'Tragic Mulatto' to Black Magic Woman: Race, Sex and Religion in Film 1
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Notes Introduction From ‘Tragic Mulatto’ to Black Magic Woman: Race, Sex and Religion in Film 1. L.A. Rebellion is a term used to describe a set of African and African American film students at the University of California, Los Angeles during the late 1960s and early 1970s, who committed themselves to the study of non- Western third cinema and who focused their film work on socio- political ideologies similar to that of Latin American and African third cin- ema films. 2. “Third Cinema” primarily produced during the late 1960’s and 1970’s in Latin America, the Caribbean and Africa is the political filmmaking focused on forging postcolonial national identities. 3. Ò. s.un (Oshun, Ochùn) is the female Yorùbá river deity believed to rule love, fertility and female sexuality. 4. O. ya (Oya) is the female Yorùba deity of war, winds, lightning and change. 5. Yemoja (Yemaya, Yemanja) is the Yorùbá female deity, ruler of the sea, fish, hurricanes and symbolises maternity; the Great Mother who cares for all children. 6. A chain of islands off the coast of South Carolina, Georgia and Florida. 7. Escaped slaves in [Jamaica and other locations] and their descendants. 8. The real social phenomenon of black people going visibly unnoticed in white society and thereby accessing white privilege was considered too shocking for American audiences. 9. ‘Obeah’ is the often perceived as derogatory term used for African- based religions in Jamaica. 10. Herskovits’ own 1941 text, The Myth of the Negro Past, establishes the inter- connectedness between West African and African American cultures. 11. This statement is a quotation from ‘The Changing Face of Black Religions’ by Tanu Henry on www.africana.com (Accessed on October 2003). 12. According to Teresa Washington, ‘àbíkú’ means ‘born to die’ in Yorùbá language (2005:283). It is the baby who dies yet whose spirit is continually reborn in the next child to the same woman only to physically die again. This curse gives spiritual meaning to stillbirths and sudden infant deaths. 1 Womanism and Womanist Gaze 1. Quotations are from “Conversation with Alice Walker” by Marianne Schnall on feminist.com (accessed December 2009). 2. Gloria Steinem’s definition of ‘womanism’ and the unique socio- political positionality of black women in the U.S. are accessible on the website www. feminist.com (accessed December 2009). 185 186 Notes 3. The Tontons Macoutes were the Haitian special police force under the direct rule of François ‘Papa Doc’ Duvalier. 4. In 1946, France established Martinique as an overseas French département, a subregional administrative area, and gave many in Martinique the hope that greater assimilation into the French nation would eliminate racial discrimination. 5. Haseenah Ebrahim’s essay, “‘Sugar Cane Alley’: Re- reading race, class and identity in Zobe’s La rue cases- nègres” was originally published in Literature/ Film Quarterly, online at www.highbeam.com (accessed 7 July 2010). 6. Cric? Crac! is a refrain or invocation used in Afro- Caribbean storytelling. 7. Thomas’ quotations are from “Womanist Theology, Epistemology, and a New Anthropological Paradigm”, online at www.crosscurrents.org (accessed May 2010). 8. Ibid. 9. Steven Spielberg’s quotations regarding The Color Purple are from “Steven Spielberg Says He Softened Lesbian Sex in The Color Purple”, by Jeremy Kinser for www.advocate.com, 5 December 2011. 2 Beauty as Power: In/visible Woman and Womanist Film in Daughters of the Dust 1. Restricted fishing among coastal communities in Accra, Ghana is based on stories commonly heard during my years living in Ghana from 1998– 1999 and 2003. 2. Recounting Yorùbá creation narratives as explained to me by Nigerian informants including Dr Abiodun Agboola on my trips to Ile- Ife and Osogbo, Nigeria in 2001– 2002. 3. Indigo was used during slavery for dyeing clothing but also holds signifi- cance in Yorùbáland, Nigeria associated with Ò. s.un. 4. In Yorùbá- Atlantic, Afro- Cuban Santería, individuals possessed by the spirit of a deity such as O. ya may wear a beaded mask crown covering the face, which signifies that the òrìs.à itself is present. 5. Rainbows are symbolic of O. ya as referring to this deity’s association with rain and the beauty that comes after the storm. 6. The term ‘Voodoo’ is heavily contested as a stereotypical construct devised by Hollywood horror to describe African- derived religions as practised in the United States. Certain scholars and practitioners use the words ‘Vodu’ and ‘Vodun’ as these terms link the religion to its Haitian and Dahomey (Benin) origins and connect it to the Fon, Ewe and Yorùbá. However, the term ‘Voodoo’ is used in this research to distinguish between American, Haitian and West African practices. 