Black Womanhood

Jerkins wishes to write about and for black women, without reducing their experiences to the blanket of womanhood or feminism, which are often dominated by white women's experience. Her framework makes black women's bodies visible, and persists in expounding on how her black womanhood has influenced how she sees the world and how she is treated by others. Jerkins struggles with her body image, whether she is beautiful, the extent to which she must please men, and just what she needs to project in order to be successful in a white dominated industry. In which ways has her identity as a black woman in a white patriarchy affected how Jerkins views herself and interacts in social spaces?

White Gaze

The white gaze obfuscates the individual qualities of black women, and subsumes their image under a white, racist imaginary that relegates them as inferior to the...