REEL WOMEN:BLACK WOMEN AND LITERACY IN FEATURE FILMS

Many times we watch films just for the entertainment perspective of things. We look at it form an emotional perspective and not really at the deep meaning within the film. This article by Joanne Dowdy indicate that we should take a step back from the emotional perspectives of important films such as "the Josephine Baker Story"' "Clara's Heart", and "The Color Purple"to establish the deeper meaning of the film and how we can apply that to our lives. By doing this we establish a sense of space for "critical observation" so that we approach the world around us in a different perspective.

Each one of the films demonstrate the views of Black women and how they view the environment around them. The films also convey the literacy of Black women and how they interacted with various cultures and the White society. "Movies provide the opportunity to witness the everyday experience of Black women within certain sociocultural contexts" (Dowdy 164). The movies mentioned above all indicate the different levels of literacy women had in the different films and recognize the differences as well as the similarities that our past has from our present and how it'll change in our future. She also accentuates the importance of taking the events and perspectives of those films and apply them to our lives and society around us today because it will make us be more literate of our environment.

This article illustrates the intelligences of Black women in films and how talented and literate they are. Dowdy tells the importance of students watching these films and extracting the importance of them, especially Black women. Being that television can be used to enhance education, Dowdy states that it is important that we extract the necessary data from these films to understand the Black experience and the history of our people. "We can use the lessons learned from our experience with popular film to build a bridge to learning more about the history of African-American women and celebrating their contribution to our society and the world" (Dowdy 180).

Unearthing Hidden Literacy: Seven Lessons I Learned in A Cotton Field 37-47

Literacy is the ability to functionally use a learned skill. As we all know there are many other kinds of literacies besides academic. We do not only learn in a classroom setting. We learn something new every day from our surroundings. The environment we grow up in can have a huge impact on how we will turn out as adults. This story was about a woman reflecting on her summers spent picking cotton and how it molded her into the person she is now. At first she repressed these memories and hated even having to do it. While going through something unpleasant we only see the negative, until we have time to reflect upon it.

I can relate to this story because I have many similar experiences. Being a child I used to worry about how much fun I could have instead of the educational value in doing something. My mother being wiser than me would constantly enroll me in vigorous educational summer programs and special schools. She made the decision for me to go to a Tavis Smiley summer program in California against my will. The first few days I hated it with all my heart until the last two days. Now when I look back on this experience words can’t explain how much I appreciate having had the opportunity to participate in something like that. It exposed me to all new ideas, new people, and the idea that I could go to college.

We should take her advice as a lesson about appreciating our pasts. Smith says people grow by “interrogating their experiences even those they had forgotten or wished they had forgotten for hidden success of comfort, clarity, and fortitude.” (Smith 41) We should take opportunities the good with the not so good as they come, because like they say “what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger”. Every new experience teaches us something new, increasing our literacies.

Going Against The Grain: Part Four

"Coming to Voice: Maria W. Stewart, a Case in Point"

In this section of Going Against The Grain, we see a life model of the attributes necessary of black women discussed earlier in the passage. Maria W. Stewart was a powerful black woman who spoke out in order to put fire behind black female progressiveness. She uses her literacy to push the entire race and gender forward, as opposed to solely out of individual need or desire. As Freire would say, she developed her own "critical consciousness." In reading states, "They re-envisioned their context, reshaped their sense of reality, charted courses of action, including rhetorical actions, that would lay the foundations from which a tradition of literacy and social action would emerge." This was the type of woman Maria W. Stewart was. Stewart's husband was politically active in speaking out about social liberation and equality for African-Americans, many argue that because of her husband's position, she was granted more possibilities and less backfire. On December 7th, 1829, her husband, James Stewart, died due to illness. James Stewart was a wealthy man considering his African-American racial status, however Maria never saw the money she should have rightfully been given. Because Stewart was a woman, and a black woman, she experienced "blatant displays of discrimination for both her race and her gender, she found herself stripped almost totally of all that he had owned." In this case, it's apparent to me the lack of respect and the lack of consideration for African-American women. The white men fighting for the money gave no thought to her level of income, or how she was living after his death.  Events such as these gave her the drive to speak out publicly. However, during this time period, women weren't given this privilege.  Stewart provided a life example of how women were going to have to step out of their comfort zones and fight for what they wanted and believed in, all the time and endlessly. At 76 years old, she was still fighting and filed a pension as the widow of a war veteran. Stewart fought for years on end, until her death for the betterment of African-American women. She paved the way for many women who would have to take those same kinds of stands against society. 

