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Male Mammies A Social Comparison Perspective On How Exaggeratedly Overweight Media Portrayals of Madea Rasputia and Big Momma Affect How Black Women
Male Mammies A Social Comparison Perspective On How Exaggeratedly Overweight Media Portrayals of Madea Rasputia and Big Momma Affect How Black Women
Male Mammies A Social Comparison Perspective On How Exaggeratedly Overweight Media Portrayals of Madea Rasputia and Big Momma Affect How Black Women
In-depth interviews with 36 Black women, ages 18 to 59, reveal that exaggeratedly overweight depictions of Black women portrayed by men dressed up as
women had a strong effect on their identities. The women reported that portrayals, such as Madea in Tyler Perrys films, Rasputia in Eddie Murphys
Norbit, and Martin Lawrences Big Momma, were mammy-like and the fact
Gina Masullo Chen (M.A., Syracuse University, 1999) is a Doctoral Candidate in the S.I.
Newhouse School of Public Communications at Syracuse University. Her research interests
include online engagement and rejection, as well as the role of gender in computer-mediated
communication.
Sherri Williams (M.A., Syracuse University, 2010) is a Doctoral Candidate in the S.I.
Newhouse School of Public Communications at Syracuse University. Her research interests
include how media consumption shapes the identity of women of color, including immigrants,
and how women of color use social media.
Nicole Hendrickson (M.A., Syracuse University, 2010) is Junior Editor at genConnect.com.
Li Chen (M.A., Syracuse University, 2011) is a Doctoral Student at the University of Iowa
School of Journalism & Mass Communication. Her research interests include gender and
lesbian-gay-bisexual-transgender (LGBT) depictions in new media.
Correspondence should be addressed to Gina Masullo Chen, S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communication, Syracuse University, 215 University Place, Syracuse, NY 13221. E-mail:
gmmasull@syr.edu
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that men dressed as women to depict these roles heightened the stereotypes
these images evoke. The male mammy portrayals increase the mockery of
Black women in the media and contribute to the effeminization of African
American men, according to women in our sample. Social comparison, social
identity, and self-categorization theories are used for interpretation.
In an iconic scene from Eddie Murphys 2007 film Norbit, a buxom, overweight Black woman clad in a fuchsia microbikini has such an abundant
girth that a lifeguard cannot tell if she is wearing bottoms because her fat
rolls obscure the view. The Madea character stars in a series of Tyler Perrys
hit movies, including the 2009 film I Can Do Bad All by Myself. She is a
large Black woman and a smoking gun-toting, sassy, buxom mother
figure (Crouse, 2006, p. 2) who dishes out smacks and advice. We argue
that these imagesand others like themperpetuate the mammy stereotype
of Black women.1 The mammy is usually a grossly overweight,
large-breasted woman who is desexualized, maternal, and nonthreatening
to White people but who may be aggressive toward men (Fuller, 2001; Hudson, 1998; Jewell, 1993). The concept of the mammy was constructed in the
1830s as a stout, dark-skinned, smiling, hardworking, doting woman who
offered the only redeeming embodiment of Black womanhood imaginable
within the intertwined race, class, and gender distinctions of the Old
South (Beauboeuf-Lafontant, 2009, p. 28). The mammy archetype lives
on, as Black women continue to be put in a position to serve others, particularly Whites, in what Omolade (1994) referred to as mammification
(pp. 5455).
The latest iteration of the mammy stereotype adds a twist: In Norbit, the
Madea movies, and Martin Lawrences Big Momma films, the mammy
characters are played by men, dressed as women, adding another layer to
the desexualing stereotype (Nelson, 2007). Milloy (2009) describes Madea
as an updated Aunt Jemima and the latest in a series of portrayals by
men to depict the fattest, ugliest Black women that Hollywood makeup
artists can conjure (p. 1). He writes that such super-mammy (p. 1) depictions are different than White men dressing as women because of Americas
centuries-long history of humiliating Black people. We may laugh at her,
Milloy (2009) wrote of Madea, but the joke is on us (p. 4).
Given this proliferation of these images, this research asks, What specific
influence do images of the male mammy have on Black women who watch
1
We use the terms Black and African American interchangeably throughout this article
because we could not get a clear consensus from the study participants on which term they
prefer.
