Gone with the Wind – Bitch Flicks

Blurred Lines: The Cinematic Appeal of Rape Fantasy

While Whore stigma is gradually declining, kinky desires remain stigmatized, especially in women. By vocally disowning that desire, “Madonna” Anastasia Steele qualifies herself to serve as an avatar for readers who struggle to acknowledge and integrate their sexual urges. The “displaced consent” model of rape fantasy may be recognized, and distinguished from the “sexual assawwwlt” model, by its masterful Ice Prince hero, whose full control is essential to eliminating the heroine’s responsibility.

Trigger Warning: Detailed discussion of rape apologism (and some explicit reference to Robin Thicke)

The Myth Of Male Power by Warren Farrell (PhD, of course) is arguably the intellectual foundation of Men’s Rights Activism (MRA). It is also notorious for its rape apologism, using female fondness for fictional rape fantasy to argue that men should not be prosecuted for date rape, as long as they are “trying to become her fantasy.” For the record, I don’t believe rape fantasies cause rape. In the real world, desire is not so easily misunderstood. What rape fantasy does feed, as Farrell illustrates, is rape apologism. Our cultural models of “romanticized rape” shape the excuses of rapists and encourage their general acceptance. We might respond by pointing out that women consent to rape fantasy automatically, just by imagining it, by turning the pages as they read or by opening their eyes to watch on-screen. Since rape fantasy is consensual, it has nothing in common with the violation of actual rape. But with the often coercive “romance” of Fifty Shades of Grey set to rule the box office, now is a good time to ask: what actually is the cinematic appeal of rape fantasy?

Gone With The Wind: Putting the “awww” in Sexual Assawwwlt

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Rhett Butler threatens to crush his wife’s skull, declares “this is one night you’re not turning me out” then carries her upstairs, visibly struggling. Cut to Scarlett awakening the next morning with smiling pleasure. Her husband threatened to kill her, declared his intention to rape her while she protested, yet she is shown waking up happy the following day. Like Fifty Shades of Grey, this is an adaptation of a female author’s book, cited as sexual fantasy by many female viewers. What’s going on?

Margaret Mitchell’s Gone With the Wind mirrors classic interpretations of Wuthering Heights‘ romance – like Linton, Ashley represents the heroine’s social aspirations, while Rhett mirrors Heathcliff as her primal, resisted passion. This must be understood within a wider tendency by female-authored texts to reject their primary object of desire, which I’ve previously examined for Jane Austen’s Unsuitable Suitor and the “Wolf” of SARCom. In response to such rejection, Twilight‘s Jacob Black forces a long kiss on heroine Bella Swann. Buffy‘s spurned “Wolves,” Spike and hyena-possessed Xander, both attempt to rape Buffy.

This rape-as-romantic-desperation trope echoes the emotional vulnerability of Rhett Butler’s marital rape, where he finally confesses jealousy and desire for Scarlett. As Rhett threatens to crush Scarlett’s skull, the gesture emphasizes his powerlessness to control her thoughts and emotions. Though his role is brutal, supposedly excused by drunkenness, the scene actually affirms Scarlett’s emotional power: he attempts to intimidate her, but cannot; he acknowledges his craving for her emotional approval and his inability to secure it. Treating sexual assault as emotional surrender is the defining feature of this category of rape fantasy, the “awww” in the “sexual assawwwlt.” Because Rhett is the primary love interest, Scarlett’s resistance is a demonstration of emotional power, not lack of desire, as her satisfaction the following morning demonstrates. She is the avatar of female viewers, who both desire Rhett and desire power over Rhett. Our culture views sex as male conquest and female surrender, but “sexual assawwwlt” flips that script: it is female conquest through emotional withholding, provoking a rape that affirms male emotional powerlessness.

The cultural concept of “female sexual power” was born in 411 B.C., with the sex boycott plot of Aristophanes’ comedy Lysistrata. At the time, this was amusing partly because women were understood to have ten times the lust of men. The female fertility cults of Demeter practiced ritual obscenity, the first known sex manual was authored by Philaenis, daughter of Okymenes, and Sappho wrote nine volumes of lesboerotic poetry, all acknowledged literary classics. These expressions of female-authored sexual culture were wiped out by patriarchs of the early christian church. However, the male-authored Lysistrata‘s model of empowerment-through-sexual-resistance survived. “The Rules of Love,” laid down by Eleanor of Aquitaine’s Courts of Love in the 12th Century, included “an easy attainment makes love contemptible” and “jealousy is absolutely required by love.” Eleanor’s influential “Rules of Love” represent an aristocratic female response to social powerlessness, diverting frustration into a sadistic model of love as gratifying empowerment, rather than as emotional fulfillment. Margaret Mitchell’s depicting Scarlett as empowered by her own rape thus reflects over 2,000 years of ideology promoting sexual resistance as an expression of female power. This “female power” of sexual resistance is a poisoned chalice: by separating resistance-as-power from resistance-as-reluctance, it justifies rape as the only way to satisfy female desire, while diverting women from actual social empowerment. “Female sexual power” thus feeds rape apologism and demands male telepathy – a practice best confined to fiction.

Fifty Shades of Grey: Madonna’s Like A Virgin

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If “sexual assawwwlt” represents female sexual conquest, then the “displaced consent” of Fifty Shades of Grey represents disowned responsibility. In E. L. James’ book, Anastasia Steele expresses unwillingness and reluctance to engage in BDSM with Christian, while her consent is detached and embodied as the infamous “inner goddess.” Again, a key to understanding can be found in Jane Austen. Writing at a time of intense Whore stigma, where expressions of female sexuality were harshly punished by the withdrawal of social protection, Austen repeatedly created plots in which the heroine resists her attraction to the Unsuitable Suitor while another woman, usually a female relative, abandons social protection and elopes with him. This constant repetition suggests that the “Whore” relative represents the displaced sex drive of the “Madonna” heroine, an “inner Lydia” comparable to Anastasia Steele’s “inner goddess.” While Whore stigma is gradually declining, kinky desires remain stigmatized, especially in women. By vocally disowning that desire, “Madonna” Anastasia Steele qualifies herself to serve as an avatar for readers who struggle to acknowledge and integrate their sexual urges. The “displaced consent” model of rape fantasy may be recognized, and distinguished from the “sexual assawwwlt” model, by its masterful Ice Prince hero, whose full control is essential to eliminating the heroine’s responsibility. The classic “Ice Prince” of teen SARCom is emotionally intense, but sexually unavailable; E. L. James titillates readers by adapting Twilight‘s sexually unavailable “Ice Prince” Edward into the emotionally unavailable, but sexually intense, Christian Grey.

