Re-blogging and Resistance: Constructing an Oppositional Black Feminist Aesthetic on Social Media

This project focuses on the capacity of new media to combat dominant oppressive ideologies about black womanhood. I use Tumblr as my case study in order to answer questions about the potential of aesthetic interventions on... [ view full abstract ]

This project focuses on the capacity of new media to combat dominant oppressive ideologies about black womanhood. I use Tumblr as my case study in order to answer questions about the potential of aesthetic interventions on social media to challenge hegemonic notions of black womanhood and the black female body. My central research questions are: What are the aesthetic means that social media users employ to push back upon dominant media discourses of black womanhood? How does black feminist engagement with social media open up the possibility for resistance of hegemonic notions of the black female body, and create a self defined subjectivity? Lastly, is there a way in which black women’s self-representation within social media plays into and reaffirms the commodification of the black female body? By engaging with the historical constructions and dominant media discourses surrounding black womanhood, and by deconstructing representations of black female sexuality in cyberspace, I look to how black women actively enact resistance through self-authorship and visual intervention online.