In her article Eating the Other: Desire and Resistance, bell hooks analyzes the cultural commodification of non-whites as power and domination over minorities (which hooks refers to as the Other) continues.
Metaphorically, "eating the other" asserts power and privilege over another racial group. This desire for transformation through the Other it is connected to a much longer history of what Black feminist scholar bell hooks calls “imperialist nostalgia:” the longing of whites to inhabit, if only for a time, the world of the Other. Bodily transcendence through cosmetic play is enacted by the consumption of otherness – a “courageous consumption,” in hooks’ words – because it is about conquering the fear of racial difference and acknowledging power. It is by eating the Other--or by eating black food “that one asserts power and privilege” (p. 378).
Because of the curiosities that whites have of the Others, the Others become a commodity, which is the idea that there is pleasure to be found in the acknowledgment and enjoyment of racial difference. The commodification of Otherness has been so successful because it is offered as a new delight, more intense, more satisfying than normal ways of doing and feeling. As hooks describes it, "Within commodity culture, ethnicity becomes spice, seasoning that can liven up the dull dish that is mainstream white culture" (p. 366).
Miley Cyrus is an example of a white person who believes that her desire for contact with the Other represents progressive change in white attitudes towards non-whites, as hook suggests (p. 369). As we have discussed several times, Miley is attempting (but failing miserably in my opinion) to fit in and even referred to her black back up dancers as "homies" in a Rolling Stone interview two months ago. However, Miley – although she might not see it as perpetuating racism – is in fact portraying it indirectly.
Her back up dancers are not "homies," they are accessories in an attempt to make her look cool and desirable just like donning a pair of sunglasses or exotic jewelry. Miley's use of the black female dancers is an act of cultural appropriation at the expense of their bodies.
The back up dancers she's working with might or might not be her friends, but the new image that she has developed is a product, and she is using black people to sell that product.
Her back up dancers are not "homies," they are accessories in an attempt to make her look cool and desirable just like donning a pair of sunglasses or exotic jewelry. Miley's use of the black female dancers is an act of cultural appropriation at the expense of their bodies.
The back up dancers she's working with might or might not be her friends, but the new image that she has developed is a product, and she is using black people to sell that product.
But why did she use black people to sell her new image? Is it because she thinks it is cool and exotic to hang out with black people? Or was it merely a coincidence that she is exploiting the Other? How does exploiting the Other promote or inhibit cultural appropriation? Is it possible to become culturally appropriated without exploitation?
hooks, b. (1993) `Eating the Other:
Desire and Resistance', in b. hooks Black Looks: Race
and Representation. Boston, MA: South
End Press
Has Miley Cyrus gone hip-hop? I first wondered. But perhaps she has took it too far.
ReplyDelete"I want urban, I just want something that just feels black," you were said to have told hit songwriting brothers Timothy and Theron Thomas for your new racy song "We Can't Stop." And to take it a step further, she expresses what "feels black" in the music video to the song as a portrayal of her "twerking" (rather badly if you are actually trying to master the craft) with a group of black women enticing her on.
So I guess she was referring to the "homegirls with the big butts, shaking it like we're at a strip club" during that clip. I also take it that in addition to the tatted black guy with the gold chain in the back in the video, she wore a custom made grill... She now feels a temporary sense of blackness from that as well?
Go take a seat, or better yet, take a course on race, Ms. Cyrus.
she is definitely not aware of the fact that its artists like her, who continue to contribute to an ever growing problem in the entertainment industry that I like to call "manufacturing race." Often low-key and subtle, but never appropriate, individuals such as Miley consider using racial stereotypes as a way of accessorizing a new look or change in self image.