Week 2-Thurs- Everyone enslaved -Identity and Beauty-Class Notes

Everyone enslaved -Identity and Beauty- Self-Image, Self-Esteem and Colorism

Idealized depictions of famous women of color – set standards of beauty

Slavery and forced racial intermixing

Social stratification due to skin color, even among black people

Media images perpetuating European ideals

Queen Nefertiti- Queen alongside Pharaoh Akhenaten from 1353 to 1336 B.C.

Who Was She?

The chief wife of Akhenaton, who was pharaoh from 1353 to 1335 B.C.

Had six daughters

Was stepmother to Tutankhamen

Symbol of Beauty

Her name means “the beautiful (or perfect) woman has come”- suggests she was a foreigner

Some think she was the daughter of a government official, a man named Ay, who later become pharaoh after Tutankhamen died

She and her husband together tried to establish monotheism by worshiping the sun disk god, Aton

Nefertiti in Artwork

Nefertiti’s famous limestone bust became an icon of beauty for women around the world.

Nefertiti and her husband tried to start a new religion. Her mummy was mutilated after her death, when Egyptians returned to other previous religion.

Nefertiti’s mummy defaced

After her husband Akenaten’s reign ended, the Egyptians destroyed almost all traces of Nefertiti and him.

Even her mummy was defaced.

But her legend of beauty and power managed to persist.

Cleopatra Thea Philopator VII

Fictional images in movies portrayed by white actresses

Elizabeth Taylor

(1963 film)

Claudette Colbert

(1934 film)

Cleopatra VII, Reign 51–30 BC

Cleopatra VII: last pharaoh of Ancient Egypt, even though her heritage was really as the last of the Macedonian Greek dynasty.

Cleopatra VII (commonly known as just 'Cleopatra‘ because she was the most famous)

But actually, there were around seven Cleopatras in the dynasty, which is why she is officially known as Cleopatra VII.

She married her 12 year old brother Ptolemy XIII, when she was 18. They ruled together for 4 years before he was drowned.

Cleopatra:
Born: 69 BC (Month: October), Alexandria
Died: August 12, 30 BC, Alexandria

Cleopatra was well-educated and spoke many languages including Egyptian. In fact, she was the only ruler during the Ptolemaic (Macedonian Greek ruling period) who actually spoke the Egyptian language.

(Greek was the official language of government in Egypt during the Ptolemaic period).

Cleopatra gained notoriety for her reputed love affairs and children with Roman Emperor Julius Caesar and Roman General Mark Antony.

She had the oomph factor - charisma, quick thinking ability, and amazing persuasive powers.

She reputedly had herself rolled up in a carpet and ordered her soldiers to take her inside Ptolemy's palace where Julius Caesar was staying. She did it because she wanted to seduce Caesar, so that he would make her queen of Egypt again.

Cleopatra

Cleopatra was the mistress of Julius Caesar, and she probably married him.

Had 4 children - Caesarion, also known as Ptolemy Caesar (son of Julius Caesar), Alexander Helios, Cleopatra Selene II, and Ptolemy Philadelphus.

After the death of Caesar, she and Mark Antony fell in love and got married.

Contrary to the popular belief that she was beautiful, historians say she wasn't. They cite the proof from coins dating back to her time, which depict her with a hooked nose and “masculine” features.

Few actual images of Cleopatra still exist: A tetradrachm (coin)- Cleopatra VII, Syria mint.

Cleopatra and her son Caesarion at the Temple of Dendera

                               

Cleopatra and Mark Antony

Roman general Mark Antony, her second lover, committed suicide on the battlefield after being misinformed about the death of Cleopatra.

Shattered after hearing the news of the death of Mark Antony, she committed suicide by making an asp, an Egyptian cobra, bite her in the breast. One of the most famous love stories (Antony and Cleopatra), thus ended tragically. She was only 39 at that time.

Cleopatra’s legend depicts her as “beautiful” although her brilliant and innovative mind as head of Egypt was really her greatest treasure.

Racial and Ethnic “Mixing” over centuries: due to war, conquest, immigration, etc.

Over many centuries, there has been a tremendous amount of “mixing” (often arbitrarily); no one inherently superior or inferior over others biologically

Based on power relations: political, religious, social

Constantly shifting and changing, even today

During the slave trade in Africa and during the Atlantic slave trade, sexual relations among black, white, Indian, Asian people, etc.

Over time, many mixed-race people came into being, as Europeans, Arabs, Asians, etc. colonized the New World.

Some prized light skin, like whites, but not everyone.

Early examples of actual, legal interracial marriages in many countries.

Black abolitionist Frederick Douglass had two wives: Anna Murray-Douglass (black –
m. 1838–1882) and Helen Pitts Douglass (white- m. 1884–1895)

After a 44 year marriage to Anna, Douglass marries Helen. They were married for 11 years, until Douglass died.

Douglass and Anna had five children. Anna Douglass remained a loyal supporter of her husband's public work.

After Anna died in 1882, in 1884 a depressed Douglass married again, to Helen Pitts, his secretary, a white feminist from Honeoye, New York. Helen Pitts was the daughter of Gideon Pitts, Jr., an abolitionist whose home was an Uncerground Railroad stop. He was a colleague and friend of Douglass.

Helen had no children with Douglass.

Pitts worked on a radical feminist publication. The marriage provoked a storm of controversy, since Pitts was both white and nearly 20 years younger than Douglass.

They married in Washington, D.C. where no anti-miscegenation law existed. (Last such state law to be overturned was in Alabama in 2000.)

Interracial marriage controversy

Helen’s family stopped speaking to her; his children considered the marriage a repudiation of their mother.

Douglass responded to the criticisms by saying that “his first marriage had been to someone the color of his mother, and his second to someone the color of his father” (his white slave master).

“Love came to me, and I was not afraid to marry the man I loved because of his color.” (Helen)

Helen established the Frederick Douglass Memorial and Historical Association.

Belle: Film depiction of
mixed-race young woman

U.S. President Thomas Jefferson and slave mistress Sarah "Sally" Hemings

Sarah "Sally" Hemings (c. 1773 – 1835) was an enslaved woman of mixed race owned by President Thomas Jefferson.

She was a half-sister of Jefferson's wife, Martha.

She was Thomas Jefferson’s half sister-in-law.

She was supposedly a “beautiful” mixed race teenager when she came into Jefferson’s possession.

She was the youngest of six mixed-race slave children that John Wayles (Martha Jefferson’s father) and his slave Betty Hemings (Sally’s mother) had together.

Wayles had been married twice but both wives had previously died.

Film depiction of Sally Hemings and Jefferson

Jefferson and Hemings in Paris

In 1787, Sally Hemings, at the age of 14, accompanied Jefferson's youngest daughter Mary (Polly) to London and then to Paris, where the widowed Jefferson was serving as the United States Ambassador to France.

Hemings spent two years there. Hemings and Jefferson are believed by some to have begun a sexual relationship either in France (or soon after their return to Monticello).

Hemings had six children of record born into slavery; four survived to adulthood.

Sally Hemings served as a domestic servant in Jefferson's house until his death. Jefferson used his black son as his personal butler and cook.

Her children were the only ones he freed at his death.

Jefferson and mixed-race “daughter” Harriet
(Mother, Sally Hemings)

An oil miniature with an inscription of Harriet Hemings, daughter of Sally Hemings and Jefferson. As such, Harriet was the niece of Martha Jefferson, his late wife.

No known image of Sally Hemings exists to our knowledge.

 Some Hemings descendants could “pass” for white

DVD Jefferson in Paris