By Aliya Khan

At the (AWP) 2016 conference, a panel of researchers from the University of Akron presented on their research related to “Gendered-Racial Risk Factors and Strengths of Black Women’s Mental Health.” The panel discussed issues related to the intersection of race and gender and how structural inequality contributes to psychological distress. Naomi Drakeford and Brittany Baker both explored the stereotype of the “Strong Black Woman,” (SBW) as well as afrocultural coping, and how the SBW stereotype can both lead to suppression and emotional deregulation in Black women. In Breaking Silence: A Hearing on Girls of Color, one participant stated:

“Oftentimes women, in addition to doing these things, are responsible for caretaking. So, while we’re being harassed by those construction workers, we’re walking home, rushing home often, to feed our brothers and sisters that we’re responsible for. Right, so while we’re dealing with being immigrants, xenophobia, the oppression that comes along maybe with being undocumented, we’re also running with our mothers to the doctors office to be translators…This often adds undue pressure in our own lives.”

In this video, the panelists speak to the strength of these girls and women, but also to the struggles that come with juggling the expectations of the SBW stereotype.

Additionally, during the panel Stephanie Dykema discussed the need for an assessment of gendered-racial identity as a means to better understand issues related specifically to Black women’s identity and mental health. Kimberlé Crenshaw describes intersectionality as a term that “Originally articulated on behalf of black women…brought to light the invisibility of many constituents within groups that claim them as members, but often fail to represent them.” Most research on Black women’s health explores participants’ racial and gendered identity separately, which does not capture the experiences of gendered-racial oppression that impact Black women and girls because of BOTH their race AND their gender.

This idea reverberates in the Combahee River Collective statement when they say, “We also find it difficult to separate race from class from sex oppression because in our lives they are most often experienced simultaneously.” Loretta Ross indicated that reproductive justice can only be obtained if Black women can “parent the children [they] have in safe and healthy environments.” Stephanie Dykema discussed the concept of wellness, an individual construct, versus wellbeing, a concept that includes community, spiritual, and individual health. Loretta Ross’s vision for reproductive justice includes a sense of wellbeing that encompasses not just individual physical wellness, but this more holistic vision of wellbeing. Racial stereotyping and discrimination targeting Black women and girls impedes individuals and communities from experiencing wellbeing. Although the SBW stereotype may be a coping mechanism by which to deal with the multitude of oppressions Black women and girls face, it also serves to diminish the ability of some women and girls from receiving support and expressing hardship. Until Black women and girls are free to express a full range of human emotions—outside of the constraints of gendered-racial oppression—our vision for an equitable future cannot be realized.