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LITERATURE REVIEW
Since the early 1900s, one of the strongest stereotypical portrayals of Black
women in the mass media has been as the mammy. The mammy archetype
originated during slavery as a counter to the lusty Jezebel, but both representations of Black women depicted them as less than human
(Beauboeuf-Lafontant, 2009). The mammy was the contented slave who
knew her place and was a foil to the White lady, a paragon of beauty
(Beauboeuf-Lafontant, 2009). The mammy lived on as Black women
worked as domestics and caregivers for White families (Omolade, 1994),
and she is distinguished by her asexual and nurturing qualities, similar to
Hattie McDaniels portrayal of Mammy in Gone with the Wind (Shabazz,
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that Ive been able to talk to so many people about so many subjects that a
lot of people have endeared to it, he told the Post-Gazette (Sheridan, 2007).
So, no, Im not concerned about it. Absolutely not. I dont know when we
became such a culture that we want to get away from who we are.
Lawrence and Murphy also have gained money and fame from dressing
as women in their respective films, which also have been box-office draws
(Heritage, 2010; Patalay, 2009). Lawrences Big Momma franchise is so
popular and lucrative, his third version, Big Mommas: Like Father, Like
Son, was released in February 2011 (Heritage, 2010). Critics say the recent
proliferation of men dressing as exaggeratedly overweight Black women is
due to a simple formula. Lets face it, men in drag are a recession-proof
form of entertainment (Patalay, 2009, p. 3).
Body Image
Years of research have shown that the images Black women see on the big
and small screen affect how they believe they should look. Some studies suggest that Black women who have strong ethnic identity may be somewhat
inoculated against the fear of becoming fat that plagues some White women
(Fujioka, Ryan, Agle, Legaspi, & Toohey, 2009; Rubin, Fitts, & Becker,
2003; Schooler, Ward, Merriwether, & Caruthers, 2004; Zhang, Dixon, &
Conrad, 2009). Bissell (2002), for example, found that both male and
female European American respondents were tougher critics than African
Americans in evaluating overweight models. Similarly, Frisby (2004) found
that Black women with low body esteem reported being less self-satisfied
when exposed to idealized African American models. How African American women respond to thin media images is different than how White
women respond, but the difference is not great (Bissell & Zhou, 2004; Botta,
2000; Grabe & Hyde, 2006). A meta-analysis of 98 studies of womens body
dissatisfaction found that both Black and White women were dissatisfied
with their bodies, but White women were slightly more dissatisfied (Grabe
& Hyde, 2006).
However, Black audiences still come to know the dominant groups
expectations and worldviews through mainstream media (Fujioka et al.,
2009), and what they see is that African Americans are portrayed less favorably than Whites (Mastro & Kopacz, 2006). A content analysis of advertisements in Essence found more lighter skinned models with Caucasoid
features in 2005, compared with 1985 (Njoroge, 2007), suggesting that even
a magazine targeted at Black women presents the dominant White cultures
view of beauty. An experiment found that counterstereotypical depictions of
women of color helped White women think better of Black women but did
little to improve how women of color thought of themselves (Covert &
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Dixon, 2008). Givens and Monahan (2005) found that job interviewers
could be primed to associate Black female job candidates with mammy
characteristics. These studies suggest that media depictions give Black
women a clear sense of what they are supposed to look like and that this
dominant ideal is a powerful factor in how Black women see themselves.
Clearly, Black women know that being portrayed as overweight in the
media violates White standards. Thin can become code for beautiful,
and fat can be code for ugly. Bissell (2010) found that women who internalize the thin standard of attractiveness offer more critical beauty assessments of others.
The Gaze
Foucaults (1977=1995) conception of the gaze is useful to understand
how Black women may internalize societys dominant beauty ideals without
realizing they are doing so because these norms are pervasive. The concept
of the gaze comes from Foucaults use of the Panopticon, a prison with a
well-lighted guard tower encircled by a ring of cells, as a metaphor for
how power operates in society. The inmates cannot see each other, and they
cannot tell if the guards are watching them because of the blinds on the
tower, so they operate as if they are constantly under surveillance. Foucault
explained that this structure offered a form of power of the norm, where
inmates feel pressure to behaveconform to prison normsbecause of
their compulsory visibility, coupled with the guards invisibility. The
inmates police themselves, becoming part of the mechanism of power.
