Header Image - The Worlds of Ntozake Shange
The Worlds of Ntozake ShangeAND DIGITAL STORYTELLING

Tag Archives

2 Articles

Updated: Blaxploitation Manic Pixie Dream Girl

by Asha Futterman 4 Comments

In today’s culture, a repetitive caricature is the “manic pixie dream girl.” She shows up in romantic comedies and dramas and young adult novels. She is Zooey Deschanel in 500 days of summer, Natalie Portman in Garden State, Kate Winslet in Eternal Sunshine on the Spotless Mind, every major female character in John Green’s novels. The manic pixie dream girl is always white and small, she is always  beautiful in “non conventional way,” her main trait is “quirky.” She appeals to men because she is different than the other girls: deeper, more interesting, or doesn’t like to shop. In Sassafras Cypress and Indigo, Indigo seems like the Blaxploitation manic pixie dream girl. She doesn’t really seem like a real child: she is a 12 year old making poetic potions and talking to the moon and playing the fiddle behind a farm house for hours and hours. Instead of making friends, Indigo “sat in her window, working with her fiddle, telling everybody, the wind and all his brothers […] the turmoil of the spirit realm” (32). She is also small and beautiful and boys seem to fall in love with her every 10 pages. While the Black bohemian feminist version of the manic pixie dream girl shares some of the hyper quirky, unrealistic qualities of the white caricature, she also is majorly different. She is not interested in men, she says “I don’t think boys are as much fun as everybody says” (63). And unlike the white manic pixie dream girls and she is a main character rather than a side character designed to help the male character discover himself. She is also Black and in love with her Blackness. Still, I think there is some danger is the Black feminist dream girl. The Black fantasy child is magical, (while she loves her world of imagination) she also has extremely mature and deep ways of viewing the world, and doesn’t need friends to be happy. She lives off of the moon’s love and her family’s and elder’s love, but doesn’t need love from white people or other kids her age. She is “Black girl magic” and never not magic, she doesn’t need what the normal, less magical Black girls need. What the white girls need. Her unrealistic un-needing isn’t intended to demonize other Black girls, but I think it has the ability to fuel this culture in which Black girls are supposed to be to magical. This magic means Black girls don’t want approval from others, feel the pain of racism, feel pain at all. We are too magic so we don’t have problems that looking at the moon and playing the fiddle won’t solve, we don’t have problems a potion won’t solve and a bath won’t solve. But we do. I do.

I loved to read about Indigo: a wondrous, though un-real Black child. But I couldn’t help but think that she seemed a little manufactured. She too perfectly the embody the Blaxploitation feminist love child. I’m happy that she exists, though, especially considering her kind did not become a caricature in every other major motion picture. Like Mullen points out,  Sassafras Cypress and Indigo is one of Shange’s lesser known works. Just as Mill’s Fransico is widely unknown. The major difference between the manic pixie dream girl and the Black feminist bohemian dream girl? The Black girl doesn’t sell.

Change Makers

by Dayna Beatty 1 Comment

I enjoyed reading Harryette Mullen’s article after having read Sassafrass, Cypress and Indigo because it helped me contextualize the text and understand its importance and the nuances to the story. The article emphasizes how intersectional and approachable the text is, and I found myself agreeing with Mullen’s comments.

Mullen writes that Shange is best known for being a poet, but that this novel includes “narrative, poetry, drama, letters, recipes, folklore, and magic spells.” (Mullen 206) Each of these different mediums, with the exception of narrative, on their own may not seem as approachable or cohesive, but how Shange puts them together in her novel makes it easy for readers to see each of these different platforms as a part of a whole.

The book is intersectional in several ways. Firstly, the topic of the story is intersectional in that it describes an intersectional experience, the “emergence of black feminist consciousness within communities of bohemian artists in the 1970s.” (Mullen 205) The novel is also intersectional in its approach to storytelling—through the use of over five different mediums Shange not only puts together a beautiful piece of literature, but celebrates the many ways in which writers choose to share their stories. The subjects of this story are also intersectional, from sharing Indigo’s journey at home to her sisters Cypress and Sassafrass’s stories as they journey away to find themselves and explore their respective passions of dance and art, the novel itself incorporates three different lives into one.

The piece of digital media that I included for this week’s post seemed appropriate to me for two reasons. The poet who wrote this piece was the first person that introduced me to spoken word poetry. Prior to hearing her work, I had never before experienced spoken word and my knowledge of poetry was very limited. She opened my eyes to a world of expression that I had previously never thought much of. Secondly, this piece combines spoken word with both music and cinematography.  In keeping with the theme of intersectional mediums, I wanted to include this piece as an example of a combination of platforms through which artists can communicate a message.

Azure Antoinette says, “we cling to the past, we cling to the normal we cling to the useful, accessible information, we define ourselves by those that have come before us, what they did or did not accomplish… you are your history.” In the first portion of the poem, she emphasizes embracing your past, but not defining ourselves solely based on the past. She continues her poem by saying, “You are a change maker… so when people ask you who you are, tell them you are a vessel, that your job is desperately trying to make the next Sistine Chapel with your hands tied behind your back and your eyes closed. Tell them you are working on creating a positive social system… when someone asks you how you are, them ‘em, I’m brilliant. When they as you where are you, tell them, I’m architecting change.” The purpose of this poem is for listeners to understand that your past is a part of you, but you are also an agent of change. Shange, throughout her written work and her life story, demonstrates how everybody can be a change maker, regardless of who you are.