Bell Hooks: Selling Hot Pussy, A Response

I was exposed to the writings and scholarship of Bell Hooks over ten years ago.  At the age of nineteen, I did not have patience for the thorough nature of her research and exposition of feminist and racist oppression.  I thought that Hooks’ works were over-analyzed collections of rants and a separatist agenda.  As a nineteen year old black girl in an abusive relationship, I wanted to believe that her analysis was an exaggeration of black female identities in mainstream society.  I felt that if I were to acknowledge or accept her opinions as valid, somehow my façade of premature adulthood would shatter and highlight my failure to become “grown.”  I did not realize at the time that Bell Hooks’ research would function as an integral tool in my academic and feminine development throughout adult hood.  Hooks’ essay “Selling Hot Pussy:  Representations of Black Female Sexuality in the Cultural Marketplace,” reviews the relationship between historic exploitation of the black female form and the perpetuation of said exploitation in pop culture. 

Rationalizing my intellect with my sexual identity is something that I continue to struggle with as I mature.  I was raised to be chaste and good, quiet and smart; in return for my cooperation the universe would reward me with success and a good man to satisfy me all the days of my life.  I was taught that I should never need a man however, and to question the intentions of any man who expressed interest in my eternal satisfaction.  Sexuality was not discussed in my home any further than warnings to not be “fast” like the girls from the projects.  As I matured, and the inevitable challenges of puberty and peer groups became more constant, I became more heavily influenced by the marketplace of popular culture and media.    

Entertainment icons like those who Hooks refers to in her essay were the very signals that comprised my cultural text of black female sexuality.  I did not realize it at the time, but all of the wounded women who were performing sexuality through the lens of their patriarchal oppressors were helping to shape my personal ideology.  Diana Ross, Aretha Franklin and Tina Turner were household names during my childhood.  They were sensationalized and larger than life images of success, beauty and stardom.  Sarah Bartman however, would remain a stranger to me until my mid-twenties.  Her brutal objectification slipped into obscurity as if it had no effect on the perpetual appropriation of black female bodies.  Hooks asserts, “Popular culture provides countless examples of black female appropriation and exploitation of ‘negative stereotypes’ to either assert control over the representation or at least reap the benefits of it.”  Since the publication of Hooks’ essay, such luminaries as Ross, Franklin, and Turner have dimmed by comparison to contemporaries such as Beyonce. 

Ironically, at this point in my response I am experiencing great difficulty trying to recall popular black female artists who are recognized as “sex symbols” in mainstream society.  Perhaps Janet Jackson for a general reference, although her 2004 wardrobe malfunction was railed as having been perverse. I wonder what distinct relations Hooks would draw to the invisibility of the black female from that observation?

I digress.  The celebrity women Hooks examines in her essay were never referred to as ‘sexy’ in my household.  Their sexuality was rather implied by their long hair, stylish clothes, expensive jewelry, and most importantly the very presence of their faces on my television screen.  It was understood that only a sexy black woman could be a celebrity.  The exception was extraordinarily intelligent black women like Claire Huxtable or Oprah Winfrey.  Interestingly enough, their intellect muted any potential query as to their sexual relevance.  Women like my grandmother who sat with their legs crossed at the ankle and never wore a dress without hosiery were absolutely not sexy, nor could they be.  Early in the development of my sexual identity, I was presented with a choice; pantyhose or fame?  The troubling part about the delineation between sexy and matronly is the fact that I was inundated with images of white women in all types of roles and wardrobes who were sexualized by their celebrity every day.  The images of beauty and sexuality as a social norm fit the mold of everyday white society.  I had at least five white friends whose mothers looked like Samantha from Bewitched.  The concept of sexuality and beauty for white women was affirmed by their constant representation in media.  A twelve year old black girl might have been hard pressed to see someone on television that affirmed or even confirmed her existence.  No one in my house looked anything like Diana Ross.

               I am the sum of the improbability of fame plus the impossible shame of ostracism for being considered “fast” by my peers and elders.  I am learning now that my intellect does not have to be separated from my sexuality in order for me to exist.  The trouble I have with rationalizing intellect and sexuality is a result of the total incongruence of the two.  Hooks claims that, “Facing herself, the black female realizes all that she must struggle against to achieve self-actualization.”  I do not feel as though self-actualization is an easy task for anyone.  Personally, where related to the topic of black female representations of sexuality, I have a specific experience with the difficulties one must face in order to reject normative standards and stereotypes without further marginalization.        

               Bell Hooks continues to offer a familiar voice and anonymous mentorship for me.  Upon reading her essay, I was able to identify personal challenges and relate them to society at large in order to create the “oppositional space” wherein my “sexuality can be named and represented” by my own standards.  I welcome this essay as a tool to help me to view myself as a subject of sexuality and to no longer be objectified by the historic or contemporary oppression of black female sexuality.   

               Read the full essay here:  http://www.julietdavis.com/WST383/sellinghotpussy.pdf