Ben Hardy Instagram – ✨ Next up I want to share an exhibition project I worked on in 2016 & 2017. ✨
Off the back of the poem of the same name, featured in my collection ‘Elephant’, the ‘I, The Angry Black Woman’ & Other Stories exhibition aimed to challenge and disrupt an age-old pernicious trope about Black women and anger.
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‘I, The Angry Black Woman’ & Other Stories Exhibition & The Angry Black Woman Trope
‘The angry black woman trope is a longstanding widely spread pernicious stereotype of Black women that has found its way into mainstream popular culture, the media, working environments, schools, colleges, universities, and other institutions as well as rearing its ugly head in everyday interactions and the personal lives of Black women.
More often than not, Black women are portrayed as aggressive, angry, hysterical, unreasonable, emasculating, strong, tough, uncontrollable as well as ratchet, ghetto, and unfeminine. White womanhood is often the default for what it means to be a woman, with anything deviating from that norm being considered the ‘other’. White womanhood is protected at all costs. Black womanhood is criticised, subjected to ridicule, viewed suspiciously and is often up for debate.
The way black women express their anger, pain and vulnerability is an ongoing focus, particularly in our current times of racial tension and socio-political unrest. The angry black woman trope, as with the mammy archetype and the Jezebel, exist to place Black women firmly in boxes, stripping them of nuance, humanity, and individuality.
Despite the angry black woman trope being popularised in the 1900s, there have been very few explorations of the subject and even fewer led by Black women themselves. In October 2016 and November 2017, writer, producer and performer, Siana Bangura debuted her first exhibition: ‘I, The Angry Black Woman’ & Other Stories at Buster Mantis, in Deptford and Centrala Gallery respectively.
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#passthemic #sianabangura #benhardy #discoverpage #lockdown #lockdownlife #igtakeover #stayhome | Posted on 17/Jan/2021 00:56:00
