the black family dynamic. In the 19th century,

industrialization had positive and negative effects on the black

collective. The one thing that changed this was the new views of

the role of the black women, during the industrial era and the

rise in capitalism. During this period, more value was being

placed on women’s productive labor, further exasperating the

ideas of the role of a black man and woman. Black women were

doing more work out of the house and being offered work at higher

rates than the men (Franklin, 1991). The black man found it

difficult to find meaningful employment. Because of this, black

men begin using violence towards black women as a way of

controlling them. Black woman likewise was manipulated by the

system, economically exploited and physically assaulted. She

could often find work in the white man's kitchen, however, and

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sometimes became the sole breadwinner of the family (Beal, 2013).

This predicament has led to many psychological problems on the

part of both man and woman and has contributed to the turmoil

that we find in the black family structure. Because of the

transfer in power, black women tended to accept the white

capitalist evaluation of manhood and womanhood believing that

they did not need the black man. In fact, that black men were

shiftless and lazy, otherwise they would get a job and support

their families as they ought to. Because of this, separation of

man from wife, mother from child became a major issue in the

black family structure.

Simultaneously, the poor black woman did not question the social and economic system.  She saw her main problem as described in the accompanying article -- social, economic and psychological oppression by the black man.  But awareness in this case has moved to a second phase and exposes an important fact in the wholeprocess of oppression.  It takes two to oppress, a proper dialectical perspective to examine at this pointin our movement. An examination of the process of oppression in any or all of its forms shows simply thatat least two parties are involved.  The need for the white man, particularly, to oppress others reveals his own anxiety and inadequacy about his own maleness and humanity.  Many black male writers have eloquently analyzed this social and psychological fact.  Generallya feeling of inadequacy can be traced to all those who

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desperately need power and authority over others throughout history (Robinson, 2013).

Despite many challenges facing black women, the emergence of

female leaders and conscious efforts to educate black women

continued to place black women over black men. From 1890 to

1910, the number of professional black women increased by 219%

(Franklin, 1991). With the emergence of a wage-labor system and

a national market in the first third of the nineteenth century,

the ideal of the male breadwinner and the nurturing mother now

appeared. But the emergence of domesticity for middle-class women

and children depended on its absence among the immigrant, working

class, and African American women or children who worked as

servants, grew the cotton, or toiled in the textile mills to free

middle-class wives from the chores that had occupied their time

previously (Koontz, 1996).

Black Nationalism, as in ideology and philosophical thought,

is one of the oldest and most enduring traditions in American

thought (Shelby 2003). The movement, which can be traced back

the 1920s, sought to acquire economic power and to infuse among

blacks a sense of community and group feeling. Many adherents to

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Black Nationalism assumed the eventual creation of a separate

black nation by African Americans. As an alternative to being

assimilated is predominantly white citizens, black nationalists

sought to maintain and promote their separate identity as a

people of color. This issue with male Black Nationalist was that

they too continued to keep black women oppressed by its direct

references to the issues of black men, which didn’t include that

of women, ultimately pushing them into the hands of the feminist

movement.

Black women are at a decision point that in many ways

mirrors that faced by African-Americans as a collectivity

(Collins, 126). Collins states that “Black women appear to have

a voice, and with this newfound voice comes a new series of

concerns (Collins 126)”. Because of this, Black women have

struggled with how to title their struggles in comparison to

other female movements. According to Collins, “current debates

about whether black women’s standpoint should be named “womanism”

or“black feminism” reflect this basic challenge of accomodating

diversity among black women”. But African American women now

stand at a different historical moment. For example, we must be

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attentive to the seductive absorption of black women's voices in

classrooms of higher education where black women's texts are

still much more welcomed than black women ourselves. Giving the

illusion of change, this strategy of symbolic inclusion masks how

the everyday institutional policies and arrangements that

suppress and exclude African Americans as a collectivity remain

virtually untouched (Yuval-Davis, 1997)

The organization of the Black Feminist Movement was

developed as a remedy to sexism and racism which influenced the

lives of black women. They felt that their needs were ignored by

the black men of the Black Liberation Movement and white women in

the Women's Movement. The movement has spawned several important

organizations which are committed to the struggle against all

forms of oppression. Women of color have long challenged the

hegemony of feminisms constructed primarily around the lives of

white middle-class women (Baca-Zinn & Thornton-Dill, 103). In

order to underscore race as a power system, feminist felt the

need to “challenge the systems of domination, not merely as

gendered subjects but as women whose lives are affected by our

location in multiple hierarchies (Baca-Zinn & Thornton-Dill, pg.

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103)”. Not only did this include white racism, it was also

expanded to how black women were being treated within their own

collectivities. The effectiveness of the movement has not been

uniform in the white feminist and black communities. While many

white women in the feminist movement have acknowledged their

racism and made attempts to address it, the issue of sexism in

the black community has not been as effective.

Despite many challenges facing black women, the emergence of

female leaders and conscious efforts to educate black women

continued to place black women over black men. From 1890 to

1910, the number of professional black women increased by 219%

(Franklin, 1991). With the emergence of a wage-labor system and

a national market in the first third of the nineteenth century,

the ideal of the male breadwinner and the nurturing mother now

appeared. But the emergence of domesticity for middle-class women

and children depended on its absence among the immigrant, working

class, and African American women or children who worked as

servants, grew the cotton, or toiled in the textile mills to free

middle-class wives from the chores that had occupied their time

previously (Koontz, 1996).