Compare the earlier Secretary, Erin Cressida Wilson’s adaptation of Mary Gaitskill’s story: the heroine Lee actively requests and provokes the domination of her boss, Mr. Grey, and is depicted in solo acts of masochism and masturbation that clarify her independent desire for BDSM. In BDSM practice, it is the submissive who ultimately controls the play through safe-words and consent, an ironic “paradox of power.” In Fifty Shades of Grey, however, the book’s BDSM negotiations are utterly undermined by Anastasia’s inability to sign or renegotiate Christian’s contracts, due to her disavowal of kinky desire. For sharp analysis of the book’s resulting abusive elements, from the perspective of a practising submissive, see Cliff Pervocracy’s reviews, while E. L. James’ own interviews exemplify covert desire and reinforce norms of respectability politics: “I am fascinated by BDSM, and fascinated as to why anyone would want to be in this lifestyle. Don’t get me wrong – I think it’s as hot as hell, and find Doms hot as hell. I met this guy recently who is a Dom… well… ‘nuff said about that – but he was fucked-up.”

Female director Sam Taylor-Johnson is apparently trying to minimize the book’s disavowal of desire, by emphasizing Dakota Johnson’s lustful facial expressions as nonverbal cues for Jamie Dornan’s Christian. His line “I like to see your face. It gives me some clue what you might be thinking” is prominent in the official trailer. But fangirls now rushing to pre-book tickets are expecting, and will demand, faithfulness to the source novel, including Anastasia’s open reluctance to enter a D/s relationship and her refusal to sign or renegotiate Christian’s contract, which deny her power of consent. E. L. James’ book also shares Gone With The Wind‘s trope of using a sexually aggressive, non-white man to provoke white male heroic protectiveness, suggesting a correlation between mainstream rape fantasy and conservative ideology. How will Taylor-Johnson tackle that? Should we support female directors regardless?

Culture’s association of sexual resistance with (white) respectability, and with (white) entitlement to social protection, acts to detach sexual resistance from lack of desire. Yet, just as Austen’s heroes cannot actually marry both the girl of their dreams and the random female relative who represents her sex drive, a hero’s being justified in forcing himself on an unwilling woman, because her consenting inner goddess is hovering like a sexual Great Gazoo, is equally unrealistic. The seduction of Anastasia may be compared to the seductions of Brad and Janet in The Rocky Horror Picture Show, a rare example of the “displaced consent” trope being unisex, as Brad and Janet’s desire is clear in their visible pleasure at “giving in,” while their vocal resistance reflects social inhibitions and fear of losing status. Janet is shown to be liberated by her coercive seduction, embracing her desires in sex-positive anthem “touch-a, touch-a, touch me,” while Brad caresses his fetish gear and croons, “I feel se-exy!” However, Rocky Horror‘s flamboyant absurdism helps to underline the fantasy aspect of this rape fantasy, as a hypothetical mental experiment in gender and sexual fluidity. Kids, don’t try this at home.

“Blurred Lines”: Male Readings Of Rape Fantasy

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Like its female equivalent, mainstream male rape fantasy centres on forcing the acknowledgement of suppressed female desire. The fact that dominant culture continues to interpret women’s sexual resistance as unconnected to any lack of desire, may be seen in the huge popularity of Robin Thicke’s “Blurred Lines.” While Thicke’s lyrics include consent-positive lines like “go ahead, get at me,” the feminist backlash highlights the damaging impact of invalidating sexual resistance, not to mention Thicke’s creepy delivery (catchy hook, though).

There is no denying that degrading porn (porn focussed on humiliation rather than pleasure) appeals to misogynist men and to sexual predators, but is that all it does? Can its full popularity, dominating the ratings of porn aggregate sites, really be explained only by a widespread sexual hatred lurking in most men? I suggest that comparison with the female model of “sexual assawwwlt” offers a more complex reading. The male porn performer, like Scarlett O’Hara, is not a direct expression of desire but an avatar of sexual frustration. Popular porn is shaped by commercial pressure; to cater to the male viewer’s resentment of the female performer’s unavailability (to him personally), the male performer must paradoxically punish that sexual unavailability while having sex with her. Compare Gone With The Wind‘s urge to punish Rhett Butler’s emotional unavailability, while he’s being emotionally vulnerable. I suggest that cinematic sexual fantasy can only be understood through this contradictory duality: performers represent their characters’ sexual fulfillment, while simultaneously being avatars for the viewer’s conflicting sexual frustration. These dual pressures shape dysfunctional models for imitation.

As long as the performers are willing and comfortable, there is nothing wrong with a purely cinematic rape fantasy, or with the intense trust of consensual BDSM power exchange, that confront inhibitions while cathartically venting sexual frustrations. However, we must recognize the roots of rape fantasy in a toxic sexual culture that stigmatizes female lust and imagines female consent as disempowering surrender. Fantasy is as good a way as any to explore the resulting tensions between power and desire. But punishing female inhibition with bodily violation, when that inhibition stems from punishing female sexuality, adds injury to insult before rubbing battery acid on the wound. Films become toxic when they blur the lines of fantasy and reality, leading viewers to mistake expressions of frustration for models of fulfillment.

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Brigit McCone is semi-apologetically Team Wolf, writes and directs short films and radio dramas.

Normalizing the Black Family

When Solomon, Eliza, and her two children are both sold, she is sold away from her children. Their new slave owner, William Ford, (Benedict Cumberbatch), feeling guilty when he hears Eliza’s sobs of protests, tries to buy the children, but the auctioneer refuses to sell the them. William Ford takes Solomon and a devastated Eliza to his plantation, where she continues to cry on the journey to the plantation. When Ford’s wife, Mistress Ford, hears of new slave Eliza’s plight she callously responds, “Oh poor thing, well she’ll get over it in a day or two.”

This guest post by Atima Omara appears as part of our theme week on Black Families.

In 12 Years of Slave, the theme of family is a tie that binds throughout the story. While the film depicts the life of Solomon Northrup, a freeman captured and sold into slavery, and his struggle to get back to his life and his family. 12 Years also reflects the lives of other slaves he meets who too are separated from their families. 12 Years is very tightly focused on the systematic dehumanization of Black people in the American South during slavery. This film defines the subhuman view of the Black family in the antebellum South that remained pervasive post the Civil War and into the 20^th Century where its effects have filtered into many films and TV shows.

