Disscusion Questions for Spillers Momma's Baby Papa's Maybe

In "Mama'southward Baby, Papa'south Maybe: An American Grammar Book," Hortense Spillers (re)membered (Dillard 2016, Morrison 1987) the history and making of African-American women and mothers as subjectivities in the U.s. as a result of the trans-Atlantic slave merchandise and the social, political, and economic workings of slavery in the U.S. Spillers highlighted that the legal and economic structures of white supremacy and patriarchy under slavery denied women of African descent the role of mother when they birthed children, and deprived them of traditional notions of family and lineage that typically accompany it. She argued that this history, or text as she described it, has been distorted to support false narratives about Black womanhood, maternity, and those roles in the Blackness family unit every bit evidenced by the infamous Moynihan Study that characterized Black women equally pathologically "dominant" and "stiff" to the point of castrating Black men. The ascendant civilization, Spillers contended, has made a fatal flaw in projecting matriarchist value to African-American females because they were universally denied the correct to lay claim to one's child and lived in a gild in which "maternity" provided no legal path to cultural inheritance. Therefore, Spillers said that because the African American female person falls outside of the traditional symbolics of female gender nosotros have an opportunity to subvert and break free from traditional gender restrictions:

"…it is our chore to make a identify for this dissimilar social subject. In doing then, we are less interested in joining the ranks of gendered femaleness than gaining the insurgent basis as female social subject. Actually claiming the monstrosity (of a female with the potential to "proper name"), which her civilization imposes in incomprehension, "Sapphire" might rewrite afterwards all a radically dissimilar text for a female empowerment." (Spillers 1987:80)

Reading the (re)membering and retelling of this history every bit a Black woman is painful nonetheless because as Spillers wrote, repetition does non rob these "well-known, often-told events" of their power or sting. Nor should information technology, because to forget these horrors and that hurting would disconnect the states from an agreement of the ways in which that past continues to inform our present lived realities. The larger sting is that the distortions of Black womanhood, Black family and kinship have remained and continue to produce the very kinds of division that white supremacist, capitalistic patriarchy sowed then long ago; African American female flesh is nonetheless unprotected much as it was during the time of enslavement. Blackness women accept had to stand contiguous with this reality recently equally we have mourned the murder of 27-twelvemonth-former Breonna Taylor at the easily of Louisville, Kentucky police officers (who at the time of this postal service still have not been charged) fifty-fifty as nosotros watch and participate in the rally weep for justice in the brutal murder of George Floyd by Minneapolis po-lice officers. At the same fourth dimension, Black women are mollywomped by misogynoir with incidents like the assault confronting Iyanna Dior and sexual assault and murder of xix-year-old Black Lives Affair activist Oluwatoyin Salau. In the midst of collective grief, Blackness women take to exist about the emotional, social, political, economic, and physical labor of ceaselessly bringing attention to these issues in order to have any hope for justice, similar the instance below calling for #JusticeForBreonnaTaylor.

What is especially painful about Oluwatoyin's murder is that while she was fighting for the condom of the Black community, someone from within the "community" violated her safety. On the day she went missing, she took to Twitter to describe her account of being preyed on and attacked by a Black man. To make matters worse, she was vulnerable to assault because she had reportedly been ostracized past her family. Oluwatoyin was Nigerian-American and did not take direct experience with, or straight memory of, the history of enslavement of African people in the U.S. that Spiller discussed; however, her story and life is particularly relevant to the word of cultural retentivity and (re)membering here in a couple of ways. Offset, Oluwatoyin's connection with and dedication to fighting on behalf of all Blackness lives here in the U.S. illustrates the power of rememory (Morrison 1987), the bringing back and dealing with the repressed parts of anti-blackness trauma, and (re)membering, recalling and (re)visioning the collective "spirit and strength of Blackness" (Dillard 2016:418) that fosters solidarity and fictive kinship with those who share an African heritage despite every attempt to destroy it.

The story of Oluwatoyin's murder also speaks to the significance of cultural memory and the compensatory measures that Blackness women in the U.S. have historically taken in order to foster family and community through "certain upstanding and sentimental features that tied her and him, beyond the mural to others, often sold from paw to hand, of the same and dissimilar blood in a mutual fabric of memory and inspiration" (Spillers 1987:75). Oluwatoyin understood and lived this out every bit praxis through her fight to protect all Black people regardless of nationality, sexuality, or gender. As Spillers asserted, we typically call this type of connectedness family, kin, community, or support construction, but its being and purpose are quite different than the ways "family unit" and lineage accept been used by those in ability to maintain racial supremacy, or more specifically whiteness and its mores. Spillers called into question the social efficacy of such alternate constructs and formations, and today I wonder the same. It is not that I uncertainty the social efficacy of Black customs and kinship formation; it is the ane thing that I know we would non have survived without. It is what nosotros need now more than ever during this time of national reckoning, global pandemic, and physical distancing measures. Notwithstanding, Oluwatoyin's murder shows the need to (re)member and tighten up our kinship and community ties for safety and survival. Even if she could not count on her blood family unit, she should accept had people she could call upon. She should not have been left lone seeking shelter. As we call for the defunding of police and the vehement down of white supremacy, which surely practise not keep us safe, the question remains, what are we building and creating? Who will be included? Who will do the labor? Who will be loved, cared for and protected? Oluwatoyin'due south life did not but thing, it was precious and to be treasured. She deserved better. She took the "insurgent ground as a female discipline" (Spillers 1987). What footing are we willing to take?

I'k boppin to Noname tryna figure it out…

Dillard, Cynthia B. "Turning the Ships Effectually: A Case Written report of (Re) Membering equally Transnational Endarkened Feminist Inquiry and Praxis for Black Teachers." Educational Studies 52.5 (2016): 406-23. Print.

Morrison, Toni. "Beloved. 1987." New York: Plume 252 (1988)Impress.

Spillers, Hortense J. "Mama'south Baby, Papa's Maybe: An American Grammar Volume." Diacritics 17.ii (1987): 65-81. Impress.

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Source: https://latoyasawyer.com/2020/06/19/sometimes-i-feel-like-a-motherless-child-a-reflection-on-black-womanhood-cultural-memory-and-connection-during-the-reckoning-of-2020/

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