Foucault carried this idea further, conceptualizing the gaze to apply to
schoolchildren, factory workers, or anyone who internalizes the norms of
an institution to such as extent that they fail to realize what they are doing
because the norms become so normal. Feminist scholars have used the gaze
to explain how women, who subconsciously know their beauty is under constant evaluation, may begin self-surveillance to see if they measure up to the
dominant norms of beauty in a patriarchal society (Deveaux, 1996). When
Black women see their gender and race demeaned through the male mammy
imagethe antithesis of Americas concept of beauty (Jewell, 1993) in a
society where beauty itself is white (Harris, 1990, p. 597)they may feel
marginalized by the discrepancy between how people similar to them are
portrayed and the societal norms (Perkins, 1996). America values beauty
and fitting into the beauty ideal, so how ones group is portrayed in media
takes on greater salience. Durham (2007) explained, Beauty is not only a
social construction, but an ideological one that is bound to the axes of
power, including race, class, and gender (p. 234).
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Theoretical Framework
Festingers (1954) social comparison theory (SCT) is useful to help explain
how media images of men portraying exaggeratedly overweight mammy-like
Black women may affect Black women of all sizes. The theory predicts that
people have a drive to self-evaluate and that people are most likely to compare themselves to people or groups they feel are more like them. If they feel
they compare favorably to what they see, they feel pleased (Festinger,
Torrey, & Willerman, 1954). If they feel they do not compare favorably
to the images, they experience a psychological discomfort called cognitive
dissonance (Festinger, 1965). Social comparison refers to the cognitive judgments people make about their own attributes compared to others (Jones,
2001). More recent researchers have expanded SCT to include the idea that
the intensity of the drive to self-evaluate varies among people (Kruglanski &
Mayseless, 1990) and that the social environment can impose comparisons
on people (Wood, 1989) such that the media could thrust a dominant beauty
ideal on people and encourage comparison simply by the ubiquity of the
image. Goethals (1986) noted that social comparison could be seen as a
natural extension of how people think about the groups they feel part of
as they use their in-group as a framework to evaluate themselves and others.
SCT has been found to be useful in understanding the influence of mass
media portrayals on body image (Dittmar & Howard, 2004; Halliwell &
Dittmar, 2005; Sohn, 2009; Tiggemann & McGill, 2004) because it helps
explain how women may perceive a discrepancy if they compare their
appearance to idealized images in the media (Bissell & Zhou, 2004). In this
study, SCT can be used to flip that scenario around. Black women compare
the exaggeratedly overweight images of Black men portraying women in the
media to the dominant beauty ideal of ultrathinness and perceive that the
group they feel part of is being maligned by a portrayal that violates societal
norms in an appearance-obsessed culture. In this sense, Black womens public identity is shaped not only by their speech and actions but also by the
perceptions of other people about them as a group, as Hancock (2004)
found in her examination of the Welfare Queen representation of Black
women.
Related theories of social identity and self-categorization (Hogg, 2003;
Hogg & Reid, 2006; Tajfel, 1978, 1982; Turner, 1987) further inform how
these images of exaggeratedly overweight Black women portrayed by men
may impact African American women. Researchers have found that people
use their prior knowledge about the world, organized as schema and stereotypes, to understand what they see in the media (Tal-Or, Tsafati, &
Gunther, 2009). There is little disagreement that people stereotype (Mastro,
2009) others and their own groups (Tajfel, 1982; Turner, 1987). Portrayals
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METHOD
This study qualitatively examined the impact of male mammy media images
on Black women. Four researchers conducted semistructured interviews of 36
Black women, ranging in age from 18 to 59. Two women in our sample
described themselves as lesbians, and the rest as heterosexuals. Ten of the
women are married, and half of the subjects have children. Fourteen of the
women are students. Other occupations represented are seven
community-outreach program workers, five clerical workers, two at-home
moms, two social workers, an academic advisor, a university professor, a
postal worker, a writer, and two retirees. Sixteen of the women we interviewed
described themselves as thin, and the rest used various terms, such as thick,
full-figured, big boned, and obese, in reference to their body types. We
chose women of a variety of sizes because we believe that exaggeratedly overweight mass media portrayals of Black women can affect all Black women,
not just those who see themselves as fat. To reach our target population of
Black women who are 18 or older, we contacted various organizations, such
as Black sororities and civic groups, and used our own social ties within the
community. Then we used a purposive snowball sampling method in the sense
Welch (1975) explained as a referral method where members of our target
population were asked to identify potential interview subjects.