12 Years A Slave is an autobiographical account told from the perspective of Solomon Northrup, after his capture into slavery. While sitting in his first prison, awaiting to be moved into the South, Solomon meets another slave, Eliza, who was essentially treated as a wife by her previous slave owner with whom she also has two children. After his death, Eliza and her two children are sold away and it is there, awaiting the auction block, she meets Solomon. When Solomon, Eliza, and her two children are both sold, she is sold away from her children. Their new slave owner, William Ford, (Benedict Cumberbatch), feeling guilty when he hears Eliza’s sobs of protests, tries to buy the children, but the auctioneer refuses to sell the them. William Ford takes Solomon and a devastated Eliza to his plantation, where she continues to cry on the journey to the plantation. When Ford’s wife, Mistress Ford, hears of new slave Eliza’s plight she callously responds, “Oh poor thing, well she’ll get over it in a day or two.”

Director Steve McQueen beautifully wove in the humanity of Northrup and the other slaves, which made their enslavement that much more heart-wrenching. When Eliza still sobs days later on the Ford plantation because she misses her children, Solomon tries to silence her. She chides him, “Have you stopped crying for YOUR children?!” He retorts, “They are as my flesh…..I survive…I will keep myself hardy until freedom is opportune.” And Solomon does, ingratiating himself to his Master, William Ford, for his work, he receives a violin in which he engraves the name of his wife and children. They are never far from his mind as he tries to desperately find ways to become a freeman again.

Eventually, because Eliza’s crying becomes to annoying to Mistress Ford, she is removed from the plantation. Mistress Ford’s dismissive comments and subsequent removal of Eliza from the plantation is reflective of the antebellum’s American South’s view of the Black person and the view of their family. There was the economic and biblical justifications for slavery, but eventually enslaving other human beings birthed an American ideology of race inferiority. Nineteenth century US Senator John C. Calhoun famously said, “Never before has the Black race of Central Africa, from the dawn of history to the present day, attained a condition so civilized and so improved, not only physically, but morally and intellectually.”

In the minds of white slave owners and their supporters, slavery was a favor to Black people, who could not have lives of their own or feel loss or pain. This ideology is understandable when you consider the horror of what they were justifying. To acknowledge the humanity of Black people would have forced one to acknowledge that slavery was wrong.

Through the evolution of American film and later television, we see the variations of this view that the white slavers have of their Black slaves filter into the lens of white directors, producers, and writers of films and TV shows featuring Black people and their families.

The film that has the distinction of being the first 12-reel full motion picture film in America is D. W. Griffith’s Birth of a Nation in 1915. Commercially successful, the film was controversial due to its portrayal of Black men as unintelligent, barely human and sexually aggressive. The first talking motion picture in 1929 was Al Jolson’s The Jazz Singer, where Jolson performed as a white actor in Black face, recalling the minstrelsy

With those promising precursors films, films in the 1930s hardly shifted. With Gone with the Wind or The Littlest Rebel, audiences never knew the stories of the Black slaves who were supporting characters to Vivien Leigh’s Scarlett O’Hara or Shirley Temple’s little Virginia Carey. Scarlett’s Mammy (played by Hattie McDaniel) we know nothing about, whether she had husband, children, or siblings. Nor do we know much of Virgie’s Uncle Bill (Bill Robinson). Because Mammy and Uncle Billy do not need a family, because their duty is to serve their white families.

From the 1930s to the 1950s, Hollywood’s “Golden Age,” these images of Black people and their families improve barely, especially when theaters refuse to show films with prominent Black leads. Look at the 1950s interpretation of Imitation of Life with actresses Lana Turner and Juanita Moore. At first glance, it is a story of two single women raising their daughters together. Lana Turner’s Lora is a struggling young actress with a daughter who befriends Sarah, the daughter of Juanita Moore’s Annie, who is a homeless Black widow. Because of the girls’ friendship, the women move in together. While you do see the humanity of Annie and the love she has for her daughter Sarah, you realize you don’t see much of Annie’s life outside of that. Annie becomes a maid to Lora and her daughter and is a momma to Sarah. Like Mammy or Uncle Bill, we know little of Annie’s friends, if she ever finds love again, in comparison we do see the love life of Lora’s, her friends, and her career become successful.

The height of the Civil Rights Movement in the 1960s and the conscience shift of the country raised awareness as to the plight and actual humanity of the Black American. With that it brought in some changes and new opportunities for Black characters in film. Actors like Sidney Poitier, Ruby Dee, Ossie Davis, Harry Belafonte, and others challenged the perception of the Black experience in film. In 1961, Black playwright Lorrain Hansberry’s play, A Raisin in the Sun, about a young Black man (Sidney Poitier) trying to find a better life for his family became a film. Behind the scenes it was a play that almost never happened, because it was a predominantly African American cast it took a long time to secure funding for its debut. And even with its final success on Broadway there was much argument between critics who were primarily white as to whether the experience was “universal” or particular to African Americans.

While the movie industry addressed race glacially, television as a newer medium moved at a faster pace in providing more opportunities for Black family portrayal. In 1968, CBS debuted Julia, with Black actress Diahann Carroll as its lead. It was the first show to depict a Black woman in the lead of a show that was a non-stereotypical role. Julia was a single mother and nurse whose husband had been killed in Vietnam. Today, it’s considered “groundbreaking.” Then, critics (again mostly white) derided it for not being “realistic.” Used to seeing nothing but Black poverty on the news, critics held Julia up to that as the standard for Black American life. The Saturday Review’s Robert Lewis Shayon wrote that Julia’s “plush, suburban setting” was “a far, far cry from the bitter realities of Negro life in the urban ghetto, the pit of America’s explosion potential.” Other critics implied the show was a “cartoon.” Unsurprisingly, Ebony Magazine, whose magazine’s readership and staff are Black Americans, appreciated its significance in showing a “slice of Black America.”

The 1970s brought more Black family focused television; of significance was Good Times and The Jeffersons, both where productions from white liberal showrunner Norman Lear. The portrayals of the Black family vastly improved, if by virtue of the fact that they were getting time on major network television, some shows still would never entirely escape the stereotypical trope in the 1970s.

Good Times featured actors Esther Rolle and John Amos in the lead roles. They played Florida and James Evans, heads of a working class Black family who live in housing project in Chicago. Notably, African American writers conceived the idea and the initial script of the show Norman Lear picked up. Actors Rolle and Amos signed up for the project, interested in a regular series with a Black working class family at the center. Not too long into the show, one of the children of the Evans family, JJ Evans, became a popular character for his phrase “Dy-NO-mite” and his funny antics. As the show progressed, it increasingly focused on him and crazy antics, which recalled the days of Black minstrelsy shows in the early 20^th century, where usually white actors in blackface exaggerated real-life Black circumstances in a cartoonish way and reinforced stereotypes of Black people. The Evans family, particularly JJ, became subject to the long line of stereotypical portrayal of African American family life much to the chagrin of actors Esther Rolle and John Amos. Behind the scenes Esther Rolle left the series in frustration and John Amos was fired.

