Review of Representations of Black Women in the Media: The Damnation of Black Womanhood, by Marquita M. Gammage

Representations of Black Women in the Media: The Damnation of Black Womanhood is packed with substantial empirical and theoretical material. The text is organized into six short chapters flanked by an introduction and conclusion. Author Marquita M. Gammage combines Africana womanism, Black feminism, and Media Studies in her analysis of visual media representations and the subsequent valuations of Black women and womanhood. The Introduction begins with a brief discussion of the damnation of Black womanhood in Western societies. Gammage summarizes for the reader W.E.B. DuBois’s view that the damnation of womanhood was tied to the devaluation of motherhood resulting from Western societies’ reductionist understanding of femininity. From the outset, Gammage charges that contemporary media are powerful and effective sites through which to perpetuate, recycle, and promote an “anti-Black woman agenda” thereby securing the continued dehumanization of Black people (1). Echoing DuBois, she argues that this agenda is informed by Western conceptions of femininity and the sexism and racism birthed through slavery to which Black women have been the primary targets. She highlights how few studies have charted the significance of this imagery of and for Black women and emphasizes that previous studies have also neglected culturally congruent analyses. Gammage outlines an Africana womanist theoretical methodology, presents the definitional contours of “damnation,” and closes with an overview of each of the six chapters. Gammage’s approach to Black womanhood privileges wholeness and is rooted in an Africana womanist conceptual framework, informed by the work of Clenora Hudson-Weems, Delores Aldridge, Pamela Yaa Asantewa Reed, and Nah Dove. In none defined