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RESULTS
Our research addressed four main questions. First, we asked, What meaning
do Black women find in the exaggeratedly overweight media portrayals of
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four research questions but specifically focuses on the influence of men portraying these roles.
Why Does She Have to Be a Man?
Almost all the women in our sample expressed a belief that Madea, Rasputia,
and Big Momma bore some resemblance to women they knew in their own
families. Michelle, a 54-year-old university professor who described herself
as thin, explained, Weve all been to Big Mommas House. Some
admired Madeas forthrightness, strength, and even her zaniness because
she reminded them of a larger-than-life version of a beloved relative.
Maureen, a 55-year-old writer, noted that Madeas name is a play on
Ma Dear, a common African American colloquialism used to affectionately dub grandmothers. Even Rasputia, whom most of the women saw as
the most destructive of the three depictions, conjured some feelings of
hominess among many of the women in our sample. However, the women
said when they remembered that men were playing these characters, that
fact undercut much of the potential benefit they saw in these depictions.
They suspected men were put in these parts because female actors may
have been hesitant to take such stereotypical roles and because putting a
man in a dress is quick way to get a laugh. Adonia, a 42-year-old mother
and social worker, said using men in these roles exploits both Black men
and women by conjuring the historic stereotype of African Americans as
jokesters, whose role is to keep white people liking us and being OK with
us. The women seem to be suggesting that by using men in these roles it
transformed the depictions from benign raillery to more toxic portrayals.
Hes making fun of us, Alicia, a 59-year-old mother and community
organizer, explained about Perrys depiction of Madea, and hes not realizing it, and its very hurtful.
The fact that some of the most high-profile depictions of Black women in
the media are actually men emphasized the vulgarity of how Black women
are portrayed by desexualing the images of Black women even more than if
women played these roles, the women said. Shade, 36, a social worker and
mom, noted that using a man to portray an overweight woman highlights
that women cannot be sexy unless they are thin. It totally takes the sensuality away, she said. Laura, a thin 53-year-old who runs a social-service
agency, said she wishes she could ask Tyler Perry whether Madea is really
like one of his relatives. That might help her feel his portrayal is less a ridicule of Black women in general, she said. I dont know if the real Madea
was that exaggerated in her behavior. Again, its that exaggerated language.
The sloppiness. The breasts down to here, as if full-figured women cannot
go to the store and buy the proper undergarments, she said.
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In addition, the use of men in these roles suggested to women in our sample
that anything they might admire about these depictions was lost because
women were not portraying them. The absence of female actors in these roles
made these images outside the collective prototype that women in our sample
see for themselves, as they compare themselves to media depictions as SCT
suggests. For example, Christine, a 38-year-old at-home mom of two who
recently lost 30 pounds, said she could not enjoy the good advice or silliness
Madea offered because she knew a man was portraying the role. Why does
she have to be a man? Christine asked. Quainna, a 29-year-old community
outreach worker who describes herself as plus-sized, echoed this view:
The question I have always had is: Why couldnt a woman play that part? Why
did they have to dress a man up in a womans get-up, gear, and have a man
play that part? Why couldnt it be played by a plus-sized woman? Whyd they
have to replace it with a man? . . . I really feel like those roles should have been
played by African American women . . . . I cant look at Madea and say Oh, I
look up to Madea or I want to be like Madea because Madea is a man, as
well as Big Momma. Big Momma is a man. Its not a role model I can look up
to. I know its not female.
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Then they felt these male mammy images also failed to reflect their in-group.
We dont have our own identity, said Marcy, a 43-year-old HIVprevention specialist who described her build as muscular and masculine.
Adonia, the social worker, explained that these depictions rob Black women
of their own identity while effeminizing Black men, offering a double dose of
negative influence. Anna, 45, an at-home mother of three who called herself
heavyset, said that Black men are hurt by the fact that dressing up as
women seems a surefire way to get a role, and that undermines the identity
of all African Americans, both male and female. Doris, a 27-year-old community organizer who described herself as thick, noted that Black women
are also masculinized by these male portrayals:
A man cant portray a woman like a woman would, so its always their twisted
spin on how a woman is. And still there is masculinity there. Black women are
seen [as] a little bit more to be dominant or take on the characteristics of men.
