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Assignment 3

Jennifer Morgan in, Male Travelers, Female bodies, and Racial Ideology, discussed about a lot of themes on a very strong topic. The most interesting from my perspective was a topic about how different writers and travelers implemented different ideas about white supremacy in the early sixteenth century. I believe that, Morgan probably connected the female bodies and racism through presenting us different opinions of those famous writers and travelers.

At the time when colonization began, Europeans didn’t really know what was out there in the world. And, as colonization gained a momentum, many people travelled to different parts of the world. They found something new in the horizon and it was definitely very strange and exotic for them. So, they wrote stories about these indigenous people and especially women. For some travelers, these indigenous women were very beautiful and others saw them as some kind of devils and unnatural monstrosity. So, the special propaganda began. Although, the propaganda word might be strong but for my purposes in serves well. Therefore, writers wrote that black people were animalistic and cruel. Black women and men were physically strong but they didn’t have any civility. Many travelers of that time saw indigenous people as a work force because they thought they could give them a purpose and use them as slaves. So, the propaganda played a huge role in validating the use of black people as slaves and Europeans would feel sorry for them. All those horrible stories about childbirth, child scarifies and cannibalism had an impact on European people and the idea of white supremacy. European people just simply thought that they were better. The black females’ bodies were compared to white female bodies and slave owners figured that black female were better in labor work. They were physically stronger and they presumably didn’t feel pain. Black female bodies were always shown as devils in women form as well as other forms such as six legs form and sagging breasts. Thus, Europeans writers and travelers implemented the idea that black people didn’t matter and it was used to justify the strict control and supremacy over the black indigenous males and females.

Question: Why most of the writers of that time concentrated mostly on women and not men? Was it Jennifer Morgan’s choice to do that?