Lear’s The Jeffersons in comparison was an improvement upon Good Times, in that it showed a working class Black family, who made good and moved to the wealthy neighborhoods of New York. Even though the show took on political topics, it is notable for featuring more of the everyday life of this Black family with its colorful patriarch George Jefferson, played by Sherman Helmsley. The show enjoyed a successful 10-year run. In some ways, The Jeffersons was the grandfather of later Black family-centered shows like The Cosby Show and The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air, with Sherman Helmsley reprising his role as George Jefferson to appear on The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air.

As the 1980s dawned there were more Black family-centered shows like 227 and Amen, but one would be remiss in not mentioning the The Cosby Show in the 1980s, which came out of already established comedian Bill Cosby’s stand up act about his family. The Huxtables were an upper-middle class Black family who lived in Brooklyn. Cliff Huxtable (Bill Cosby) and Claire Huxtable (Phylicia Rashad) were the parents to their five children. The show was revolutionary for the Black family because it was distinct in featuring the everyday occurrences, drama, and humor of family life. The Cosby Show occasionally dealt with serious issues like dyslexia or teen pregnancy, but it was not a show that focused on racial politics; indeed, that may have been the point. Some criticized the lack of discussion around race or racial politics in the series, fearing that white audiences who embraced the show would consider “racism” a thing of the past. What is certain is that The Cosby Show was viewed as seminal in Black family portrayal on television. When it ended in the early 1990s, there was an influx of Black family-centered comedies that were greenlighted for major network television like In Living Color, The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air, Family Matters, Roc, Hanging with Mr. Cooper, Sister, Sister, and the list goes on. Notably many of these shows had African American creators or writers, which allowed for more Black family storytelling.

We have come a long way in the normalizing of the Black American family, but given the diversity of the Black American family experience, it is clear we still have a long way to go in Black family storytelling.

Atima Omara is a political strategist of 10 years who has served as staff on eight federal and local political campaigns and other progressive causes. Her writings focus on gender, race, and politics but also how gender and race are reflected in film and popular culture. In her sparetime, she reads, watches movies and documentaries, and attends film festivals when she can. You can find more of her writing at www.atima-omara.com. She tweets at @atima_omara.

The Fantasy of Mammy, the Truth of Patsey

However, I want to challenge that particular narrative: that nothing has changed. If we juxtapose McDaniel’s Mammy alongside Nyong’o’s Patsey, we might realize that, apart from being slaves, their characters are nothing alike. Indeed, from a historical and cinematic context, something significant has changed. Mammy is the mask that pro-slavery apologists used to erase the existence of the Patseys in slavery. It is remarkable that it took 75 years to remove that mask from depictions of cinematic slavery.

This guest post by Janell Hobson previously appeared at the Ms. Blog and is cross-posted with permission.

It was not lost on some that, 75 years after Hattie McDaniel became the first African American to win a Best Supporting Actress Oscar, the beautiful, poised, and talented Lupita Nyong’o would become the sixth black woman to win that same Oscar—and for playing the same type of role, a slave.

If we count Halle Berry’s Oscar for Best Actress in a Leading Role, that brings the full count of African American women Oscar winners to seven. And when we look at the types of portrayals that won these awards—McDaniel as “Mammy,” Whoopi Goldberg as a con-artist spiritual adviser, Halle Berry as an oversexed and imbalanced grieving widow and mother, Jennifer Hudson as a sassy yet rejected lover singing with much attitude, Monique as a deranged abusive welfare mother, Octavia Spencer as a sassy yet abused maid, and now Lupita Nyong’o as a raped, whipped and victimized slave—it’s very easy to imagine that our subservience as black women (or even our hysteria as women in general; just look at the roles that white actresses often win for) is what is recognizable and later celebrated. In short, such recognition might convince us that nothing has changed.

However, I want to challenge that particular narrative: that nothing has changed. If we juxtapose McDaniel’s Mammy alongside Nyong’o’s Patsey, we might realize that, apart from being slaves, their characters are nothing alike. Indeed, from a historical and cinematic context, something significant has changed. Mammy is the mask that pro-slavery apologists used to erase the existence of the Patseys in slavery. It is remarkable that it took 75 years to remove that mask from depictions of cinematic slavery.

There are other changes that we cannot overlook: The fact that McDaniel was forced to sit in the back row the night of the Oscars ceremony, segregated from the rest of her white cast members in the movie Gone with the Wind, contrasts with Nyong’o sitting up front with all the other A-list stars. There is also the fact that McDaniel and other black actors in the Negro Actors Guild fought to remove the n-word from the script of Gone with the Wind, as well as other offensive scenes of racial degradation (shoe-shining her master’s shoes on her knees, or having Butterfly McQueen’s Prissy eating watermelon or being slapped onscreen by Vivien Leigh’s Scarlett O’Hara). I sometimes wonder: Had the Negro Actors Guild not intervened and those elements remained in the film, would we be able to celebrate this classic without embarrassment? Thanks to the efforts of McDaniel, she infused a long-standing stereotype of Mammy with some complicated humor, and she also helped make Gone with the Wind respectable for later generations.

Vivien Leigh and Hattie McDaniel in Gone with the Wind — Vivien Leigh and Hattie McDaniel in *Gone with the Wind*

But this is 2014, and we no longer play to respectability politics. The Civil Rights generation exposed the harsh realities of slavery’s history, with its legacy of racism and white supremacy, through our own felt experiences; the hip-hop generation embraced and poked holes in the n-word with a vengeance; and the millennial generation rightly condemns the nostalgic lies that movies like Birth of a Nation and Gone with the Wind have fostered about slavery. Those lies are hard to erase, since the big, expansive movie screen, with its elaborate montage in Birth and dreamy technicolor in Wind, solidified these myths. Against these grand narratives, the marginal and enslaved black woman’s story is often silenced.

It took a no-holds-barred black filmmaker like Steve McQueen to not only face the harshness of slavery—as told in Solomon Northup’s 1853 narrative, 12 Years a Slave—but to paint its cruelty in sharp colors, to sparingly use sound to build up dread or emotional release and especially to cast a dark-skinned actress such as Nyong’o who could interject sexuality and emotional depth to a character who might otherwise have been reduced to symbolic black woman victimhood. Instead, she emerged as the emotional center in one of the few slave movies that fully humanizes the slave story.

