Discussion Main / BlackJezebelStereotype

Unfortunately, this trope doesn't work the same way as Gorgeous Greek, Sensual Slavs, Hot Gypsy Woman, Spicy Latina or other "sexy stereotype" tropes. Foxxy, on her own, doesn't demonstrate the trope well enough. She has the objectification/fanservice element down, yes, but the core of the trope was that the Black woman was considered morally-deficient or inferior because of it. That part is so important that a racist Fan Disservice pic would arguably be more illustrative (I'm not saying we should use it, just making a point); unlike other "sexy race" tropes, Black women were treated as inherently animalistic.

I'm uncertain about Pam Grier's characters qualifying for this as a straight example of the trope. Doesn't this trope imply a critical portrayal with a racist bent, aimed at a white audience? Foxy Brown and Coffy have a strong Male Gaze component, but they're also in films aimed at Black audiences and portrayed as empowering, aspirational figures to female audience members. They're understandably polarizing (especially to modern audiences and commentators), but they're always written and performed as just and morally superior, especially compared to the men around them. And their actions are in the service of a larger cause; in the absence of the tragedies and injustices that motivated them, Foxy Brown and Coffy would be leading normal lives.

We had a lot of debate about that in the TLP.

Pam Grier's movies are widely considered blatant examples of the stereotype by black scholars. Also, as I stated in the TLP thread, "A Irish movie, made by an Irish creator, about drunken fighting Irishmen, doesn't stop the movie from being about a stereotype."

Also, we discussed the "vengeful action girl" aspect, too. Regardless of how badass or cathartic her actions are, they are wholly in service to her objectification and not the other way around. The proof of this is in the dialogue she says, and the sexual framing of the violence she employs.

Oh, that's a fair point. I think I'm probably looking too much at surface of the narrative and not the syntax of the camera. Because thinking about it, Foxy Brown and Coffy both lack the mitigating camp element in the tone that Hill's later Switchblade Sisters has, and in that film there's a black feminist militia that's depicted both positively and without objectification. And in general the visuals and fight construction are much less skeevy than the Grier films can get, despite the presence of numerous exploitation tropes (the violence within oppressive spaces is framed with a camp comic element until an on-the-streets revolution against the local patriarchy, which is played cathartically straight). That's probably a useful comparison here.

If anything I guess my appreciation for Switchblade Sisters has deepened.

There's a lot more baggage to the Jezebel stereotype than just that. As I mentioned below, it's not just "exotic fanservice".

Even if that weren't the case, I would avoid making that comparison, tbh.

Fair enough.