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Black feminist theory has argued that black women are

positioned within structures of power in fundamentally different

ways than white women. Black feminist organizations emerged

during the 1970s and face many difficulties from both the white

feminist and Black Nationalist political organizations they were

confronting. These women fought against suppression from the

larger movements in which many of its members came from. The

issue of racial solidarity dominated the race-movement and white-

feminist-controlled spaces of many 1970s publications, and thus

limited the conversation, primarily because the locations drove

audience and content, restricting coverage to those themes deemed

relevant to a nonminority feminist audience. (Townsend-Bell,

2012, p. 127).

While this was a significant advantage for black families,

black men felt even more emasculated because black women felt

that they didn’t have to answer to them. Black women began to

see that they were in complete control over their own lives

following the pattern of identity development of Black women as

theorized by Helm (1990) in her womanist identity development

theory. This model conceptualizes the process by which black

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women, "move from an externally based to an internally based

definition of oneself as a woman" (Moradi, 2005, p. 226).

Helms's theory holds unique significance for Black women because

it parallels the racial identity development process in which

Black individuals come to recognize, question, and reject

societal definitions of what it means to be a Black women

(Moradi, 2005, p 227).

As the discussion continues about why the decline of black

relationships, I found that most educated black women are

deciding to stay single because they are misrepresented. Like

many discussions of the dating challenges facing black women, it

is often echoed that black women are simply too strong, too

independent and too self-sufficient for their own good (Franklin,

1991). According to the stereotype, African-American women who

are educated are often characterized by black men as bitches and

they run men out of their lives. Because of the issue of power,

black women have becoming more discerning and picky when it comes

to choosing men and in some cases are ultimately choosing men

already in relationships. Thus, black women are choosing careers

over marriage, which often leads to them entering defunct

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relationships, which result children being raised in single

parent homes. Unfortunately, the next generation learns to that

marriage is not an option for black people.

Media’s New Black Independent Woman: Being Mary Jane

As we divert from the issues of capitalism, sexism and black

feminist thought, the surge in African-American inspired media

has increased significantly. We often talk about television

as a basic means of entertainment and escapism, but the

cultural significance of television is about so much more

than that. Networks have become more inclusive of African-

Americans and their life stories. This communal aspect of

television is layered, and perhaps the most significant

facet of it is the idea that television often acts as an

agent of socialization, offering us a glimpse into how we

are both different and alike, and informs how we view and

interact with one another. Television also has the power to

impact how we view ourselves and, by seeing portrayals of

people like us on television, tells us how society views us.

While this has become a trend, African-American entertainment

scripts are still generated images of dysfunction in African-

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American gender relationships; specifically in shows marketed to

black women. According to a report from PR Newswire, African-

American women consume more media than any other comparison

groups, and today, there is more mass and targeted content

featuring African-American women than ever before (PR Newswire,

2013).

The representation of black women in new media is also

a testament to the resiliency of black women. The medium of

television abandoned us, and instead of simply accepting

this, we created our own communities in which we are

represented and where stories are valid. And yet despite

this triumph, the outlook of the representation of black

women on television continues to be disappointing, and it’s

easy to believe that our space in television has already

been delegated for us. Shows like Basketball Wives, Love & Hip-

Hop Atlanta and Real Housewives of Atlanta are viewed primarily

by black women. They do not promote positive images of African-

American women but just recently, Black Entertainment Television

(BET) has adopted its own version of what society views as an

“independent black woman” with its newest series, Being Mary

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Jane. Mary Jane Paul, played by award-winning actress Gabrielle

Union, is a 30-something-year-old single Black career woman,

balancing being the bread winner of her family, the woes of

dating and upholding responsibility to the Black community as a

TV journalist. Mary Jane, formally known as Pauletta Patterson,

is a beautiful, successful and well-educated black woman. She is

the host of a popular news-style daytime show on a CNN-like

network called SNC. Extremely good at what she does and very

personable, Mary Jane seems to have it all. However, despite the

trappings of a well-heeled life, she is looking for love in all

the wrong places, which brings her to the arms of Andre Daniels

played by Omari Hardwick. Andre is a well-educated and

professionally stable black man, who has two children and is

married to an equally successful black woman named Avery Daniels,

played by Robinne Lee.

Mary Jane knows that she cannot continue the relationship

and consequently breaks things off but Mary Jane finds that he’s

more difficult to resist than she thought. The misconception

here is that most independent black women cling to men who will

cheat on and with them and they are fine with it. Like many

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African American women, when Mary Jane is not working, which is

rare, she’s very involved with her family and close friends. She

does her best to always support them and is always willing to

offer her opinion about their individual journeys — even if they

don’t want to hear it — which is most of the time. While these

are prevalent themes in the text, the one stereotype that is the

constant in the series is her relationship with Andre. Here’s

where the problem lies. It is only inevitable with multiple shows

portraying Black women as jezebels, mammies, sapphires and tragic

mulattos, audiences will walk away believing this to be a true

representation of Black women. As more women aspire to be the

“Mary Jane Pauls” of the world, the importance of building and

sustaining meaningful relationships with black men are still

areas of difficulty. Because of this, the more we see images of

the independent black woman and the emasculated, whorish black

males; we continue to fuel the discourse that black men and women

cannot function in relationships.

ConclusionIn conclusion, the issues that encompasses gender relations

in the African-American community stems out America’s dark past.

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Trying to decode the history that continues to haunt blacks is an

ongoing project. I feel that these studies are imperative for

dissecting the African-Americans response to the liberation of

black women in the 21st century and how it affects their

relationships with black men. It is so easy to continue to blame

issues of citizenship, gender and race but at some point,

African-Americans must begin the work of healing and

understanding so that they can work towards building better

relationships. In doing this, I hope that the results of the

study might shed light on what seems to be both a continuing, as

well as a new form of gender power struggle within the African

American community.

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