I'm only into the second chapter as of yet, but so far she's arguing for Black girlhood celebration as a "format" for working with those individuals who call themselves Black, female, and young rather than any sort of girl empowerment programming or mentoring. She asks, "What if we abandon the notion that we Black girls are not good enough? What if we got rid of the thinking that says programming makes young people better? What if we did not define 'adolescence' as inherently problematic? What if we valued who Black girls are, including what they say and how they speak? What if we understood Black girls as producers of knowledge rather than consumers? What if we recognized that there is no magical age when one 'gets over' the racism, classism, sexism, and homophobia that collude to make us, as Black girls and women, the problem?" (29).
I think what she has to say is fascinating in that she takes a critical look at well-intentioned programmers who in fact miss the point that investment "in a [girl empowerment and/or mentoring] program's singular narative of who we need Black girls to be. To get funding. To make us feel good. To be good feminists, Black women, teachers, mentos, whatever" actually disallows those Black girls that a program intends to "fix" from taking an "explicitly political approach" to celebrating their identities in a world that rarely does so. (How's that for a run-on sentence?)
I can't wait to read more of what she says on how hip-hop theories and cultures can and should be woven through spaces that seek to celebrate Black girlhood. I like this part:
For the girls with whom I work in our community, as is the case with my girlfriends, hip-hop gives meaning to our girlhood. That makes us experts. Our expertise is rarely acknowleged.
Consider this example: I was working at a community center with a group of girls. it was the first time I had met them, so I concentrated very hard on learning their names. One girl in particular had the polysllabic but familiar name of 'Tameka' that I mistakenly mispronounced as 'Tamesha.' When I 'called her out of her name,' she responded, 'Get it right, get it tight.' A graduate students , Nita... acompanied me on this expedition and afterward sared with me how 'disrespectful' this girl had been in correcting me -- being a Black female adult with a doctorate degree. I shrugged it off. To Nita's dismay, I was not bothered by the girl's defense.
'I did call her out of her name,' I responded. 'Besides, I rarely take offense to the language She was probably quoting some rap song I'm too old to know about.'
...
On my way home from the recreation center that night, I searched for the hip-hop station on the car radio. Not even one mile from the community center, I heard the song 'Ms. New Booty' boosting the chorus, 'get it right get it tight!' The year was 2006, and Bubba Sparxxx, a White rapper from LaGrange, California, rapping an oft-used msogynist trope of objectifying Black women's backsides, was the rapper Tameka decided to quote that night at the recreation center. Catchy beat aside, the lyrics confirmed my suspicions.
Tameka sampled a line from 'Ms. New Booty' to speak to me. In my work, I found that Black girls literally speak though hip-hop. Even as she corrected me, I did not think she was talking abck to me or speaking disrespectfuly. Tameka was demonstrating a leracy that at one time I was too well-versed in. (33)
No comments:
Post a Comment