Lupita Nyong'o in 12 Years a Slave — Lupita Nyong’o in *12 Years a Slave*

Which is why the journey from Mammy to Patsey is a historic big deal. The image of Mammy was deliberately designed by pro-slavery advocates to deny the existence of slave rapes. Her dark skin (now celebrated thanks to Nyong’o’s natural beauty) was loudly negated as an aesthetic ideal. Her big and shapeless body created in the white imagination an image of safety, in which racial mixing did not occur except in the realm of loyal servitude and fierce protectionism. Moreover, her unfeminine, aggressive style made it difficult to view her as victimized by the slave system (imagine how Mammy would look in a scene with Michael Fassbender’s terrifying Edwin Epps).

Mammy was literally the visual opposition to Scarlett O’Hara, someone confined to slavery and sidekick status to the white heroine. Contrast such a pairing with Patsey and Mistress Epps (portrayed icily by Sarah Paulson), two women confined to the same man while one is given the privilege of her class position as wife and the power of whiteness to subjugate Patsey to cruelty and violence—an added insult to the injury of sexual violence that Patsey must endure from her master.

12 Years a Slave removes the masks from Gone with the Wind, and we recognize this through the very different depictions of Mammy and Patsey. As we bask in the afterglow of Lupita Nyong’o’s win—the climax to a whirlwind awards season in which we witnessed Nyongo’s transformation “up from slavery” to red-carpet fashion icon and role model for darker-skinned women everywhere—her Oscar acceptance speech said it best:

“It does not escape me for one moment that so much joy in my life is thanks to so much pain in someone else’s, and so I salute the spirit of Patsey.”

How can we, like Nyong’o, salute the spirit of Patsey? It only took 75 years for us to even catch a glimpse into the truth of her life. I would call that cinematic progress, and it’s merely the tip of the iceberg of painful history that technicolor tried to distort and which we can now watch with a bit more realism.

Janell Hobson is an associate professor of Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies at the University at Albany, State University of New York. She is the author of Body as Evidence: Mediating Race, Globalizing Gender (SUNY Press, 2012) and Venus in the Dark: Blackness and Beauty in Popular Culture (Routledge, 2005), and a frequent contributor to Ms.

Female Friendship: The Roundup

Check out all of the posts for our Female Friendship Theme Week here.

Pretty Little Friendships by Victor Kirksey-Brown

I don’t know if the writers portray this type of friendship and steer away from many of the harmful female friend tropes on purpose, or if it’s just because there’s no way to fit them in with all the other crazy shit that’s going on, but the strong and positive friendship these girls share is one of the reasons I enjoy Pretty Little Liars.

“I’m a Veronica”: Power and Transformation Through Female Friendships in Heathers by Alize Emme

A snappy dark comedy set in a high school bubble, Heathers touches on difficult subjects including murder and suicide, and nonchalantly addresses major social issues like female friendship and power. The friendships we are introduced to steer every aspect of the story as it progresses and bring us into a world where female characters aren’t just cardboard cutouts but multidimensional, seriously flawed, and sinfully interesting young women.

It Takes Two for Friendship by Laura Money

To me, this movie is all about a deep female friendship. Yes, it is a bit narcissistic on the surface – instantly falling in love with someone who looks just like you – but it really captures the essence of friendship, connection, and trust. Alyssa and Amanda realise that they look alike on their first meeting but soon understand that they are also both deeply unsatisfied with particular elements in their lives.

“She’s My Best Friend”: Friendship and the Girls of Teen Wolf by Andrea Taylor

The girls of Beacon Hills, especially Allison and Lydia, are loyal, dedicated friends. They help each other out and they encourage each other. They stand up for each other. They’re best friends with all the complexities that relationship implies. There are better, or at least more consistent, examples in media to turn to, but the perfect moments of female friendship in Teen Wolf mean a lot to me.

You’ll Never Walk Alone: Heavenly Creatures and the Power of Teenage Friendship by Caroline Madden

Peter Jackson shows the girls interacting and playing in these worlds. “The Fourth World” is a beautiful garden. Borvonia is a dark and delightfully wicked world of castle intrigue and courtly love. Seeing the girls in the worlds they’ve created demonstrates the extent of the fantasies and the pleasures their imaginative and playful friendship brings. Pauline and Juliet have an intense friendship; they don’t want anyone to stand in their way of spending time together or stop the joy that it brings for them.

Why This Bitch Loves the B— by Mychael Blinde

I avoided Don’t Trust the B— in Apartment 23 for quite a while; at a cursory Netflix glance it looked like anti-feminist tripe featuring catty women pitted against each other in a false dichotomy of “nice” and “bitch.” Then I watched it.

I could not have been more wrong.

The Queer Female Friendship of Frances Ha by Sarah Smyth

For Frances Ha is not a film where “boy-meets-girl,” and there is definitely no diamond ring. The love story of Frances Ha is between the titular character, Frances (Greta Gerwig) and her best friend, Sophie (Mickey Sumner), and it is precisely this friendship between two women which questions, resists, and challenges the definition of love posed by the (primarily) heterosexual and (almost always) heteronormative romcom genre.

I Married a Monster: Female Friendship in The Other Woman by Chantell Monique

Instead of hating and seeing each other as competition, the women form a bond, increasing their woman-power. Kate decides that she wants to make Mark pay for his unfaithfulness saying, “I want him to have to start over,” but she’s afraid she doesn’t have the killer instincts to do it. Her new friends step in, telling her that she does and that if they work together, they can get their revenge.

In Spite of Mean Girls: The Radical Vision of Pretty Little Liars by Jessica Freeman-Slade

In her bestselling collection ‘Bad Feminist,’ Roxane Gay starts the listicle entitled “How to Be Friends with Another Woman” with this as the very first item: “Abandon the cultural myth that all female friendships must be bitchy, toxic, or competitive. This myth is like heels and purses—pretty but designed to SLOW women down.”

Romy and Michele’s High School Reunion: Bosom Buddies Against The World by Emma Kat Richardson

While there’s quite a bit that’s frivolous about Romy and Michele – the film’s tagline is “The Blonde Leading the Blonde” – there is also, much more importantly, the heartwarming love story at the film’s creamy center. But this love has nothing to do with the complications and disappointments that romantic relationships can bring; rather, it’s what the Greeks called agape, or a deeply spiritual, passionate love between intimate friends.

We’re All for One, We’re One for All in A League of Their Own by Rhianna Shaheen

At the end, many of the league’s players reunite to be inducted into the National Baseball Hall of Fame. Old friendships rekindle and emotions soar. After following these women through what must have been the best time they ever had in their youth it is refreshing to see authentic portrayals of them as older women. It feels like their lives are unfolding before my eyes.