The women in our sample seem to be saying that they had internalized
societys norms, and these norms thrust a comparison on them, as social
comparison theory suggests, and that the comparison depersonalizes by
leaving them invisible. Marcy explained,
I think it stops [Black women] from seeing themselves, that it forces them to
see themselves made up as something else and in essence they lose who they
are. And that kind of bothers me, as if there is something wrong naturally with
how we were created . . . . So its kind of raped us of our identity.
DISCUSSION
This research had two main goals. The first was to understand the meaning
African American women derive from a trend of recent depictions of grossly
overweight female charactersportrayed by menin films featuring
Madea, Rasputia, and Big Momma. The second is to understand how the
fact that men portray these modern-day male mammies affects Black
womens self image. Clearly, our data show that these images wield power
to reduce Black women to caricatures that help relegate them to the bottom
of societys hierarchy, as decades of female mammy images have done (Hudson, 1998; Peters, 2006). However, the major goal of this research is to
extend the literature, not replicate it. This research provides new knowledge
by offering evidence that the male mammy may be more virulent than earlier
female mammies because it heightens the negative stereotypes of Black
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women. This suggests that media imagesat least in this narrow area of
men portraying exaggeratedly overweight womenmay be taking several
steps backward with heightened stereotypes that fly in the face of the racial
progress for which many have strived.
Women in our study reported that they felt some level of familiarity with
the male mammy characters of Madea, Rasputia, and Big Momma.
Although buffoonish, these characters offered a feeling of hominess that
reminded them a bit of members of their own families. However, the fact
that men portrayed these characters undercut that familiarity and any positive impact the depictions might have. This illustrates one way that the male
mammy portrayals may be more damaging for Black women than female
mammies of the past. In addition, many of the women reported that using
men in these roles robbed Black women of their own identity, compounding
the way media images of Black women in general either render women of
color as unattractive or invisible. The women in our sample showed evidence they had internalized societys dominant beauty ideals, perhaps without realizing it, as Foucaults (1977=1995) concept of the gaze suggests.
Then, as Festingers (1954) SCT proposes, the women compare themselves
to this societal ideal while knowing that the media portrays people in their
in-groupother Black womenas deviating from this ideal. As such, these
portrayals seem to tap into the intersectionality between gender and race
that Crenshaw (1989, 1991) explained can be used to understand the tension
between different aspects of ones identity. As result, women of color may
feel greater sting from these images because they experience them in multiple
ways, as a Black person, as a Black woman, and, perhaps, as a person who
struggles with body image or weight.
Mammy images have always offered a stark negative comparison for
Black women, showing them as outside the female norms of thinness and
beauty. As Adonia, the 42-year-old social worker, summarized, America
and the American media start with the Barbie doll image, and then works
its way out from there to define Black women. So were either overweight
and unattractive or just unattractive. The dissonance was palpable in the
women we interviewed over how the media portrays Black womens beauty
and what message that sends to Black women about their value. The male
mammy images underscored this disconnect by showing characters who fail
to meet female beauty ideals on three levels, by being overweight, unattractive, and not even female at all. Data from this study support the idea that in
a society that worships beauty, being part of an in-group that is depicted as
ugly casts the group in a negative light. The fact that men portray these
images extends the damage. It not only casts Black women in a negative
light but renders them an absurdity, highlighting the desexualizing stereotypical portrayals. Furthermore, some women in our sample saw these images
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are White, and one who is Asian. Two of the researchers consider themselves overweight. We realize that qualitative research such as this depends
greatly on the relationship between researcher and subject (Johnson, 2000;
McCracken, 1988), so we acknowledge that some women in our sample
may have felt more comfortable or been more candid if they were talking
to researchers who looked more like them. A woman who considers herself
overweight may be more willing to talk about body image with a heavier
researcher. A Black woman may be more comfortable discussing race with
a Black researcher. In addition, we believe, as Collins (1986) does, that
Black women should produce Black feminist thought. We disclose this
potential limitation because we believe, as Brechin and Sidell (2000)
asserted, the way to cope with this is through transparency. However,
despite this potential limitation, our interviews yielded rich data, so we do
not see it as a fatal flaw.
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