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Black Women: Identity, Healing and Belonging

Writer's picture: Christie JonesChristie Jones

Updated: Jan 17



In some reality shows, Black women are portrayed as a monolith, the same narrative to represent all Black women in negative ways. AfricanAncestry.com, a business created by a Black woman, Gina Paige along with her business partner, Dr. Rick A. Kittles, a leading Black genetics researcher, has come into mainstream hip hop by partnering with the popular reality show franchise, Love & Hip Hop. The women of Love & Hip Hop were taken on a journey of self discovery in a special mini series called Love & Hip Hop: Lineage to Legacy, which revealed their roots. The show allowed viewers to watch the emotional experience of roots tracing. Remy Ma, a character on the show, is a rapper usually characterized as a gangster for the jail sentence she served in the past, but this particular series showed her as a Nigerian Queen. After learning about her Nigerian roots during the reveal, she had the opportunity to be dressed in traditional clothing and had a photoshoot. When she saw herself in the portrait dressed in her culture’s luxurious fabric, exuding power and confidence, she looked amazed, humbled and complete. She met herself and her people for the very first time through that portrait. More Black women are becoming interested in DNA tracing for self-discovery. The big reveal: what does this mean for Black women, the experience of finding out their roots in front of an audience? DNA tracing can not erase the sin of Maafa, but it can offer Black women a sense of identity, healing, and belonging.


The experience for Black women during Maafa was inhumane and disgusting; they suffered from psychological and physical violence against them through rape, torture, and the selling of their children. The reveal of roots tracing is a way to reaffirm the African identity that was stolen during Maafa. Remy Ma’s reaction to finding her roots was filled with excitement, similar to Alondra Nelson’s profound experience. She is a leading professor and researcher at the intersection of science, politics, and social inequality. “Although this experience elicited mixed emotions in me, I can personally attest that new branches on ancestral trees are the undeniable graft of genetic genealogy,” said Alondra Nelson. Throughout her career and personal life, she always had a fascination with family history, and having the opportunity to learn this new information about her roots changed her worldview in that all the “external things” that she thought she needed to connect her to Africa were “unnecessary” because “Africa had been inside of her all along.” Africana studies and taking an African-centered approach are necessary to understand the psychological anguish that many Black women feel in relation to family history. The slave narratives, stories told from the perspective of Black women have helped people to further understand their psychological anguish during Maafa. Black Writing Project is a contemporary Black arts movement that collects Black girls and women's narratives to express their experiences from their own perspectives. Black women need to know their narrative prior to enslavement; they were warriors, queens, and mothers to all children, the lifeline of their villages. The connection to Africa will promote self-love for Black women.


Black women have always struggled with a sense of belonging in America. Anti-black sentiment is trending in today’s news, from parents being able to opt out of Black History Month lessons in K-12 schools, voter suppression, book bans, and an attack on Critical Race Theory and the 1619 Project. Reparations are long overdue; the promise of 40 acres and a mule needs to be honored. For Deidra Farmer-Paellmann, activist and scholar, the desire for reparations was about more than just money; it amplified a loss of identity and humanity for Black people caused by economic and political gain for those in power. According to Nelson, “given the United States’ recalcitrance to publicly acknowledge the enduring maleffects of chattel slavery—effects that persist to the present day—to turn the tide of the American narrative on the consequences of racial slavery is no small feat. " Such a transformation would be dramatic; it would change the “image of African Americans from victims to creditors." Black women continue to fight for reparations with the help of DNA evidence that connects African Americans to their African roots.


DNA tracing has come to the hip hop community, influencing more Black women to find their roots. DNA tracing can help Black women to discover and create connections with their African ancestral homelands, support legal claims for reparations based specifically on African ancestry, and provide a portal to the past that can inform the future, while addressing social trauma that persists today. Science can contribute to activism for social change and transform twenty-first-century racial politics, but it can’t solely bring about social change that Black women have been fighting for since the beginning of the struggle. Before the Maafa, Black people were fully human. Alondra Nelson, Gina Paige, and Deidra Farmer-Paellmann continue to seek the truth and connect African American women to their African roots through their scholarship about DNA tracing. A sense of identity, healing, and belonging will continue to come into reach for Black women as they pursue knowledge of self, self love, and racial pride. Black women are not defined by the violence committed against them. They are learning more about who they really are, and they are ready to re-imagine a future filled with endless possibilities.


Watch Remy Ma discover her Nigerian roots: https://fb.watch/ecqYbwNddZ/




Sources:

Alondra Nelson, “The Social Life of DNA: Race, Reparations, and Reconciliation” (Beacon Press, 2016),10-11. On-line via ASU Library.


Love & Hip Hop Franchise


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