7. The Underground Railroad was a complex system of escape for runaway slaves to travel to the American North or Canada seeking freedom. Assisted by white abolitionists and former slaves, Harriet Tubman was famous for helping over 300 slaves to freedom, either by leading them herself or others following her path. Tubman is known as the “Moses of her people”. 8. Although white and yellow are colours often associated with Ò. s.un in the Americas, according to Dr Abiodun Agboola in Yorùbáland, Nigeria, indigo is a significant colour linked with Ò. s.un. Notes 187 9. Egungun is the masquerade within Yorùbá culture and religion that embod- ies the collective spirit of the ancestors. 10. In April 2012, Swedish Minister of Culture, Lena Adelsohn Lijeroth, was heavily criticised and called to resign after video clips on World Art Day showed her laughing with other arts patrons as they cut up an installation of a cake shaped as an African woman’s naked body. Lijeroth and fellow patrons cut a chunk of the cake’s clitoris, while screaming as if mirroring female genitalia mutilation. 11. Linda B. Thompson in Beyond the Black Lady discusses Daughters of the Dust and Eve’s Bayou in terms of the historical treatment of gender and sexuality within the black middle class, with black chastity as signifying black human- ity for the striving black middle class. 12. Gwendolyn DuBois Shaw describes the satirical artwork of Kara Walker as encouraging viewers to “see the unspeakable” in terms of the history of rac- ism and sexism in America (2004:9). 13. This assertion regarding Agfa- Gevaert film stock and black skin is similar to the assessment by many black independent filmmakers who prefer Japanese- manufactured Fuji film because of its superiority in photographing non- white skin. 14. Cinema audiences being encouraged to be ‘active participants’ rather than passive consumers is a principle of postcolonial ‘third cinema’ theory. 3 Passing Strange: Voodoo Queens and Hollywood Fantasy in Eve’s Bayou 1. The play Desdemona was performed in 2011 in several cities, including Vienna, Brussels, Berlin and New York, and in 2012 in London. It was a collaboration between Morrison and director Peter Sellars with the play featuring Malian singer Rokia Traoré as the lyrical presence of Desdemona’s African nurse. 2. Passing Strange is a rock musical written by African American musician Stew. The play premiered off- Broadway in 2007 and on Broadway in 2008. The play is also the subject of a Spike Lee documentary, Passing Strange: The Movie released in 2010. 3. Stephen Talty relies on W.E.B. Du Bois’ “deep contact” to examine the his- tory of interracial mixing in American society in Mulatto America. 4. The term “creole” like that of mulatto was used to classify individuals of mixed racial heritage particularly those of African and European back- ground. Creole remains a classification linked to Louisiana particularly to those individuals whose family lineages date back prior to the Louisiana Purchase of the French Territory by the United States in 1803. 5. A Free Man of Color written by John Guare and directed by George C. Wolfe premiered on Broadway in November 2010. 6. ‘Mambo’ is the title used in Haitian Vodu and Louisiana Voodoo for a priestess. 7. Every August in the south- western city of Osogbo, Nigeria, hundreds of national and international visitors pay homage to and ask for favours from Ò. s.un, as the Grove is dedicated to her. 8. The syncretism of Ò. s.un in Cuba and Santiago is the shrine dedicated to La Caridad (Our Lady of Charity of El Cobre). 188 Notes 9. Based on W.E.B. Du Bois’ notion of the ‘talented tenth’, ‘race men’ are those well- educated, ‘successful’ black men who are best suited to lead the black race on social, political, educational and religious matters. 10. ‘Talented Tenth’ is a terminology first used by W.E.B. Du Bois as a mandate or call to action that the most ‘educated’ of black men amounting to the ‘talented tenth’ percentage have an obligation to be leaders for the rest of the race. 11. Between 1932 and 1972, the U.S. Department of Health conducted a study of poor black men in sharecropping communities in Alabama, half of whom had syphilis. This study was done in order to observe the effects of the disease. The men were never told that they had syphilis nor were they treated with penicillin once it had been medically established that penicillin was safe for treating the disease. The experiment sparked controversy and public pressure towards greater ethical codes in medical experimentation on humans. 12. According to Krin Gabbard’s Black Magic: White Hollywood and African American Culture, Hollywood appropriates ‘blackness’ through white actors’ performance, inclusion of black actors as enablers to white protagonists and/ or elements of black cultural themes. 4 I’ll Fly Away: Baadasssss Mamas and Third Cinema in Sankofa 1.