Black Girls Research Paper

My research proposal will focus on the different issues African American women face while trying to advance within society. I will discuss how these women are paid less because they are women as well as African American. I will also be comparing their struggles to Black men, and White men and women. My next topic will include how these women are often discriminated against. And finally I will discuss how these women are often over looked for receiving promotions at work, even if they obtain more experience.

Kimberly Bryant is very inspirational to every black girl in America. When she was younger, she wasn’t interested in coding before she made it into a career. She was in the department of biotechnology, which is studying mutations and finding antibiotics. It all started when her daughter Kai was disappointed in her experience at a computing summer camp over the summer. She was disappointed in how there were only a handful of African American girls there, and that the boys got a lot more opportunity than the girls. Bryant started the Black Girls Code in April of 2011.

If a girl slave gets pregnant, she dare not say who fathered the child, they could only whisper amongst themselves (Jacobs, 31). If they did, they would be terribly dealt with, especially if they were abused by their masters. "The slave girl is reared in an atmosphere of licentiousness and fear" (Jacobs, 44). As soon as a slave girl is of age, she starts to get sexual advances from men around her. If she does not yield them, they punish her

While the majority of black women accounts are lost to history due to anti-literacy laws, we do have a good idea of what their lives were, through slave narratives and other records. The life of a female slave in pre-civil war America was characterized by sexual assault, physical and mental abuse along with harsh treatment both in the fields and inside the master’s house. Female slaves were treated as property with no regards to their

White explores the master’s sexual exploitation of their female slaves, and proves this method of oppression to be the defining factor of what sets the female slaves apart from their male counterparts. Citing former slaves White writes, “Christopher Nichols, an escaped slave living in Canada, remembered how his master laid a woman on a bench, threw her clothes over her head, and whipped her. The whipping of a thirteen-year-old Georgia slave girl also had sexual overtones. The girl was put on all fours ‘sometimes her head down, and sometimes up’ and beaten until froth ran from her mouth (33).” The girl’s forced bodily position as well as her total helplessness to stop her master’s torture blatantly reveals the forced sexual trauma many African females endured.

As stated in “Incident of the Life of an Enslaved Girl” by Harriet Jacobs, it says, “Soon she will learn to tremble when she hears her master's footfall. She will be compelled to realize that she is no longer a child. If she is beautiful, it will prove her greatest curse.” This evidence proves that both women and enslaved Americans were treated negatively because it shows the physical pain and suffering they had to face and go through. It demonstrates unfairness and

Not only did young women get sexually abused at a young age, but also the abuse continued on as they matured. As the slaves got older they were forced to engage in sexual affairs with their married masters, as is seen in the case of Harriet Jacobs. This naturally caused the slaves to feel shameful, immoral, and wrongful in doing so. However, they did not have much of a choice in the matter. To make matters worse, the mistresses who were jealous that their husbands, the masters, were being unfaithful to them with the slaves. This commonly resulted in persecution of the slaves by the mistresses. Although the mistresses knew that the masters were committing wrongful acts in sexually abusing the slaves, they did not show any compassion. Instead, they were enraged. Harriet Jacobs explains the typical reaction of a mistress as she writes: "The mistress, who ought to protect the helpless victim, has no other feelings towards her but those of jealousy and rage".

The United States prides itself on being a land of opportunities, and in many ways it is. We look at countries like South Africa, which not long ago was segregated through the laws of Apartheid, and we are glad that we are so much further along than the land of Mandela. However, every now and then we need to stop and ask ourselves just how far along we really are, and we have to wonder if many of the once oppressed countries we helped free are not passing us up in the area of civil rights and opportunity.

n 1619 a Dutch ship brought 20 slaves to America and it took nearly 240 years for slavery to end in 1865. In the absence of rights or freedom, my ancestors were put to work growing anything from cotton to tobacco. For centuries, my people fought for equality. Although we are “free” the fight has still remain. As a black women raised in America, I was hit with some harsh realities at a very young age.