Going Against the Grain

This excerpt , the second quarter of  the excerpt of "Going Against the Grain" basicly informed me of the white slave owners intention to keep slaves illiterate. Though it does state that not all people did believe in this passed law stating that literacy was illegal for the enslaved, it is still apalling to me. They actually had a system, when business was easy they loosened up on the slaves and did not enforce certain things but as soon as busines was booming the slaves were put on a tighter leash, especially as far as access to educational opportunities. According to Woodson there were three advocates of education for african americans: "slaveholders who believed that education increased economic efficiency, individual social reformers who operated from a sense of compassion for the oppressed, Christians of various denominations who belived that education was appropriate for all".This di bring about an interest to inform slaves. 
Later on slaveowners got cultivated the idea that slavery was a benefit to the enslaved because it brought from "barbaric and heathen conditions into civilizationand introduced them to the word of God.Sooner o Later Africans were however freely allowed the access to educational materials. In fact, Whites began to teach them so that they could soon becomes teachers. Literacy eventually rose in the african american community, more so in the north than in the south being as though the North had opened schools which mostly freed slaves attended or even slaves in between there chores. One of these black schools opened remain today and is known as Cheyney University. However, as the years went on literacy came to a decline. Educational opportunities for the blacks began to come to a close with the hopes of ending the" spirit of freedom among african americans" . This was not a success.


By: Aquila Payton

Going Against the Grain Part 3 pages 140-157

"She hungered for knowledge, took advantage of the learning opportunities available to her, and was inspired by the materiel circumstances of her life to sacrifice herself and her people”. (Royster 140)

Gaining literacy in the black community was seen as a crusade against slavery. It was a fight to prove to the skeptics that African Americans deserved their freedom. Writers in the black community were seen as leaders. African Americans were becoming literate through many traditional and nontraditional means during this time. Even though slaves in the south were academically illiterate, they were usually skilled in a particular field. Some African Americans ended up being educated for their slave holders’ benefit. Freed slaves would escape to communities with other free slaves who were literate. Southern men started seeing the benefits of having literate blacks around.

Others were educated because they were related to white people because of the intimate violence that occurred during slavery. An example of this was Charlotte Forten, a biracial woman, who took the educational opportunities presented to her and ran with them. She accomplished many firsts during her lifetime including being the first black woman to attend Higginson Grammar school, to teach at Epes Grammar school, and to participate in a federal tax supported effort to educate blacks. Forten being raised in a white community considered the black people as deserving freedom and educational opportunities but still not equal to white people. She connected with them as less fortunate members of her own race that she had to help. Being biracial she wasn’t viewed as an equal to her co-workers but her main concern was on the community development.

Three key events lead to the formalization of schooling for African Americans. The first event was when President Abraham Lincoln wrote the Emancipation Proclamation freeing all slaves in states that didn’t belong to the union. The second event was the victory of the Union troops over the Confederates forcing the surrounding plantation owners to evacuate leaving behind everything including their slaves which later became known as “contraband”. This led to the government taking control of the Port Royal Island and its inhabitants. The government decided to then do an experiment on the black people who lived on the island to see if they were capable of being educated, thus becoming the first federal funding educational opportunity for African Americans.

A missionary school movement began, in which missionaries were dispersed all over the country schooling the illiterate. After the Civil war the Atlanta University for African Americans was opened. Sabbath day schools were opened to service the black community. Privileged African Americans preferred to educate their children in private schools instead of dealing with the racism in public schools. The Morril Act gave grants to new schools and universities being opened specifically for African Americans.

