Social division is prevalent throughout this world. Minorities are constantly being oppressed by the system. We are constantly placed into categories based on complexion, hair texture, shape, size etc. Certain ethnic groups are considered to be inferior and less civilizedwhen compared to others. Today, we continue to see this unfair pattern within our society. Most manual and degrading jobs are done by the poor (blacks Mexican, Hispanic). We are assumed to be the less intellectual than most and are stereotyped as savages. Morgan explores her views on this stereotypical behavior against blacks. She expanded this ideology on page 35 where she stated that blacks develop flat noses based on the laborious activities performed by the mother. A study was done by Nicholas villaut who made the distinction of children having regular noses when their parents didn’t do laborious jobs. He draws a conclusion that because many African women worked in the field they would breast feed their infants with their breast over their shoulder. The laborious movement,the suckling of the child and the knocking against their mother’s shoulders causes the child’s nose to flatten. Overtime, flat nostrils became a feature within the black community due to natural selection.Historiansused another case of blacks’ aborted fetus to construct a believable theory of the birth of flat nostril among blacks. Thus, this ideology is false and the author wants us to stop this belief that the formation of black’s noseswere established from hard labor of black women compared to the Europeans who had straighter noses from the lack of domestic work. The author wants us to know that our physical traits were developed based on climate. For instance,in hot climates women had wider nostrils compared to white European women. This variation comes from the different establishment of theirorigin. In colder weather, a person breathes in less air; this causes the air to become warm before going into ourbrain. Homeostasis causes the temperature of the air outside to be the same as our body temperature to prevent freezing and deterioration of our cells. Therefore, African women breathe more rapidly than a white European female. Natural selection selects the stronger traits and these womencontinue to have distinct features.
Another issue explored by the author on racism and the female body is that many Europeansbelieved black/African women had sagging breasts because of their manual labor. They believed white women had smaller breasts because they weren’t domestic workers and had little to no children. African women were categorized as domestic animals (dogs, cows). This is due to the fact that they were said to look like a 6 legged animal when they were weeding and when laying on their backs they were accompanied by the young ones nibbling on their breast. As a result of their sagging breast and nuditythey were seen as uncivilized and savage people. The Europeans use black’sphysical makeup to profit them. For instance, black laborers bared the pain of child labor, whipping and long hours.They had elongatedbreast for feeding while laboring. Additionally, many Europeans believed Africans didn’t suffer when undergoing child bearing. Thus,it became a custom for them to have multiple births. Consequently, many believed these women didn’t need assistance while giving birth. Most births were done independently; they weren’t given any medication to suppress their pain nor were they given mid-wives to assist.Instead, they were sent out into the fields to work during the post-partum period.
Morgan wants us to raise awareness to the fact that Africans are subjected to having many children and why having children doesn’t affect their mobility. She wants us to see the inhumane acts that the Europeans brought upon their enslaved women. She also wants us to know that these practices were seen by other blacks in Africa and that theEuropean adopted this notion that if you areblack you are labeled to work and reproduce. They assumed Black women didn’t have stretch marks or wrinkles on their stomach from giving birth; their bodies were believed to be an elastic. Consequently, their only role in society is to be like farm animals.
Leave a Reply
You must be logged in to post a comment.