"Feminists, What's Good?": Black Women, Race, and Sexuality

After Nicki Minaj confronted pop star Miley Cyrus at the 2015 MTV Music Awards, Minaj  stated in an interview: “…You’re in videos with black men, and you’re bringing out black women on your stages, but you don’t want to know how black women feel about something that’s so important?” Black female rappers have long used their music as a platform to contest the socio-cultural politics of sexuality. Salt-N-Pepa dared to challenge slut shaming in 1993 with their song “None of Your Business” while Foxy Brown’s Ill Na Na and Lil’Kim’s Hard Core albums of 1996 explored black female sexuality in a way that overtly and explicitly displayed black women’s agency over their bodies. Feminists have argued that female rappers replicate the same misogynistic language as their male counterparts. However, when white pop stars appropriate the same lyrics, clothes, or dances, these artists are labeled as “empowering.” Through an analysis of black female rappers from the 1990’s to the present, this paper seeks to explore how the personal is political for black women’s sexuality. Drawing on Patricia Hill Collins’ Black Feminist Thought, Trimika Melancon and Joanne M. Braxton’s edited text Black Female Sexualities and Shayne Lee’s Erotic Revolutionaries, this paper will demonstrate the shift from Salt-N-Pepa’s exploration of sexuality to Nicki Minaj’s while simultaneously exploring the shift of rap and hip-hop into popular culture. Moreover, this paper will demonstrate the harm done to black women’s sexuality when popular culture continues to be analyzed through a white and heterosexual sociopolitical lens.