Walking and Talking With Non-Toxic Women Friends by Ren Jender

A short clip at the beginning of writer-director Nicole Holofcener’s first film, 1996’s Walking and Talking, lets us know that Amelia (Catherine Keener) and Laura (Anne Heche) have been friends since adolescence. Both are in their 30s and living in New York City–Laura with her boyfriend Frank, and Amelia alone in the sort of sunlit airy apartment someone with her job, even in a pre-gentrified New York (which, like many films from then and now is also mysteriously bereft of people of color), would never be able to afford.

Practical Magic: Sisters as Friends, Mirrors by Olivia London-Webb

This is why I love this movie. I have two real sisters in my life. One born and one chosen. I have strong powerful women everywhere I look–my friends, my mother, my sister-in-law, and my mother-in-law. I would go through hell for them. They would go through hell for me. What we are more than anything else are each other’s mirrors.

Martyrs: Female Friendships Can Be Bloody Complex by Dierdre Crimmins

Often in feminist criticism female friendships are discussed as a great barometer for the authenticity of the female characters. Strong bonds and healthy interactions serve the dual purpose of highlighting positive female roles and for showing the many dimensions of women as whole persons. I propose that in order to continue the push to show women as well-developed characters we also need representations of flawed female friendships.

St. Trinian’s: Girlish Wiles and Cunning Friendships by Bethany Ainsworth-Cole

Now whilst this seems like an odd collection of friendships, it is an important selection of lessons. It fosters the idea that girls working together will always be better than scheming men, and will always sort things out even if they do need help. Girls are fearless: willing to steal, blow up iron bars, fight back against creeps, and speak out. And most importantly, it’s OK to make mistakes. The girls also enjoy themselves doing it.

Best Frenemies Forever by Emanuela Betti

Can women be friends? Or, most importantly, can two women who share the same man be friends? The depiction of genuinely loving and caring female friends has found its way onto many movies and TV shows, but when it comes to the idea of a more complex situation—the “frenemies”—it’s harder to find characters that do it justice. There is a shallow notion that when two women want the same man, they turn into hair-pulling, catfighting brats.

The First Wives Club and First World “Feminism” by Amanda Lyons

But the focus on “getting everything” was a little hard to stomach from women living in huge condos in the heart of New York with an interior designer on their payroll. Somehow it felt like the message was getting a little lost in the middle of all the high-society hob-nobbing – there was nothing particularly universal about it, and any feminism that was being communicated was certainly of a rarefied kind that most of us wouldn’t be able to access.

Scarlett and Melanie: The Ultimate BFFs by Jennifer Hollie Bowles

Seed & Spark: Female Friendship On Screen–Art Imitating Life by Liz Cardenas Franke

But what if I spent my time, instead, helping another female filmmaker make her movie involving female friendship? Wouldn’t that be just as meaningful? And could it perhaps be making an even bigger statement—promoting the “cause,” so to speak?

Homegirls Make Some Noise: Antônia and the Magic of Black Female Friendships by Lisa Bolekaja

Classism, racism, sexism, and colorism are very real in the world of Antônia. But the film shows us a fresh narrative of Black women succeeding despite living in a slum, despite poverty, despite violence and all the ills that pervade real life. For just a moment, I’m able to watch Black women who are free to be themselves. They don’t have to unpack external baggage based on a checklist of intersections involving their skin color, social status, or gender. That is a rare treat. It’s their tight friendship that sustains them. Music is friendship, and friendship is music.

Kamikaze Girls: When a Lolita Meets a Yanki by Jasmine Sanchez

While their connection doesn’t form immediately, especially in Momoko’s case, the two eventually are able to form a close bond. When they first meet they are both taken aback by one another’s exterior–Momoko is horrified to be dealing with a yanki and Ichiko thinks that Momoko is a little girl. Once she finds out they are the same age Ichiko admits to her folly, “I shouldn’t judge by appearances,” which Momoko counters with, “But appearances says everything.” This sets up their dynamic for the rest of the film as Ichiko is willing to look beyond, while Momoko prefers the superficial.

Julia: A Portrait of Heroic Friendship in an Age of Darkness by Rachael Johnson

Although peppered with flashbacks to the women’s childhood and youth, Julia is set during their formative academic and professional years. The film chronicles the women’s personal and political lives in the decade that saw the rise of Fascism. We witness how the fight against those dark forces transforms both friends.

9 to 5: The Necessity of Female Friendships at Work by Deb Rox

Like the three fates, the friends conjure a life-altering force by listening to each other, by laughing, by being friends. The scenes where they envisioned the demise of their “sexist, egotistical, lying, hypocritical bigot” of a boss start to play out for real in madcap, accidental, and intentional ways. As the fabric unrolls, each woman experiences being supported by the other two and feels compelled to help her friends. In their confusions, cover-ups, and retribution schemes, Violet, Doralee, and Judy knit together a solid friendship where each character finds strength and support. And manage to avoid getting caught. It’s the little things.

“I Love You More Than My Luggage”: Female Friendships and Fertility by Joanne Bardsley

The implication of the relative richness of the representations of female friendships at either end of the fertile period is that at these times the female is free to explore relationships which are not sexual but during the fertile period the female’s most important relationships are sexual. This is damaging and dangerous as it is a structural reinforcement of the objectification of women. We only see our friendships represented on screen when we are no longer of use to the patriarchy, when we have either yet to serve our function or have already performed our reproductive duties. It is only in the margins that we are free to pursue our own interests.

Making Sure Female Friendship Films Aren’t Forgotten: Take Care of My Cat by Adam Hartzell

The film is about the evolving friendships of five young South Korean women as they step away from their technical high school into a less certain world. Their degrees of closeness shift as they consider their futures in the face of particular restrictions in work and life opportunities due to gender and class discrimination.

Frances Ha: Chasing Sophie by Rachel Wortherly

In my experience, people who have seen this film often mistake Sophie’s actions as abandoning Frances for her boyfriend, Patch. The fact that it happens differently is a breath of fresh air. Rather, it represents an early point in which audiences experience the divide between Frances and Sophie in physical and emotional aspects. Sophie sees the opportunity to move on and fulfill her dreams, while Frances’ dream is fractured. The story of “us” that precedes this action becomes their separate, respective stories: “the story of Frances” and “the story of Sophie.”