An example of this is our very own Spelman College that was dedicated to fill the need for educated black women. Clara Howard was a member of the first graduating class at Spelman and along with other alumnae became a missionary dedicated to educating the less fortunate.

Going Against the Grain Part 1: Empowerment of African American Women and Literacy

                                                     

·            

Black Women/ Black Literature

   "Literature is not just an academic thing. It really is not. It's a life thing"(Christina McVay).

Literacy and the Black Woman

       Being a black woman means that you must carry the weight of being a woman and being black, "double bias of sex and race" (17). Our culture teaches us that we are first black then a woman. So as one becomes educated, she feels the need to uplift her people. Throughout history our education has had to take a back seat to us being mothers. Now that we can have both, it seems that we have to choose. Darlings points out that in the time of slavery the ability to read was the division between the enslaved and their oppressors.
       Literacy is a way to elevate our status from the role society has relegated us. We must take advantage of all the opportunities that come across us for ourselves and our people. We must expose ourselves to new things and never stop learning.

                                                                        

To Protect and Serve ; But At What Cost?

"A woman has strengths that amaze me, she can handle trouble and carry heavy burdens, she holds happiness, love and opinions. She smiles when she feels like screaming. She sings when she feels like crying. Cries when she's happy, and laughs when she's afraid, her love is unconditional, there's only one thing wrong with her and that is that sometimes she forgets what she is worth." - Unknown

[Sidenote: "Phenomenal Woman" is a GREAT poem! I suggest you read it :) ]

Although I'm not sure who said this quote, after reading To Protect and Serve: African American Female Literacies, it seemed to grasp a majority of the thoughts I had about this article.  Elaine Richardson although uplifts the work and endurance of the black female and in particular a mother, or motherly figure,  she left me with an almost bitter realization of what many people may ignore. In the first paragraph of this piece Richardson writes, "Young Black females often struggle to invent themselves against the distorted images of 'money hungry heartless bitch,' 'Jezebel,' and good ole 'Mammy' among others...." (676).  At this point in the reading I could understand what would prompt Richardson to make these statements. Because this sort of language has been used so frequently towards the African-American population, it has also been adopted by many of it's inhabitants, whether right or wrong.  Richardson also references the stereotype of the "heartless Nigger bitch" in the next paragraph (676).  As someone who is directly and indirectly insulted by such language and comments towards women that I believe to be some of the greatest in history, I originally processed these paragraphs as simply what OTHER people were classifying African-American woman as. 

However, later on in this piece, Richardson speaks on the character Mamy Lou who hid a man who was on the run under her quilt between her legs when the "padddyroolers" came looking for him.  Further along in this very paragraph Richardson writes, "The ultimate struggle for Black females is to retain proper love of self and significant others without becoming or being seen as heartless bitches for the choices they make" (684). 

After reading this sentence, I was more enraged than I had been at the original statement collecting all the degrading names African-American women have been given.  Through reading this selection of the piece, it's almost suggested that unless black woman take life-threatening risks and prove their "unconditional love" for all, that we were subjected to being labeled as "heartless bitches."  I was almost as disgusted that Richardson choose to use this as the reason behind Mamy Lou taking the action that she did. If black women are "supposed" to be creatures of love and nurture and protection, why would these sorts of actions be taken simply to put disclosure to the idea that we are "heartless bitches"?

With that in mind, this quote began to ring in my head. No matter what trials and struggles black woman are EXPECTED to go through, such as hide a man under her quilt or kill her child to protect them, what sympathies is she given? Who is there in return to provide these comforts for her? If there is no one to secure this position,  it can be legitimately induced that the black woman truly does carry the weight of the world on her shoulders. Although this can be seen as both a positive and negative circumstance, there is truth behind it.  

Works Cited:
Richardson, Elaine. "'To Protect and Serve': African American Female Literacies." College Composition and Communcation, Vol. 53, No. 4 (Jun 2002): 675-704. NCTE JSTOR. Web. 13 Jan. 2010.