In a time period when women were considered inferior, as were blacks, it was unimaginable the horrors a black woman in the south had to endure during this period. African women were slaves and subject to the many horrors that come along with being in bondage, but because they were also women, they were subject to the cruelties of men who look down on women as inferior simply because of their sex. The sexual exploitation of these females often lead to the women fathering children of their white masters. Black women were also prohibited from defending themselves against any type of abuse, including sexual, at the hands of white men. If a slave attempted to defend herself she was often subjected to further beatings from the master. The black female was forced into sexual relationships for the slave master’s pleasure and profit. By doing this it was the slave owner ways of helping his slave population grow.

The slave owner’s exploitation of the black woman’s sexuality was one of the most significant factors differentiating the experience of slavery for males and females. The white man’s claim to the slave body, male as well as female, was inherent in the concept of the Slave Trade and was tangibly realized perhaps no where more than the auction block. Captive Africans were stripped of their clothing, oiled down, and poked and prodded by potential buyers. The erotic undertones of such scenes were particularly pronounced in the case of black women. Throughout the period of slavery in America, white society believed black women to be innately lustful beings. The perception of the African woman as hyper-sexual made her both the object of white man’s abhorrence and his fantasy. Within the bonds of slavery, masters often felt it was their right to engage in sexual activity with black women. Sometimes, female slaves made advances hoping that such relationships would increase the chances that they or their children would be liberated by the master. Most of the time, slave owners took slaves by force.

1866 is the first time a Black woman was raped in the United States of America. Now, something seems wrong with that sentence. A more accurate way to express this would be that in 1866 the United States government recognized that Black women were capable of being raped for the first time. It was in response to the 1866 Memphis Riot, in which white men attacked a Black community for 72 hours straight killing 48 people, wounding 60-80, and raping at least 5 Black women. Republican abolitionist and reformers came from Washington D.C. and gave the Black women who were sexually abused a platform to speak, giving them a chance to have a Federal testimony in 1866 (Peiss, 2002). This recognition did little to change a society that has been built upon the lie that Black women are “unrapable” due to their assumed hypersexual and licentious ways. A Mississippi defense attorney summarized this viewpoint well in an 1859 court case in which an older enslaved man was being convicted of raping an enslaved girl under the age of ten. He said, “The crime of rape does not exist in this State between African slaves...their intercourse is promiscuous” (Sommerville, 2004, p. 65). This toxic mentality cultivated in slavery is just as present and strong today and creates not only blindness to the presence of sexual violence towards Black women, but also pushes Black women into silence due to shame and a desire to separate oneself from such negative stereotypes (Harris-Perry, 2013)

Have you ever felt like you were being discriminated? Or if the other kids were getting treated better than you? Many people worldwide feel like this every single day. Whether it is from hate comments on the internet to racial comments walking down the street. Article 1 states “All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights. They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood.” This right was supposed to forge a barrier between the comments being made and the people getting harassed, but not everybody follows them. Plenty of people in the world make these comments and it is a huge issue. Because of this, a great deal of people are feeling they do not belong here. Black girls that go to school are more likely to get suspended than white girls because of racism. There is hate all around the world no matter what your race is. Recent events in the United States have caused

The aim of the thesis is to analyze and discuss the African American women`s quest for voice, acceptance and fulfilment. The analysis will be based on three selected novels, namely, Their Eyes Were Watching God, The Color Purple and Beloved. Since their authors - Zora Neale Hurston, Toni Morrison and Alice Walker all - experienced some difficulties in their life related to the subject matter of the thesis, their biographies will be sketched, too. The analysis focuses especially on three women who are the protagonists of the selected novels. Their personal and social problems will be juxtaposed within the context of the criticism selected for the purpose of this thesis.

Black women have come a long way from just being the typical housewife and mother. They have excelled over the years. Now you have female entrepreneurs, astronauts, doctors, professors, etc. Back then, females were not even allowed to work. To try to degrade someone for their gender is discrimination at its best. Because of stereotypes and old myths, Black Women were viewed as lazy, angry, intimidating, unintelligent, etc. It was said that Black Women were only good for making babies and being on welfare.