Fearless Friendship! Usagi and Rei by Kathryn Diaz

Growing up isn’t cute. At six or 16 or anywhere in between, figuring out who you are and what your place in the world is isn’t sparkly fun-times. The best you can hope for is to have a real friend to muddle through the worst of it with you, someone who is having just as much of a crazy time as you are, who will run to your defense, give you pep talks when you’re about to face the Dark Kingdom, and shamelessly make fun of you for being such a crybaby after you call her a meanie.

What Now and Then Taught Me About Friendship by Kim Hoffman

Summer has always been a magical time where childhood lingers, and every time I get on a swingset again, or have a hankering for a push pop, or throw on my Now and Then soundtrack, I think of my childhood and feel invigorated with that rush of youth. I think of Taylor and Sara, and a time when we were so eager to make our own adventures. I also think of those four girls from the Gaslight Addition; somehow they affected my life by making me appreciate what it means to be and have a true friend in this wild world.

Reality Bites: A Tale of Two Ladies by Beatrix Coles

While a fun exercise, it’s really just as counter-productive to reduce these two women to their Reality Bites character archetypes as it is pointless. But yet, there is something familiar and soothing in these roles. We want the pretty girl who falls from grace punished, just as we want the girl wearing glasses to have a political point of view and to not be too concerned about whether she has a boyfriend.

Feisty and Heisty: Female Friendship in The First Wives Club by Artemis Linhart

The main characters’ friendship goes way back: a flashback shows the group in college, together with their valedictorian and close friend Cynthia. The four of them vow to be friends forever. This, however, turns out to be easier said than done. After graduation, the four of them lose touch and are only reunited years later, with the occasion being Cynthia’s funeral. After her husband took financial advantage of her and then left her for a younger woman, she commits suicide. At a post-funeral get-together, the three women bond over their own failed marriages and spite for their ex-husbands. Their friendship is rekindled as they decide to settle the score with their exploitative exes.

When Friendships Fray: Me Without You, Not Waving But Drowning, and Brokedown Palace by Elizabeth Kiy

Not all friendships are built to last. Teenage friendships are little romances between two people, tiny beautiful, impossibly fragile things that break apart upon touch or close examination. Just as a true romantic relationship between two unformed people rarely lasts, so often we grow out of our early friendships. Because so much of growing up means developing into a person who can live in the world, films about the ends of friendships can be just as satisfying coming of age stories as the typical narratives of beginnings. Each ending after all, is the beginning of something else.

“We Stick Together”: Rebellion, Solidarity, and Girl Crushes in Foxfire by Jenny Lapekas

In the spirit of Boys on the Side, along with a dose of teen angst, Foxfire is perhaps the most bad ass chick flick ever. Many Angelina Jolie fans are not aware of this 1996 phenomenon, where Angie makes a name for herself as a rebellious free spirit who changes the lives of four young women in New York. Based on the Joyce Carol Oates novel by the same name, ‘Foxfire’ is the epitome of girl power and female friendship, a pleasant departure from the competition and spitefulness often portrayed between women characters on the big screen (see Bride Wars and Just Go with It). However, it does seem that Hollywood is catching on as of late, and producing films that cater to a more progressive viewership (see Bridesmaids and The Other Woman). When I first saw Foxfire around 16 years old, I stole the VHS copy from the video store where I worked at the time.

Scarlett and Melanie: The Ultimate BFFs

This guest post by Jennifer Hollie Bowles appears as part of our theme week on Female Friendship.

Gone With the Wind is one of my favorite movies of all time. Of course, it has its social ills, historical flaws, and damn if super-strong Scarlett doesn’t whine over men a lot, but I still love it. The dynamic relationships and subtleties of emotions and interactions captured on film is a classically beautiful adventure to behold. Yeah, so I dig the movie, and I’ve always been a fan of Scarlett, her southern spitfire, and her bold feminist acts.

I’ve seen the movie at least a dozen times. When I first watched it as an adolescent, I remember almost hating Melanie. She was so mealy mouthed and annoying. I was, however, not in tune with the more demure, mature, calm, centered, and otherwise introverted part of myself at the time. Flash forward five years, and I start to see Melanie in a different light. Flash forward a decade, and I love her as much as I do Scarlett.

Scarlett was often a bitch to Melanie, and even though Scarlett was a bitch to everyone unless she wanted something, she was an uber-bitch to Melanie on purpose—most of the time. Until Melanie needed her. Then she was the most helpful bitch in the world. Melanie, on the other hand, was the epitome of kindness and compassion to everyone—most of the time. Until Scarlett needed her. Then she was kindest you-can’t-say-no-to-me bitch in the world.

One of the most intriguing things about the extreme Scarlet-Melanie polarity is that their best and worst traits were ultimately highlighted through their friendship. Together, they show the manifested metaphors of fire and water. Scarlett maintained a world view of passion; Melanie maintained a world view of non-judgment. Every time that Melanie seemed weak and dispassionate, she rose to the occasion to exhibit passion with Scarlett, and every time that Scarlett seemed strong and judgmental, she rose to the occasion to exhibit compassion with Melanie.

Melanie’s character was filled with a rare sort of gratitude that most people utterly lack. She was able to read others and feel gratitude for their existence, no matter how different it was from her own (take her kindness toward the prostitute Belle as a prime example). She mentored everyone around her, and she was continuously counted upon to aid those in need. Melanie also had a very deep love for Scarlett right from the beginning. She revered (and perhaps envied in her own way) Scarlett’s hot-headedness, and she expressed her love for Scarlett throughout the film.

Scarlett, on the other hand, was filled with a rare sort of will power and drive that most people utterly lack. She would forge through any circumstance in order to not only survive, but thrive. She was counted upon to make things work when others failed. Scarlett had a very deep jealousy of Melanie, and she expressed criticism and indignation about Melanie countless times throughout the film. However, while the movie does not expose Scarlett’s unfolding realizations per se, we definitely discover Scarlett appreciating Melanie as the story progresses. Scarlett sees Melanie’s strength in an unforgettable scene where Scarlett kills a “Yankee” intruder. Melanie yells out the window and promptly makes up a lie about the gunshot so the others in the household won’t worry. Scarlett says, “What a cool eye you are, Melly.”

An amazing juxtaposition of their characters occurs later in the film. A couple of gossiping no-gooders find Scarlett and Ashley (Melanie’s husband) hugging. Oddly enough, it is the one scene in which Scarlett is not really being inappropriate with Ashley. Everyone in town knows about the hug, and everyone is bashing Scarlett for her shameful behavior. Rhett coerces Scarlett into wearing a gorgeous, sexy scarlet dress and drops her off all by herself at Melanie’s house for Ashley’s big social birthday party.

Both Rhett and Scarlett expect Melanie to publicly throw Scarlett out of her house for being inappropriate with her husband. Melanie does no such thing. She goes against the suggestions and wishes of everyone in the room and embraces Scarlett, doting on her with a plethora of kind, welcoming statements. She even asks Scarlett to help her receive guests, and then refers to Scarlett in the presence of Ashley as “our Scarlett.” Scarlett is obviously immensely grateful for Melanie’s character, friendship, understanding, and behavior in this scene, and Melanie is obviously driven by her own passionate motives to do what she wants, regardless of what others think—just as Scarlett would.

The implications for Scarlett’s ridiculous pining over Ashley and her friendship with Melanie is a complicated one. On the one hand, it seems as though Scarlett is driven by something she can’t put her finger on when it comes to her obsession with Ashley, and Melanie just happens to be his wife. Yet, if we observe closely, we find that Scarlett is as drawn to Melanie as she is Ashley, and near the end of the film, we see Scarlett identifying the highest ideals of a lost way of life with both of them. She loves and yearns for them both along with her love and yearning for lost southern culture because it is in her nature to want what is difficult, and in this case, impossible to attain.

If we get really psychological, we find that Melanie and Ashley are both representations of everything Scarlett is not. It is easier, however, for Scarlett to outwardly—project and individuate—through Ashley, the shadow male/animus archetype of her psyche, rather than the far too close anima/shadow female archetype of her psyche.

Regardless of how psychological or interpretive you want to get with Scarlett and Melanie’s friendship, it serves as an invaluable example for how women can accept, value, and interact with one another. For example, if a woman dresses more provocatively than you, perhaps, as Melanie stated, she is just more “high-spirited,” and she can’t help that the men just “naturally flock to her.” If a woman needs help during childbirth, nothing else matters but helping her, just as Scarlett helped her “Melly.”

It’s suggested all along that Melanie understood Scarlett, and Scarlett understood Melanie. It’s as if Melanie knew all about Scarlett’s pining for Ashley and the underlying reasons why she felt that way, and Scarlett knew all about Melanie’s knowing acceptance. On her deathbed, Melanie asks to see Scarlett, who is the last person she communicates with before she dies. Scarlett receives Melanie’s last words with respect, holding on to their guiding significance and meanings with deeply rooted trust. The entire dynamic of their relationship just makes sense at that point: their bond was unbreakable.

Jennifer Hollie Bowles is a widely published multi-genre writer, including satire, poetry, op-eds, erotica, horoscope columns, fiction, eco living blogs, how-tos, and beyond. She lives in the Greater Boston area with her amazing husband and their blissed-out pit bull. She enjoys cooking from scratch, teaching creative writing workshops, and providing unique services via www.holisticnook.com.

Bitch Flicks’ Weekly Picks

Check out what we’ve been reading this week–and let us know what you’ve been reading/writing in the comments!

New Documentary “Anita” is a Powerful Look at Race, Work, and Scandal by Tiana Reid at Bitch Media

The Nonhuman Disney Princesses (Deconstructing Disney) by Corey Lee Wrenn at Human-Animal Studies Cinema

Why We Need More ‘Ugly’ People On TV by Lindy West at Jezebel

10 female directors you, and the Academy, should keep an eye on by Harriet Minter at The Guardian

MPAA Data Shows That Women Are Still The Majority of Moviegoers by Melissa Silverstein at Women and Hollywood

So…where’s Dolores Huerta’s movie? by Verónica Bayetti Flores at Feministing

Drop everything and take your kids to see ‘Divergent’ by Margot Magowen at Reel Girl

‘Gone With the Wind’ prequel starring Mammy may be a mistake by Ronda Racha Penrice at the Grio

Disney’s Missteps on “Alice in Arabia” Show the Need for Complex Muslim Characters on TV by Stephanie Abraham at Bitch Media

What have you been reading/writing this week? Tell us in the comments!

Women in Science Fiction Week: 21st Century Mammy: Older Black Women Are the Lowest Rung on the Visibility Ladder of Science Fiction

Guinan (Whoopi Goldberg) in Star Trek: The Next Generation

Guest post written by Joanne Bardsley.

At some point in the near future, a mass genocide, coupled with a widespread sterilisation programme, occurs. This results in an overwhelmingly white population (genetic preservation orders are been enacted for redheads and natural blondes). Compulsory euthanasia exists for the elderly, although four people at a time are excepted because of their great leadership skills. Babies are raised Brave New World style in farms far away from the public eye but girl children often succumb to a mysterious illness which kills them before they reach adulthood. The women who do survive this mysterious illness suffer changes to their metabolism so that they never need to eat and never put on weight.

The two older black women who have survived the depredations enacted on non-whites, females and the elderly are so relieved to be alive that they devote their whole lives to the service of others.

The Oracle (Gloria Foster) in The Matrix and The Matrix Revolutions

The lack of representation of older black women in science fiction is coupled with a complete lack of interest in developing any kind of independent agenda for their characters. Guinan in Star Trek: The Next Generation and the Oracle in The Matrix, the only two named older black women that I (or anybody else that I asked) could think of, are recycled wholesale from the stereotypical mammy of the slave era.

Mammy (Hattie McDaniel) in Gone with the Wind

The main features of the stereotypical mammy are grounded in a white fantasy; often these women were wet nurses, bringing up their white charges in a far more intimate relationship than either have with their biological families. It is not Scarlett O’Hara’s mother who fusses about her eating habits, does up her dress, or worries about her relationships. It is Mammy. Scarlett, and the viewers of Gone With the Wind, never consider what Mammy might think of their relationship, or worry that she might have children of her own whom she cannot raise. We are content to construct a fantasy in which Mammy wants nothing more than to feed, clothe and care for her white charge.

Neither Guinan nor the Oracle appear to have any other desire than to help others. Guinan does have hidden talents; she can outwit Captain Picard and outshoot Lieutenant Worf, she is even prepared to take on the omnipotent Q. However, her main preoccupation is serving food, drink and advice to the crew of the Starship Enterprise. The Oracle literally only exists to guide others, she is the matrix’s help programme. Her help comes with a side of cookies and is served in a dingy kitchen.

The preoccupation with food seems to be a particular feature of the mammy and possibly explains her continued presence in our fantasies. She exists to feed us. She alone of all women in the future is allowed to be plump and to wear less than skin tight clothing. Her presence is symbolically and physically maternal, yet her slave status denies her the independent desires of a mother, and removes the rival demands of a father; she exists for us alone.

Joanne Bardsley teaches English and Media Studies in North West London. She is currentlystudying for a Masters in Education.